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Category: Daily Life
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First off, let me preface my description with a bit of personal history. I grew up in the high desert riding motorcycles and driving dune buggies and 4 wheel drives so as far as the off road experience the X-Buggy excursion provided, it was, well, comparatively tame. Many people there were completely freaked out by it though because they had never done anything even similar. The X-Buggies had obviously been up and down the trail many times before and were showing, um, signs of wear. The steering is not power assisted. You really need to put the muscle to the steering wheel to get the buggy to do what you want and avoid the trees. Two buggies in our 28 person tour (split into two groups) actually lost a front wheel. No worries though as we really weren't going very fast. They dealt with the incidents quickly and efficiently like it happens all the time. There was a guide at the front and one bringing up the rear of both groups controlling the speed and dealing with lost front wheels.

The road was quite rough and bumpy with a few puddles here and there. The jungle (yes, real jungle) there is a thin layer of top soil over what appears to be sheets of rock that make up the island and keep it from eroding away from the wave action. I say this because the first stop on the outing was at a place called Aaktun Balam, a Mayan sort of a hurricane shelter. It has an intriguing entrance that was a small hole in the ground with a stairway leading down into it and a sign over it.

The cave is really interesting and kind of deceptive since the whole back side of the cave was open. The cave looked as though it had been dug out under a massive slab of stone that formed the roof. Outside, the roof of the cave was as densely vegetated as anywhere in the jungle.

Next, we bumped and jostled our way to the spectacular Jade Cavern, so named for the color of the water. It has a rickety stairway of maybe thirty or so steps and a boardwalk at the waters edge. Swimming was allowed with a life vest though I didn't do it because of the smell. I did speak to another guy in the other group who said he was led around to the side where he dove in head first off of a cliff into the part of the pool that is 64 feet deep.

We then headed back with a pass over a hump where the buggy almost jumped and a plunge in the mud hole near the end of the ride where we were told to gas it full throttle. We got a little muddy and so did a few others but the less brave went through slowly after seeing how we looked. Our heads were shielded from the mud for the most part by helmets and goggles. If you take a camera with you be sure it's well protected, especially if you do the mud splash. Ours survived well in its belt pouch with my shirt over it.

Overall, it was pretty fun and I'd say worth the money. Our boy LOVED it!