Thompsons vs the World

I've mentioned in previous posts how expensive all the tours etc are on the Riviera Maya, but this was one that I REALLY wanted to do, as I felt like the chance to snorkel with so much marine life in the beautiful Caribbean Sea was too good to pass up while we were here. I spent quite a while researching various options for a snorkelling trip with kids in the region and Cozumel island seemed to be THE one - the chance to swim at two reefs with loads of marine life (including possibly turtles) plus the El Cielo sandbar. All the reports seemed to indicate that the snorkelling itself wasn't too challenging too, which was important as as the boys have snorkelled a few times before they haven't done a huge amount and we didn't want anything they would find too challenging. Cozumel is a diving and snorkelling dream so there were hundreds of tour options available (which tour companies attempt to sell to you every time you walk anywhere in Playa del Carmen). The prices we were...

There seems to be an overwhelming amount of choice when it comes to days out with the kids on the Riviera Maya,  but they all seem to have one thing in common - all the parks/tours are very expensive. We knew this in advance so had tried to budget for at least one big day out as we knew the boys would LOVE any of the parks in and around Cancun/Playa del Carmen.  Initially we looked at Xcaret and Xel-Ha and had budgeted for a day at one of these (around £250-£300 for a family of four), but the more we looked in to it the less we actually liked the look of the big nature water parks like these. Now, I know people who have been and LOVED them, so I'm sure they are a fab day out but they were just so expensive for us on a travelling budget that it was difficult to justify the cost for one day. Instead we opted for a day at Ventura Park , which is in the Zona Hotelera in Cancun. It has a pretty big waterpark area, ziplining, go karts, a VR type zone and a dolphin swimming option (t...

  We spent a week in Playa del Carmen, staying at the Hotelito del Mar apartments slightly away from the centre. The list of things you can do with kids in Playa is pretty much endless, however, many of these things come with a pretty hefty price tag attached which our budget just didn't stretch to. We still had a brilliant week though and managed to include a couple of pricier activities here and there.  Where we stayed Firstly, we were fortunate that our little apartment hotel ( Hotelito del Mar ) had a small but perfectly formed swimming pool on the roof which we had almost entirely to ourselves every time we went up there. Given the sheer heat and humidity (which the boys have never really experienced before) this was a bit of a godsend for us - both boys can spend hours and hours in any form of water so they were happy here splashing around while we had a bit of a chill! The beach! We were also only a 10-15minute walk from the beach, where again the boys were happy to wil...

As the whole issue of what on earth to pack for a long period of travel with two small(ish) children was one that I spent a LONG time deliberating I thought it might be helpful to share the details of what we DID end of taking with us in the end. Over the course of around 4-months, our spare room was turned in to packing ground zero; everytime I came across anything that I thought might be useful to take it was flung in to the mountain of stuff for consideration.  How we chose the kids backpacks We knew we didn't want suitcases etc as we'd be moving around too much.  We already had two big backpacks (65L and 70L) for the two of us from previous travels, and after a lots of research and a few trips to various shops to try backpacks on (because I needed to see what the boys could actually carry in real life!) we finally settled on North Face 'Jester' bags for the boys (28L). This seemed like the biggest pack they could possibly carry (Angus even complained about the weig...

Hello world!  In case you've stumbled on this from the wider worldwide web (and are not our family friends) let me introduce our little travelling family. We're a family of four from just outside Sheffield, UK - Mum (Julia), Dad (Steve) and our two boys, Griffin (9) and Angus (7). After 10+ years of saving we finally took the plunge in October 2023 and set off on our year of adventure. I'm writing this from Playa del Carmen in Mexico, our first stop. Our planned itinerary takes us further in to Mexico and then down to Costa Rica and over to South East Asia in January 2024 (after a pitstop at home for Christmas so that Santa can find us!). I gleaned loads of helpful info from other family travel blogs when planning our mega trip, so am hoping that this blog will allow us to share our adventure with anyone interested in what we're getting up to, but also maybe be at least a teensy bit helpful for anyone else planning some form of travel madness with children :)