Sorry we haven’t posted in a while. There has been a TON going on. So here’s the big one, a decision has been made, and tickets have been bought. Woot!!!

Anyone know where that is? It’s one of the most popular ruins. It’s Chichen Itza. Not that we’re moving into an ancient Mayan Ruin. But we are moving to the Yucatan Peninsula.

So here’s the deal: We bought a one-way plane ticket to Cancun(super cheap around $160 a piece). And then we rented a full size car for a week for $15 a day. The Yucatan peninsula offers many advantages. Very fast internet, very safe, and pretty cheap. We were almost decided on Costa Rica. The prices just didn’t work, we would blow through our nest egg too quickly. While renting a car gives us some flexibility to tour the area and find out where we want to go. Here are some of our options we’re considering:

Merida

Merida has been a city I’ve honestly been intrigued by for over ten years. I don’t know where I first heard about it. But I think when I was heavy into real estate investing, I had thought of buying a little property down there. It’s a colonial city of around 800,000 inhabitants with at least 20,000 expats living down there. The weather is decent if a little hot, prices are super cheap, and it’s friendly and very safe. With a size of 800,000 it’s a decent sized city with good amenities that is about a half hour drive to the beach.

Progreso

Progreso is the beach town to Merida. About thirty minutes away. It offers beautiful views of the Caribbean. Excellent value in rentals, and a very laid back lifestyle. Plus you’re a short jaunt away from the Walmart, Costco and Sam’s that you might need in Merida.

Playa Del Carmen

Playa del Carmen is also under consideration. About 20 minutes south of Cancun. It offers a laid back beach lifestyle where you can comfortably and affordably be walking distance from the beach. The beaches in this area are much nicer than Progreso. But that’s kind of like saying this paradise is slightly nicer than your paradise.

Tulum

Another beachside town about 45 minutes south of Playa Del Carmen. This has been recommended as being a very quiet area. About an hour or so from a large city. Interesting fact it’s the only Mayan ruins that is oceanfront.

The considerations we have for where we choose to live:

1. Price (obviously). We want to be around the $600/mo range give or take $200.

2. Access to good schools for the littles. We’d like to enroll them in a Spanish language elementary school so that they can become bi-lingual. This is a huge goal of ours.

3. Access to the beach. Our family loves the ocean, so ideally we’d want the beach to be pretty accessible.

4. Culture. We want to immerse ourselves in Mexican culture, there’s no point of moving to Mexico and then hanging out with a bunch of gringos.

5. Safety- Now you might wonder why I would put safety so low. But, in the Yucatan peninsula safety is actually one of the biggest draws. So I don’t think we’d be unsafe anywhere in the area(given normal precautions).

6. Food- What are the food choices nearby, can we walk to a few affordable restaurants in the area. We’d like to eat out a couple of times a week or so.

I’m sure there’s more. But that’s the start of it. MamaSita may have different ideas of what she wants or desires in a different order.

So huge news, tickets are bought and paid for. Rental car is booked. I declined the travel insurance because I want us to go, no more excuses. So it’s a done deal. Now we’re not 100% sure we’ll stay in the Yucatan, we may decide to stay 2-3 months and then move on. But, for now that’s what the plan is.

Would you come visit us for a week in the Yucatan? And what do you know about it?