Oh, Tulum.
We love her some days and hate her on others. Usually Mondays, when there’s only one place to go.
She’s the kind of place you crawl into when you need to disappear for a while. To bubble-wrap your soul and recuperate. She brings you friendship, moonlit dancing, yoga on the beach, and if you’re lucky, she brings you back to yourself. But she’s also where you get lost. Where the world outside of La Veleta fades away, where you forget the corporate ladder; where sometimes, you even forget who you are.
I hopped off the boat at the destabilizing, ripe age of 18, from Vancouver, Canada. Armed with delusion and teenage righteousness, I somehow made it work. And I’ve been here ever since.
Now I’m 30, held up by a community of people who’ve clung together through it all: heartbreaks, failed brands, last-minute guest lists, and roads lined with potholes the size of a Super Chedraui parking lot. You name it.
2017 was the last great year of Tulum for those of us who burrowed into the sand before COVID. Now, she’s crawling with too many DJs, white-girl shamans, and a heavy dose of spiritual narcissism dressed in “love and light.” Condos sit empty, with rent prices climbing to New York skyscraper levels.
Back then, the scene was a beer at Curandero and Waye until 7 a.m., dancing on Saturdays, and living it up on Boca Paila before it got bougie. Now it’s crypto bros, $15 smoothies, and co-working hubs full of people trying not to confront their reality.
There are still whispers of the old Tulum if you know where to look: Guarida, Batey, La Pizzine, Asian Bodega, Neek at Laguna Nopalitos. These places offer a flicker of the golden age. But the potholes keep getting deeper, the prices higher, and the crowds, more mainstream.
If you thought I’d have the answer, I don’t. I’m just a writer in the jungle, figuring it out. I won’t be around when Tulum takes her last breath. But when she does, I’ll say goodbye with a heart full of gratitude for this decade in the sun.
What’s Tulum to you now? What keeps you holding on?
I still see her in the way the light filters through the palm trees. And I know she’ll keep shining for the next group of humans who inherit her.
Stay tuned for Part 2.