Today we awoke after a really really good sleep.
You know those sleeps when you go to bed under perfect conditions & wake up when your body is ready feeling recharged & brand new ? It was one of those!
Travelling has made us appreciate the small thing's even more & realise certain luxuries. Things like privacy & a good night's sleep are now things we appreciate & treat as luxuries, which I dont think we truly did before travelling. I think this is something people generally don't realise till they have kids!
We had plans today to eat breakfast at one of the cafe's we had seen along the main strip, buy our overnight bus tickets which will take us to Playa del Carmen & visit a local wildlife sanctuary.
Breakfast was amazing & booking the bus ticket was really easy, the ADO bus terminal was about 300 metres from our hotel & to our surprise the tickets were cheaper than the prices stated online. Winning! We have decided to head straight to Playa del Carmen for 2 extra days of relaxing before starting the tour. This meant cutting Merida, which is a shame, but it was pretty similar to what we've already seen & done in Mexico. We're getting exhausted from moving every 2 - 3 days.
After checking out, we stowed our bags at the hotel reception & enquired about transport to the wildlife sanctuary. We were told about a bus stop in the centre of town that has regular tourist vans every 20 minutes that go past Aluxes.
We arrived here & waited about 30 seconds before a van pulled up. It was so quick & easy, the best 20 peso's we spent that day.
Aluxes is a wildlife sanctuary that we saw advertised along the road when we were driving back from the Palenque ruins yesterday. What caught our attention was the picure's of the Tucan & the Panther!
Before deciding to go we went online to look up reviews & make sure we wouldn't be accidentally supporting something that was exploiting the animal instead of doing conservation work.
Nearly everybody had rated the park excellent, with a few negative comments that were absurd and a reflection of the people & not the place. However, we did read a few people who commented on the small enclosure sizes & some unusual behaviour from an Ocelot.
We decided to go & make up our own mind's.
I'm glad we decided to go, we spent 4 hours here & really had a good time. It was only 150 Peso's each & I paid an extra 100 Peso's to feed the Manatee's. Thankfully, we were both very happy that we went to Aluxes & donated both our time & money. It is one of the good ones! We do agree with some of the comments that the wild cats need bigger enclosures, as do the bigger bird's. However, Once we had finished walking about the sanctuary, I made some enquiries with the manager, asking who looks after the animal's ? how they were obtained? their future ? & the concerns that we had. She told me that all of the wild cats were seized from from illegal traffickers by authorities or abandoned by people who had obtained them illegally, intending to keep them as domestic pets. She assured me that the animals get regular veterinary assessments & the organisation work's very closely with a biologist who is in charge of the enclosures. She said a key focus for them is to make sure they are creating environmental enrichment & stimulation for the animal's. Sadly, none of these cat's can be released back into the wild & be expected to survive. She assured me that all of the enclosure's are at or above the international standard for sizing.
One of the jaguar Negro's (black panther's) did appear to have some sort of deformity with one of it's front claws, however apart from this it looked very happy, healthy & even a bit fat. The female Ocelot appeared to be agitated when we arrived at her enclosure & we saw her doing circle's inside of her enclosure, we sat down and watched her for quite some time to see if this would change. This behaviour from her has been mentioned in reviews by other tourists who have also witnessed this. After about 10 minutes we realised it was lunch time & that she was reacting to this, the circling got worse when the male Ocelot, who is in another enclosure got fed first.
Once she had her chicken, she ate it straight away & then went to sleep. She didn't appear to be neurological or stressed after eating & her enclosure didn't suggest that she does this circling all day, however we mentioned it to the manager who was grateful that we told her & said she would tell the biologist straight away so they can adjust her habits.
Undeniably you want to see these cats in the wild where they belong & when they aren't, we resent that fact. I still do agree that the enclosures could be bigger, despite them already meeting an international standard, however, we don't know if the animals have medical problems that require them to have a restricted exercise regime.
This could also be the case again for the bigger birds. Perhaps they have had an injury to their wing which means they cannot fly or be released into the wild or have a cage big enough that would allow flight attempts.
It's not a perfect solution for these animals, but in an imperfect world it's the best possible solution.
I loved the fact that the cats were not being exploited for unrealistic tourist encounters or bred within this conservation park. I have a big problem when tourism and money are justification for breeding wild or exotic animals so that tourists can have extra special encounters with their offspring, for example the lion cub cuddling that we saw in Africa. I felt like all the animal encounters here at this place were done very responsibly so that both the animals & people had a nice interaction.
The manager told me about the wonderful work that they have done in conjunction with the authorities & the general public to create awareness & education. It was also really good to be told about the breeding & successful rehabilitation & release programs for some of these animals. The howler monkeys are a good example of this. The original 2 were seized by authorities after being sold on the black market.
Thankfully Aluxes could take them in, which was a much better option that euthanasia. They are currently critically endangered, as are a lot of the animals we saw in Aluxes. Reading about the animal's survival status & realising that so many of them were critically endangered was the only bad thing about the day.
We spent 4 hours looking at the animals in enclosures & exploring the natural areas of habitat, looking out for wild birds, reptiles & insects that were in abundance here. I would definitely recommend going here & supporting this organisation.
There was so many highlights from this day, its hard to know what to talk about first. We started With the Guacamaya Escarlata aka scarlet Macaw. Aluxes have hundred's that they have successfully bred & released into the local area. As well as being a conservation haven for abused animals, it was a land conservation area & the birds choose to live in the local rainforests & jungle's. It was a pleasure to see them up in the canopy above our heads, as well as at the designated feeding stations. There was an animal encounter experience available with some the tame ones, however we decided not to do it & just admired them as we were walking along the park. Some other birds that we saw, which were highlights for us were a flock of very pink flamingo's, birds of prey, parrots in averies, Pink spoonbill's and drum roll, a Toucan!!! We were both super, super excited to see one of these gorgeous birds! Another creature high up on the list of animals we wanted to see while in Central America.
Shortly after entering the park we encountered the first cat. A Jaguar Negro, or in English the Black Panther. Another endangered species that frequents the black market's & people's houses. He looked very happy & even a bit fat, he was rolling around in the sun when we got there. He has these gorgeous rosette markings that show up when he was in the sun. They are a lot smaller than the African Leopard, though they are still dense animals with a considerable amount of muscle.
We would circle back to se him again & to our delight he had moved from the sun into the shade & was sitting right next to the glass.
Next to his enclosure was a Jaguar Pinto, also called a Panthera Once, with he traditional rosette colouring. We weren't sure if this was a female or male & it was partially hidden from us, right at the back of the enclosure. Both of these enclosures looked big enough, were very clean & had lots of things to stimulate them.
We then saw quite a few different enclosures for turtles. There was 2 enclosures with some tortoise's that were visiting from Africa, as well as some local species. We stood by one enclosure & laughed for a few minutes while watching a tortoise enthusiastically eat a big bowl of salad. There was some in pond's we couldn't really see & some big snapping ones with thick brutish necks & cruel looking mouths. You wouldn't want to accidentally step on one in a river!
We were amazed at the very different species of crocodiles at Aluxes & the quantity. There was an albino one that had a special glass enclosure, he was pretty cute. Being from Australia, were not easily fazed by crocs. They had a few big pythons in enclosures, which were of an impressive size, again another animal, you wouldn't want to stumble across in the jungle!
There was a lot of small reptiles running around outside of enclosures as well, we kept seeing these bright green lizards & were on the look out for snakes. Aluxes is set up on a protected piece of land & has established various different habitats to be able to conserve both plants & animals. We walked across an island to a forrest of bamboo, which was really nice.
They have islands as enclosures where they have monkeys. It's a really good idea, giving them lots of space, lots of trees & a unique way to see them, it feels more real & more friendly. The monkeys that we saw here were the Yucatan Black Howler Monkey & the Spider Monkey. Both of which are critically endangered due to the destruction of their habitat & human trafficking, which is how they were at Aluxes. It was really nice to read that the authorities will contact places like Aluxes when they seize abused animals like this & that they get a second chance at life. Aluxes has a successful breeding & release program for the 2 different types of monkeys we saw here!
We finally arrived at the large lake where the Manatee's live! Until today, I had no idea what a Manatee was or that they even existed. It was here that I had the great pleasure of feeding & loving 4 Manatee's aka sea cows. They are very similar to the dugongs that are found in Australia, the big difference in these friendly vegetarians is the shape of their tail. These gentle giants have no natural predators, except humans. It breaks my heart to learn they are on the threatened & vulnerable listing (as are dugong's) because of humans.
They are so placid & defenseless, despite weighing 400kg + The purple colour on it's mouth is beetroot, which they love!
It was weird feeding them, they have a very unusual shaped mouth. Alux's has a male & female that they have successfully bred to produce 2 young ones, which were there. I felt a bit sorry for the male who was in a smaller enclosure, a necessity for his survival while the female has babies with her. She was older than him & absolutely humungous, far bigger than him. He was very cute & kept rolling over in the water & putting his flipper up on the cement enclosure to get my attention. I was so mesmerised & in love with these giant blubbery animals. Seriously, they are so bloody cute! They make these snuffly grunting noises while you feed them & they have these nostril flaps that seal off while they are feeding.
I fed the female, male & the 2 babies. I noticed that the female appeared to have an old injury to one of her eyes which was all white. We forgot to ask how the male & female ended up at Aluxes, however we were told the babies would be released back into the wild.
Theres one place where you can legally have snorkelling encounters with them and thats in America, I'll add that to the list! They are meant to be really curious, personable & gentle with people who are swimming with them.
There is a few places where you can swim with dugong's in Indonesia though, which is a bit closer to home.
Other mammals that we saw were the Mexican Agouti, which looks like a large guinea pig, a few of these were sharing an enclosure with some white tailed deer & Spotted Paca, another small mammal.
We also saw collared Peccary & White Lipped Peccary, which are bigger than the Agouti & Paca. They look like wild pigs crossed with guinea pigs! I haven't even heard of any of these animals before. Apparently I need to watch more documentaries about central & south America.
Oso Hormiguero or Anteater is another mammal we didn't realise would be here! He was so much more flexible than we would have imagined & was busy sniffing around the roof of his enclosure while we were there. & yet again another endangered species, threatened by human kind. If it wasn't for zoo's & conservation parks, so many of these amazing animals wouldn't even be in existence today.
An unusual Central American animal we did know of & wanted to see was the Tapir. Aluxes has 4 that were all born & raised in captivity. It was sad to learn that they are also critically endangered. It was lunch time when we arrived at their enclosure & the male was very passionately showing us how he is capable of eating a very large bucket of oats & cut up fruit. He looked so happy & cute while he was eating.
We also 3 racoons sleeping in a little cave, which was very cute & 2 otters swimming around behind an enclosure with a glass wall. We both adore racoons & otters & are both guilty of watching an absurd amount of videos of them online.
Finally we got to the Ocelot enclosure, something Tom was really really excited for. There was 2 in separate enclosures & we spent a fair bit fo time trying to observe their behaviour & get a real appreciation for they welfare & state of mind. As I mentioned up above, a few people had wrote in reviews about the female circling her cage in an agitated manner. It was really nice when we left to see her sleeping on a log after eating & grooming herself.
Next to the male Ocelot's cage was something called a Dwarf Leopard. A small wild cat that looked like a kitten from an Ocelot or a domestic Ocicat. It was really cute & also circling its cage, anxiously waiting for lunch.
It was quite a shock to realise we had been in Aluxe's for 4 hours. After we finished here, we caught another tourist van back into town, where we collected our bags & went to a local restaurant for a few drinks & dinner before getting on the bus. It was a really nice evening, despite feeling like a million degrees!
Our bus left 25 minutes early & we were seated in the back in seats 33 & 34. Thankfully the road wasn't too mountainous or winding & I was able to get to sleep without feeling sick. Sleeping on this overnight bus was actually a lot easier than the last one we went on. There was fewer disturbances from scheduled stops, & no security footage needed. The only major disturbance was just after 3am, when someone went to the toilet & nearly killed us all with the smell.
- Alli
