Where: Cenote Dos Ojos/ Quintana Roo / Mexico
When: February/2015
Water temperature: warm
Visibility: Crytal clear (about “to infinity and beyond!”)
Main attractions: Stalactites and stalagmites
Duration: approximately 1 hour
I went to Cenote Dos Ojos with a tour that included a visit to Tulum ruins, with like 8 more people. It is situated at the north of Tulum, about 115 km south of Cancun:
Before proceding to the experience, as you may ask, what is a cenote?
First of all, you have to understand a little bit of the Yucatan Peninsula geology. In short, this place is composed of innumerable subterranean caves filled with salt water and fresh water. The limestone bedrock sometimes collapses and expose the caves to the surface, creating a cenote. Since the terrain in Yucatan is like a big underground sponge, there are a big number of cenotes formed.
Cenote Dos Ojos is composed of 2 open caves conected by a flooded cave system (East and West Eye). The west eye is connected to a closed cave called Bat Cave.
The first cave we entered was the East Eye. There are a lot of divers preparing themselves to dive the “underground rivers”, and it is very nice to see:
The visibility there is awesome, you sometimes just cant differ the view over water from the under water.
The caves are made of limestone, and from the outside they have a beige color with sponge looking texture.
From under water you can see the comunications with the flooded underwater caves.
The second was the West Eye, where there is the possibility to snorkel until the Bat Cave. They ask you to have a guide to enter the cave, since we were already with one in our tour, we just proceed:
The entrance to the Bat Cave is a bit dark, I recieved a flashlight with a very weak light flax, but here you can see some underwater stalactites and stalagmites:
Just before reaching the Bat Cave, we saw a group of divers entering the tunnels:
We ended at the cave, where a group of bats call it their home (that is the obvious reason why it is called Bat Cave, since Gotham City is far away from here!) Here you can see diferent and interesting calcareous formation:
Yucatan Tetra _ Astyanax altior
These were the only living species (with the exception of us humans) we found there. They are very tiny silver fishes, with a black and yellow tail.
Overall: A great place to chill out, with a superb visibility! Do not expect to be alone here, since it is a common cenote between divers. But even just for swimming or snorkeling, I think it is a time well spent being in this cenote. Recommended!
Youtube video:
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