Travel Recommendations: The Yucatan Peninsula?

Hello fellow steemians!

Hope you are all as happy as I am :)

My girlfriend and I have just purchased our outward ticket for our South American adventure. After talking about this for months, we finally jumped. No turning back now!

We went to Merida in Mexico last year to volunteer and both fell in love with the area. We were working with local children and teaching them basic English. We managed to explore the area a little but nowhere near as much as we would have liked! To be honest, we created such a bond with the kids that we spent as much time as possible with them!

We tried to remain professional when we were around them, but by the time we left all the kids had a suspicion we were a couple!

I don't think they had ever seen a redhead before. They were all amazed by my hair; one of them thought it was because my mom had eaten too many carrots!

Neither of us would trade the time we spent there volunteering for anything, but this time we really want to see more of the beautiful region. So there's Cancun, but neither of us are particularly keen on the resorty-vibe and would much rather get off the beaten track and get a true sense of South American culture. Last year we would spend all day working with the kids, and then the afternoons and evenings exploring the city, local towns, and cenotes. This is the sort of thing we want to be doing again. My girlfriend speaks fluent Spanish so we aren't averse to going to tiny villages and finding our own way around places.

My muse for travelling is Kerouac's classic 'On The Road'; I feel like I might enjoy Mexico City but I haven't heard particularly great things about it. Well, I suppose, to be correct, it isn't that I have heard negative things but simply that I haven't heard positive things either. Has anyone been? It's a fairly substantial trip in the opposite direction to where we want to end up, is it worth making the trip from the Yucatan?

Has anyone here visited or lived in the areas around the Yucatan Peninsula? If so, any recommendations on what to visit whilst we are there? Obviously I've googled things to do, but Google will only tell us so much. As great as things like Lonely Planet and TripAdvisor are, we would both prefer some personal recommendations from you lot!

Ultimately, our goal is to spend a few months backpacking through Mexico, Belize, Panama and Colombia. We'd love to be able to spend a much longer time out there, but money is unfortunately a fickle master! I'm currently working freelance in Digital Marketing, Steeming and trading crypto as a source of income, but we both expect we won't have the finances to do the tip we really want to :(

Our plane is booked to leave the UK on the 28th of August, and we are both absolutely buzzing! I'm going to be posting summaries of the areas we explore as well as the recommendations we find as we stumble through our adventure; so if you're planning on visiting any of these countries yourself keep your eyes peeled for this!

Vive la aventura

Everyone keeps saying that this is a 'once in a lifetime opportunity' which I think is utter rubbish. I can already tell I'm the sort of person who will carry on exploring until my legs give out. Either way, we both really want to make the most of this trip, so PLEASE don't forget to leave your recommendations below.

Peace, Love & Steem!