Saturday, November 18, 12023 Human Era (HE)
- Brief Backstory
- SUP Specific
- The Beach
- The Boards
- Searching for Surf
- Mayakoba Morning SUP
- Non-SUP Specific
- Last Lines
Brief Backstory
Friends and Family
We had planned a family vacation to Mexico for the fall. Originally, we booked a resort on the Pacific Coast near Puerto Vallarta after a recommendation from some friends. But then we had the good fortune to be invited to join some other friends on a trip to the Mayan Riviera. One of them works in the hotel industry, and they extended her friends and family rate to us. So, despite the longer travel and change in time zones, we couldn’t pass up the experience.
Destination
We are staying just north of Playa del Carmen at the Fairmount Mayakoba. Years ago, I had been to Playa del Carmen, so I was familiar with the characteristic white sand beaches. However, since that trip, I had a few newfound interests and insights…
Meteorological Mention
Since my last visit to the Yucatán Peninsula, a few things have changed. First and foremost, this visit, I would be keen to get on the water for my first stand up paddleboard (SUP) on the Caribbean Sea. My last trip to the Yucatán as well as past ventures to the Caribbean Sea were pre-paddleboard. In addition, I also had a newfound understanding of the historical human significance of the area. A few years ago, I watched the documentary series “Catastrophe” by Naked Science on YouTube. The whole series was immensely captivating but specific to this tale was the fourth episode, “Asteroid Impact,” which highlights the Chicxulub crater. The crater is believed to be the impact site of an asteroid that struck the Earth approximately 66 million years ago, resulting in the extinction of the non-avian dinosaurs.
Human History
The theme behind the Catastrophe series is how life, as we know it today, is the product of a long trail of catastrophic events that have culminated in our present good fortune as humans today. Without the catastrophic extinction event of the Chicxulub asteroid impact, the death of the dominant dinosaurs does not happen, and mammals may not have moved into the void that the meteorological massacre made. It is certainly a survivorship bias story, in that we wouldn’t be telling it if it were any different.
The less macabre mention from the miniseries was the Ring of Cenotes. Cenotes (pronounced ‘say-no-tays‘) is the Western interpretation of the Maya word “ts’ono’ot,” meaning “a hole filled with water”. These pits or sinkholes have formed from the collapse of Cenzoic limestone (carbonate) bedrock that exposes groundwater. The Ring of Cenotes is a denser band of cenotes that is believed to be a sort of perimeter remnant of the underlying asteroid impact.
After hearing about the Ring in the documentary, I made a mental note to look into cenotes if ever I was back on the Yucatán. How cool would it be to visit the site where the dinosaur asteroid struck!
A Darker Side of the Story
Coincidentally, shortly before our departure date, The Rest is History released the first episode of a series that was titled, “The Fall of Aztecs.” While we were travelling to a Mayan area of Mexico, it seemed fitting to learn some Mexican history pre-trip. I was loosely familiar with the story of Spanish conquistadors, but it turned out I was much less familiar with the details pertaining to Hernán Cortés. The eight-part series gives a detailed account of the controversial conquistador, and from what I could tell, did a decent job of providing a less biased view than traditional accounts.
If interested in the account, I would recommend checking out episode 51 with Camilla Townsend called “Aztecs,” where she discusses her book, “Fifth Sun: A New History of the Aztecs,” first. The episode sets the stage for how to interpret past accounts of the conquistador era with a modern revisionist outlook. History is told by the victors and the conquistadors very much had a motivated agenda in retelling their tale.
The stage was set with threads leading into geology, prehistory, and history. We were ready to travel.
SUP Specific
The resort where we were staying allowed you access to the beach accessories for a small nominal activity fee. Included in the accessories were SUPs, so there was no need to pack my iSUP. At least, that’s what my wife tried to convince me. I was slightly skeptical, with concerns about the quality of the kit and availability. In the end, I was convinced that even low-quality hard boards would out-perform my iSUP, plus not packing my inflatable meant I would not have to figure out how to get a 3.28 metre (11’6″) board into a hotel room or find secure storage onshore after sundown.
This turned out to be a great decision. Our room was about one kilometre from the beach. Typically, we took either a golf cart shuttle or rode courtesy bikes to get to the beach. It would not have been an easy commute with an inflated board and inflating and deflating my board daily at a tropical destination seemed blasphemous.
The Beach
Pre-travel I did some internet sleuthing. Specifically, I searched for nearby SUP/surf spots as well as satellite maps of the surrounding hotel shoreline. I was curious about nearby surf spots and whether any offshore islands seemed SUP accessible. Unfortunately, there didn’t seem to be any surf worth sneaking away for on a family vacation. And, the closest island I could see, Cozumel, was just under 20 kilometres away. Too far for a vacation voyage without a proper day touring kit. Not to mention the time taken away from family.
On the satellite images, the beaches seemed to have strange offshore structures. Was it the edge of a land shelf or a safety shore break? Subconsciously, I seemed to conclude the former. So when we arrived to check out the beach in the dark on our first night, my subconscious conclusion seemed to be confirmed in the sundown shadows.
It was not until the following day in daylight that I could fully see what was going on. Inland to the rock-like structures were floating seaweed nets that lined the entirety of the beach. But I still wasn’t certain what the tan-coloured structures were further offshore.
The evenly distributed maintenance holes were a giveaway that they were anthropogenic. I assumed them to be floating wave breaks. Eventually, we found out that they were solid sand-filled storm breaks for hurricane season that ran down to the seafloor.
The Boards
Down at the beach, I was keen to get out and try the rental kit. The SUP fleet consisted of five boards, two touring styles, and three flatwater all-around boards. The touring boards were Tahe Sport, and from memory, most looked like the Beach Cross-Yak model. I suspect it was this discontinued model, the Beach Cross as they definitely had the keeled-nosed feature. The other boards were likely an older version of the Beach Performer, though they lacked a thruster fin setup.
First Ride
For my first ride, the pickings were slim. All the boards except the oldest of the flatwater boards were leant out.
It had been a while since I had been on a domed deck board. Immediately, I felt the awkwardness of having to adopt a slightly bowlegged stance to fit the contour of the deck. The decreased primary stability was evident, too. I wasn’t sure if that was a result of board shape, thinner rails compared to an iSUP or recessed deck design, the domed deck, or some combination thereof.
Nor did it help that the EVA deck pad for the board was well-worn and slick. Despite the slippery sensation, I still wanted to test the limits of the board. Once I was into deeper water, I manoeuvred my feet from a parallel SUP stance into a step back (pivot) turn. As I stepped back into a parallel stance, I felt my one-foot loose grip on the deck and start to slide. There was nothing I could do. Before I was fully aware of what was happening, I had slid off of the board from a parallel stance.
Despite my embarrassment, it would turn out that there was little I could do to prevent this from happening. The deck surface was so slippery once there was a layer of water between my foot and the foam. Chalk a point up for “The Wonderful Weirdness of Water,” for an instance when it was definitely slippery. After checking that board in I made a mental note to avoid it again.
More Kit
The keeled-nosed design of the touring board had me intrigued. Would you feel the effects of the added contour as more stability, better tracking, greater resistance, or less manoeuvrability?
Once on the touring board, I immediately felt more comfortable. The flat deck design was much more what I was accustomed to. Its boxier rails were also more akin to my iSUP and arguably surf-shaped deck. The width of the board seemed wider and was listed as 34″ or 86.4 centimetres, which is a wide stable platform. The all-around boards did not have the widths visibly legible, but I guessed they were 81.3 to 86.4 centimetres (32 to 34″).
In the flatwater conditions, I couldn’t notice any significant effects from the keeled-nosed. My guess was that the added stability on the touring board came down to its width, outline, and thicker rails.
Step-Back Turns: Stability Comparison
Later, I would ride the newer all-around boards. While I still found them less stable than the touring board, the newer version had a texture to the EVA deck pad, which provided some grip. You wouldn’t just start sliding off the edge when a film of water made it between your foot and the deck pad. Despite the better grip, I found that I still needed to be alert when stepping out of a step-back turn. I suspect this was due to the doomed deck design and the reduced primary stability of an all-around board compared to a touring board. The board was tippier in general, so you needed your footwork to be sound. Lowering my centre of mass also made balancing much easier.
Below is a crude comparison of the board shapes, assuming that the all-around board was similar to the model shown below by Tahe Sport. Most notable is the wider width that the touring board maintains throughout the length of the board and the more square tail design which creates more stability during step-back turns. The more pin tail design of the all-around board is more responsive and thus quicker to turn.
I definitely felt the stability difference between the boards when doing step-back turns. The touring board. The all-around board had much more roll that you had to control when you moved back to the tail. The stability on the touring board was most likely due to a combination of factors, the wider and squarer tail, along with thicker rails contributing to more volume, coupled with a reduced board rocker. The all-around boards they had did not have the thruster fins so this was not a factor.
Nose-side 360 turns were also easier on the touring board. Here, I think the keeled-nose design played a factor along with a wider board shape, greater volume, and minimal rocker on the touring design.
Searching for Surf
As expected, there were little to no waves at the beach. The minimal amount of waves that would have made it to shore were broken up by the shoreline wave break. If you paddled north up the beach just under one kilometre, you would eventually get beyond the wave break structures. Here, there was a bit more wave action, but not much. I am no expert, but my assumption is that the prevailing winds and bathymetry do not coincide to create surf along this section of the coast. I wonder if Cozumel plays a role in blocking any wind and shortening the fetch. Or are the winds governed by more global patterns pertaining to the pressure systems of the Caribbean Sea and Gulf of Mexico and wider synoptic scales of weather.
We did have one day where the offshore winds picked up and created a bit more chop on the water. Checking the weather in the morning on Windy.com, there was a large low-pressure system in the Caribbean that we were catching the edge of. Unfortunately, I saw in the news that what was slightly increased winds for us, was causing death and destruction in the Dominican Republic. At the time I did not see anything about the wider island of Hispaniola being affected, but a quick search now revealed that Haiti was also negatively impacted.
In Mexico, all we felt were the increased winds. The wave breaks still broke up any significant waves before they made it to shore. A few smaller waves churned up by the wind were making it through into the controlled beach area. I played around trying to catch them to minimal success.
We were fortunate in that we had booked a catamaran sailing trip for the afternoon. When we were out, I estimated that winds were around 12-15 knots. Apparently, we hit it just right, as our sailors said that they are not allowed to go out in winds any higher. Though perhaps my question was lost in translation, as the other pilot later said they could go out in anything except hurricanes.
Mayakoba Morning SUP
The resort had a sunrise SUP advertised. We nearly missed it as it was only on select days, twice per week, and it slipped our mind to book after arrival. Thankfully, seeing some sunrise SUPers out for the Tuesday session reminded us to book. Fortunately, the next session would fall on Saturday, which was our day of departure. With a later flight, there was no stress about making the morning session.
The conditions worked out to be excellent. Calm waters with some cloud cover to add to the sunrise colour palette. Below are a few highlights.
Non-SUP Specific
Mostly for my future self to reflect on, here are a few more highlights from the trip, in no particular order. Good food, great company, mescal margaritas, manmade mangrove boat tour, monkey sanctuary, cenote swim, lizard counts, anhingas, belt bike skids, coatis, beach play, small pool shenanigans, fire dance dinner, raccoon invasions, breakfast buffets, grilled pineapple, morning fitness, guacamole, golf cart nature tour, self-timer pool jumps, nighttime volleyball, burgers and fries.
Last Lines
Overall we had an incredible time away. Definitely one of the highlights for 12023 HE. There is nothing like a little fun in the sun to help you get through the Vancouver winter.
I SUP Explore 