Cenotes are infinitely beautiful, interesting places filled with Mexican history.  There are between 6,000-7,000 of them in the Yucatan Peninsula alone (most likely an underreported number) with only around 150 that are currently open to visitors.  In case you don’t know, cenotes are basically limestone sinkholes that form when limestone bedrock partially or totally collapses and exposes fresh groundwater.  Cenotes are practically everywhere in the Riviera Maya, and more are being accidentally discovered all the time.

I’ve been to several cenotes in the Riviera Maya and I’d have to say my favorite type is the semi-open cenote where parts of the ceiling have collapsed–if these ceiling holes are large enough they can be perfect spots for jumping into a cenote or having interesting lighting effects occurring within the cenote over the course of the day as the sun makes it way across the sky.  One of my more magical moments during a Mexico vacation was watching the cenote walls shimmer and wave with light from the changing sunlight patterns coming through the ceiling opening, it actually looked like the walls were on fire…ahhh, I will never forget Cenote La Noria.

While I am so enamored with cenotes that I’m thinking of writing my next book on cenotes for Riviera Maya visitors, there is one cenote that I would never enter, most likely never visit at all, and that one is Casa Cenote, a cenote located between Akumal and Tulum which has its own resident crocodile named Panchito. Now I consider myself an adventurous person but I don’t consider myself to be that much of a risk taker that I would willingly swim in the same body of water as a free swimming crocodile.  That’s a hard no.

But many vacationers and locals have, and so far Panchito has left everyone alone. (I don’t want to risk being the statistical outlier, thank you).  So I leave it up to all other cenote lovers to go for it and try to find Panchito on their next visit to Casa Cenote.

Here’s a couple of videos showing Panchito in his natural habitat.  So, what do you think, would you go?

mmm