Gay Men and the Art of Aging Gracefully-SOLD OUT

For one glorious week, we will be the exclusive guests of a unique, new venue called El Pueblo.  A spacious residence created especially with men in mind, El Pueblo is owned and operated by a multi-national gay couple. The compound has 7 large bedrooms, each with a king bed and a private, modern bathroom.  These rooms are distributed over 2 floors encircling a common indoor/outdoor area of lush gardens, a library, 2 dining rooms, 2 kitchens, numerous terraces and a stunning 25 meter, 2-lane lap pool.

The complex was designed and built from 4 existing properties expertly crafted into one fully-functioning “home” with ample space for gathering together as a group or for spending quiet time alone.

The street facade of El Pueblo

The interior courtyard of El Pueblo

El Pueblo’s location is ideal of our group – literally right in the center of Merida Centro.  It sits at the base of the cosmopolitan avenue Paseo di Montejo (some refer to it as the Champs-Elysées of Merida) – a wide boulevard lined with trees, boutiques, international restaurants, hotels, historic mansions, art galleries and cafes.  The Paseo is closed to traffic on Sunday mornings when bicycles dominate the avenue.

This lovely area is very convenient, within walking distance (or a short Uber ride) of most attractions such as the main Plaza Grande, Parque Santa Lucía, where on any night you will find locals enjoying music or dance,  the buzzing Santiago market with plenty of outdoor tables for lunch and the neighborhood of Santiago with colorful homes, small cafes, local restaurants and respectful renovations preserving the authentic setting.

Rooms are available for singles, couples or friends who are willing to share a king bed.  Click on this link for a look at the rooms…

Dining area and kitchen #1

From the balcony

The library

Covered terrace, downstairs

Upstairs lounge

Clothing optional, 2-man lap pool

Merida, with its international airport, is an accessible destination.  There are many direct flights into the city from Miami, Houston or Mexico City.

From the airport, it is a short taxi ride to El Pueblo.  After exiting customs,  walk to the Transport Desk to reserve – and pay for – a taxi to the center.  With a voucher in hand, your car will be waiting for you just outside the arrivals terminal.

Note:  Uber is used extensively throughout the city, but not at the airport.  Uber divers are not allowed to pick up passengers in front of the terminal. These pre-booked airport taxis are totally safe as no money is exchanged with the driver.

Money:  unlike many towns in Resort México, visitors to Mérida will not be able to spend American dollars anywhere.  We suggest using your US debit card in one of the many ATM machines in town to draw Mexican pesos from a bank.  As always when drawing money in a foreign location, obtaining pesos will incur small fees bank.

Merida is one of the fastest growing and safest  warm-weather destinations in the world and with a rich mix of culture, cuisine, architecture and openness it is especially attractive for gay men.  If you are tired of the scene in PV (Puerta Vallerta) or the tourist crush of Playa (del Carmen) or Cancun, then Merida might be the place for you.

Merida is the vibrant capital of the Yucatan state, far to the east in Mexico (directly underneath New Orleans!) with a rich Mayan and Spanish colonial history. It offers a much older, deeper, substantial history — in a word, it is Authentic México — than some of the popular vacation destinations.

The city has a population of nearly 1 million, but the quaint Centro area is concentrated with varied neighborhoods of homes and businesses of locals who have lived there for generations, expats, architects, artists, families from Mexico City and, of course, gay couples.  One intriguing aspect of this city-scape is that you can never tell what lies behind a door until it is opened to you.

Folk dancers in the plaza

One the joys of Merida is how expats and locals comfortably intermingle. Yucatecans are deeply proud of their history and heritage and so as the city of Merida finds a new audience, the local government has taken pains to preserve long-held traditions. Thursday nights in Parque Santa Lucia are reserved for regional dancing performances; Saturday nights, Noche Mexicana on the remate of Paseo de Montejo (right around the corner from El Pueblo!) or the ancient Mayan ball game pok ta’ pok which is recreated in an elaborate ceremony culminating in an actual game played by local men in loin cloths using flaming balls! Wednesday nights, the challenging history of the Mayan state is recreated in front of — and projected onto the facade of — the Merida Cathedral.  These fascinating weekly events are attended as much by locals as visitors, creating a delightful mash of culture, family and friends.

During any season there are music festivals, parades, outdoor performances, marathons, garden tours, artisanal fairs, fresh markets and food festivals.  In Merida people love to gather outdoors for any possible reason.

Renowned as the White City, Merida has been honored as the Americas Capital of Culture numerous times.  The city has a distinctive blend of ancient Mayan and Spanish cultures.  Once, it was deemed the wealthiest city in the Americas due to its mass production of henequén – derived from the abundant agave plant and used to make rope products for the global marketplace.

Example of architecture preserved in Merida

One of the many 19th century mansions built along the Paseo

Mayan temple at Chichen Itzá

For the archeologist in you, Merida is encircled by Mayan temple ruins like one of the seven wonders of the world, Chichen Itza, Uxmal and many less-travelled but no less fascinating Mayan ruins.  The city sports elaborate examples of original colonial architecture, and is fast becoming the artistic center of the Yucatan. Merida features several impressive art museums as well as The Cúpula, a privately-owned historic series of structures featuring galleries, a video room, large gardens with indoor and outdoor performance spaces, a production workshop and two artists residences.

Mayan cuisine is not at all the stereotypical tacos, enchiladas and rice and beans you might know from the Tex-Mex restaurants in your neighborhood.  Many Yucatan dishes are famously slow-cooked, such as their pork specialty Cochinita pibil, wrapped in banana leaves, buried and roasted underground for hours on end until served fall-apart tender.

The Yucatan grows over 50 different varieties of peppers, exotic fruits such as pitahaya (or Dragon Fruit), nance and guanábana.  Merida is packed with diverse opportunities to sample the local cuisine —  from lively, music-filled open markets with fresh catches from the nearby Caribbean Sea, to homemade Italian pasta and wood-fired pizza eateries, to impressive high-end tasting restaurants like K’u’uk or  Huniik. And there is a wide selection of local Mexican wines — not widely distributed in the United States — a whole new world of varietal discoveries!

Cenote with stalactites, blue water and light streaming in from above

One of the most unique attractions in the area are its magical water hole formations —  more than 7,000 cenotes – naturally-formed freshwater sinkholes embedded in the soft limestone. They were formed over 66 million years ago from the impact of a gigantic meteor that created a huge shock wave — the evidence of which is seen today as a ring of hundreds of cenotes around Mérida. To the Mayans, cenotes were a critical water source representing the gateway to the world of the dead. To the Spaniards colonialist, cenotes provided the essential waters that helped build the henequén trade and allowed their Haciendas to thrive. Some cenotes are deep water-filled shafts with strictly vertical walls, while some are shallow but wide. Other cenotes are semi-open with part of the water surface hidden from view in a cavern. But all cenotes make for an entrancing swimming experience, with lush warm, blue-hued fresh waters and dramatic tree roots hanging down from their semi-open ceilings.