Sian Ka'an float trip from Muyil

You float down a Maya canal in a life jacket worn like a nappy, legs through the arm holes, so it turns into a seat. The current is gentle, the water clear over a white sandy bottom and about 1.5 metres deep, with mangroves and grass on both sides and orchids and bromeliads on the branches. The float itself lasts about half an hour.

Getting there is a boat trip. From the shore by the Muyil ruins, small launches cross Muyil lagoon, go through a narrow channel the Maya cut through the limestone into the much larger Chunyaxché lagoon, and tie up at Xlapak, a small stone building that probably worked as a customs post on the old trade route. A boardwalk through the wetland brings you back to the boat. Allow at least a couple of hours for the water part.

Most people go on a tour from Tulum or Playa del Carmen that adds the Muyil ruins and lunch, about five or six hours in all. Doing it alone means driving south on the highway and hiring a boat at the lagoon; there is a fee to enter the reserve.