One of the things I love most about traveling is that I get to do it with my friends sometimes! I have a great group of friends (most of which are going to be visiting me while I’m on this upcoming trip to Italy) that love to travel as much as I do. Typically we go to various places in Mexico, but lately we’ve been expanding! Our last trip was to the 2024 Paris Olympics. Are you getting a bit of a trend here? Even my friends don’t do things half-way. If we’re going to travel overseas, might as well be for something like the Olympics – or to see a friend living in Italy for 3 months.
But getting back to the topic, something that we like to do is find these small hidden gems before the masses. We went to Tulum before an airport existed there, went to Tequila, Mexico for a bachelorette before it got popular to do so, etc. One of these hidden places is a small island off the coast of the Yucatan peninsula, called Holbox (pronounced whole bo shhhh).
01.
Getting there
To get there, you need to fly into Cancun airport, take a bus or private transfer from there through a small town about an hour inland where you’ll pivot and take that Route 5 up to Chilquilá, where you then take a ferry over to the island. The entire trip one-way is around 2 and a half hours.
02.
What to do there
The island itself is pretty uninhabited. There’s a few resorts that some European tourists go to and the island itself roughly has a population of 3,000 people. It also doesn’t have any paved streets and the only “cars” are these golf-cart like things that drive all over the island.
But what Holbox is famous for is truly amazing! These are all the activities that I did while visiting the island for 3 days:
- Bioluminescence
- Swam with whale sharks
- Walked the sandbar at Punta Mosquito
- Enjoyed the street art in downtown
- Snorkeled a reef
- Wake up with the sunrise and watch every sunset
- See the flamingos
03.
What not to do
If you’re thinking of going, here’s some quick things that I would recommend not doing:
- Do not bring shoes you care about! The island floods easily and it’s very difficult to walk around
- Stay near the city center for the same reason, you’ll want easy access to restaurants!
- Do not bring your own alcohol to the island unless you’re going with a big group. The alcohol on the island wasn’t as expensive as we thought it would be
- Do not pay for a bioluminescence tour! We were able to do this for free every night of our stay right outside of our Airbnb. I’ve been to the island twice and both times didn’t have any issues. The only time you’ll have a problem is when the moon is full or if there’s a lot of light noise.
- Do not wing-it with the taxis and booking your return trip back to Chiquilá. Get one of the driver’s WhatsApp numbers so you can book in advance and make sure you make your ferry on time.
And that’s all I got for this small hidden gem! It was a truly great island and I can’t wait to visit again sometime.
