Today we explored the small beach town of Puerto Morelos. Our Christmas Eve was spent in the Caribbean Sea looking at fish and coral reefs. We drove 30-minutes south to Puerto Morelos and snorkeled at the National Reef Park with Wet Set Diving and Snorkeling Adventures. Then, we worked up an appetite and found some delicious grinds at La Petita en la Playita before chilling on the beach for a while and cleaning out some leftovers at our AirBnB.

We knew our visit to Chichen Itza would be a long day, so I booked our snorkeling excursion for 12:30 pm. That should give us enough time to sleep in and rest, then travel at our leisure and let the day warm up. The timing worked out perfectly for us.

After a light breakfast, we were packed up with our snorkel and beach gear, full cooler with drinks and snacks, ready to go. It was a short, 30-minute drive, maybe less, to get to Puerto Morelos. We found easy street parking and walked along the beach, checking out the beach town. 

We had plenty of time before our boat left. We found a picnic table on the beach access right by the dive shop, and we fueled up with a charcuterie board and drinks. The vibe was so cool, as we finished our snack, Merri Beth and I filled out our waiver forms for the family, then we got ready to start our snorkel adventure.

It was a short walk from the dive shop to the boat anchored on the sand. We boarded with a few other folks and made the short trip out to the reef for our first snorkeling spot. We snorkeled as a group with one of our guides in front and the other picking up the rear. It worked out well and we saw a lot of underwater activity. Zander was my snorkel buddy and our top find was a school or Barracuda. 

The group continued to the next spot. We got out of the water and back on the boat, they gave us granola bars and a small bottle of water and it was a quick trip to get in the water again. Wow, I loved our excursion. I really enjoyed the variety of fish and the most majestic purple fan coral was alive with the motions of the sea. Despite a strong current, we had a great time and saw a lot of cool sea life on our adventure. 

The team we had from Wet Set diving / snorkeling, Chris, Laura, and Captain Marco, had our safety at the top of their priorities. We would definitely go out with them again, we worked up a wicked appetite and we asked for a recommendation on where to eat. It worked out well. 

A short walk down the beach led us to a neat little restaurant called La Petita en la Playita, where we ordered ceviche, tacos, coconut shrimp, a quesadilla, and more. We had a simple table with plastic chairs, but that didn’t matter, the drinks were cold and the food was muy bueno.

We finished most of our food, but they gave me three fish tacos and I couldn’t finish the third, so we brought it home. The white flaky fish (Dog fish), made a great taco. Everyone else dogged their food and we loved just chilling at our place on Christmas Eve.

I was up a little later, and the neighborhood was in party mode. There were fireworks, presents exchanged at the pool area, and moments of outbursts as the local community celebrated. At one point, I woke up Merri Beth so she could experience it. What a fun time, Merry Christmas. Santa is making the rounds.