When we first moved to Merida, we moved from a country that was experiencing the height of Starbuck’s frenzy. There seemed to be a Starbucks on every corner, everyone had their favorite drink and everyone loved to go to Starbucks. In addition, we came from a cooler land, where a steaming hot cup of coffee in the morning was a wonderful thing.

When we got to Merida, we realized that this was one of life’s little comforts that we may have to leave behind. Not only was there no Starbucks for thousands of miles around us (think about that…), but we didn’t even really WANT that cup of coffee so much anymore. A hot, steaming cup of coffee isn’t quite the same on a hot, steaming morning in the tropics. And that was a good thing, because wherever we went, when we asked for coffee, they brought a spoon, a cup full of hot water and a jar of Nescafe to the table. Not exactly what we were used to!

Over the years, we have adapted more to our chosen home and once in awhile, we actually do still enjoy a hot cup of coffee. Well, let’s be honest… our preference is a hot, foamy capuccino (a habit we picked up in Italy on our ‘weddingmoon"). Or sometimes a mocha caliente (hot mocha) or a chai latte. What has also changed is that our choices about where to buy a cup of coffee (or a mocha or a latte, etc.) have expanded considerably.

And here finally is a place for our rant about capuccinos in the Yucatan. Somewhere along the line, someone got the idea that Americans (or all tourists, maybe) like their capuccinos served in a tall glass, with a lot of hot milk (and not much foam). Where we come from (and in the rest of the world, as far as we can tell), capuccinos are served en tasa (in a cup), thereby resulting in less milk (and more foam and more coffee). Even the best restaurants in Merida will serve a capuccino in a tall glass, sometimes even if you request otherwise (and you can be sure we have requested this on occasions too numerous to count). We continue our gallant quest to bring true capuccinos to Merida’s restaurants, and welcome any fellow luchadores por cambio who would like to join us. End of rant.

About ten months ago, we were alternately teased and applauded for printing the news that Starbucks had come to Merida and how happy we were about it. As 2008 draws to a close, we feel that there are so many choices about where to get a cup of coffee (and a capuccino), we’d better take a poll!

As usual with our Readers Choice Polls, here are our suggestions to start. If you have a suggestion that is not on the list, please send us a comment with your nomination. We will take new nominations up until the end of September, but voting will be open on this and all other polls until the end of 2008.

Thanks for participating…now read, and then vote!

Italian Coffee Company

Italian Coffee Company strikes us as the Mexican version of Starbucks. It is a nationwide franchise. It serves coffee and tea of various kinds, as well as paninis, croissant sandwiches and a variety of desserts and other beverages.

Address: c. 62 x 61 next to Teatro Merida, downtown. (There are others in the malls and around town)
Wireless internet: Yes
Hours: Sunday-Friday: 7:30 AM to 11 PM, Saturdays: 7:30 AM to 12 PM
American coffee: $17 pesos
Cappuchino: $27 pesos

Café La Cabaña

This cute little hole-in-the-wall seems to get what we like about a place that serves coffee. They are open all the time (so you can just drop in when you feel like it). The few tables outside on the zocalo make for great people watching. And in addition to coffee drinks, they serve breakfast, paninis and croissants. Mostly, though, the coffee is good.

Location: Calle 61 x 62 in the across from the Plaza and almost next to the Governor’s Palace.
Wireless internet: Yes (free from the city)
Hours: Monday-Sunday: 7:30am- 11:30 PM approximately. They close when the last client leaves.
American coffee: $18 pesos
Cappuchino: $30 pesos

El Gran Café

Probably one of the first places we ate when we moved here (it was right down the street from our new home), El Gran Café reminds us vaguely of an old black-and-white film about traveling in Latin America. They have a lot of bags of coffee displayed on their shelves, and they are somehow affiliated with Cuba (the owner is Cuban perhaps?). El Gran Café serves a lot of food (international, Mexican and Yucatecan), and it definitely makes a strong cup of coffee, as well as other coffee drinks. Their various buffets are pretty good, and the big picture window looking out onto Paseo Montejo is another good people-watching spot.
Location: 47 con Remate de paseo de Montejo.
Wireless internet: Yes
Hours: 7 am to 2 am every day
American: $16 pesos
Capuccino: $23 pesos
They are also a restaurant serving a variety of international, national and local food.

Olive Café Stop

This is the New Kid on the Block. Olive Café Stop was started in 2008 by a woman, originally from Peru, who worked for many years for some of the best hotels on the Mayan Riviera. She brings a welcome cafe to an area on Paseo Montejo that needs that sort of thing (just north of Triunfo) and we’re hoping she is successful there. What would be more fun than to go shopping for mirror balls and oversized salad bowls, and then go have a latte with your fellow shopping buddies? The Olive Café Stop also sells baguettes, sandwiches and desserts. And they have a blog!

Location: Paseo de Montejo x 31 y 39
Wireless internet: Yes
Hours: Monday –Saturday, 8:30 am to 8 PM
American: $15 pesos
Capuccino: $22 pesos

Starbucks

What can we say really? Stepping into a Starbucks here made us wonder if the Star Trek teleporter had finally been invented. It’s like taking a mini-trip to the USA, without having to go through a metal detector. The smells, the colors, the ambiance, the comfy chairs, the magazines…. oh, okay. So the magazines are in Spanish. No LA Times or LA Weekly. A rude awakening from a coffee-scented daydream. Anyway, sometimes Starbucks is like a letter from an ex-lover… bittersweet.

For the records, as far as we know, there is a Starbucks at this location, at the Gran Plaza, and at the Alta Brisa Mall. They might be closing down Starbucks in the States, but they are expanding here!
Our favorite location: Circuito colonias in Colonia Mexico, between Nasstroms and Chapur (just east of the Burger King Circle)
Wireless internet: Yes
Hours: Monday-Thursday: 7:00 AM to 11 PM, Friday: 7:00 AM to 12 PM, Saturday: 8:00 AM to 12 PM, Sunday: 8:00 AM to 11 PM
American: $18 pesos
Capuccino: $29 pesos

Segafreddo

Segafreddo is so much more than a cup of coffee, we almost hesitated to include them. But then, they do make a great coffee and when you ask for a capuccino, you get it in a cup. That puts them on our white list! Of course, it’s trying to be Italian (it is also a chain), so it needs to know these things. Segafreddo also serves breakfast, lunch and dinner. Our favorite is lunch, actually. Their croissant sandwiches are delicious and they also serve bagels! Segafreddo can also be found in the Gran Plaza, the Alta Brisa Plaza and probably a few other places.
Location: Prolongacion Montejo, inside Plaza Mayor, next to Checkers restaurant.
Wireless internet: Yes
Hours: 8:00 am to 2:00 AM every day
American: $21 pesos
Capuccino: $27 pesos

Reader’s Nominations:

Flor de Santiago
Possibly the oldest café in Merida. They serve coffee and meals, under lazily turning ceiling fans that just make you want to relax and enjoy.
Location: Calle 70 x 57 y 59, Santiago
Hours: 6:00 am to 1:00 am every day
Wireless Internet: Yes
American: $15 pesos
Capuccino: $24 pesos

Café Latte
Located north of downtown in the Itzimna neighborhood.
Location: C. 18 Av. Perez Ponce num. 96, Itzimna, near the corner with 21 and the church
Hours: Monday-Friday 8:00 AM to 6:30 PM, Saturday: 8:00 AM to 3PM, Sunday closed
Wireless Internet: Yes
American: $8 pesos
Capuccino: $17 pesos

Cafe Genevieve
Named after the owner’s mother, this cozy coffee shop is located in the front room of a home. Light streams in the windows, couches, chairs & tables beckon, reading material is readily available and good conversation is too.
Location: C. 51 #493 between 56 and 58 (the yellow house)
Hours: Monday-Saturday 8:00 AM to 1:00 PM, Sunday closed
Wireless Internet:Not yet.
American: $15 pesos (includes refill)
French Drip: $25 pesos (includes refill)

If you are living here in Yucatan, chances are one of the first things you did was to buy or rent a home.

While some of us were savvy enough or spoke Spanish well enough to trato directo (deal direct) with the sellers or landlords, many of us spent our initial days here with a helpful real estate agent. So we’re pretty sure that almost every reader of Yucatan Living has something to contribute to this poll.

In order for a real estate agency to qualify for this poll, it must list and sell properties in and around the state of Yucatan. And it must also have at least one bilingual employee who can deal competently with English-speaking extranjeros.

Please consider a few other things when voting for the best real estate agency. Naturally, the best agency should hire and employ knowledgeable agents. They should know the territory, the process of buying and selling a house here in the Yucatan and how to get things done in this environment. They should treat customers well, with both patience and respect. They should have integrity (loosely defined as doing what they say they are going to do). They should be pleasant to work with, and after the deal is done, you should feel comfortable recommending them to family and friends.

Some things we feel are not in the real estate agent’s control, especially here in the Yucatan. We believe you can’t judge a real estate agent on how long it takes to buy or sell a house, for instance. Or on whether or not the seller or buyer had integrity. Or on how happy or unhappy you are with the house once you move in. Sometimes, forces of nature (or forces of Mexico) create havoc for the best of professionals.

We open this poll with five real estate agencies that work regularly with extranjeros, but this is certainly not an exhaustive list. New agencies appear on the scene all the time, and we are not the best judges… that’s why the Poll is here for our readers to make their favorites known. So please vote (one person – one vote, please) and may the best agency win!

The Nominees Are…

Here in alphabetical order are the initial 2008 nominees for Yucatan Living’s Readers Choice Award for Best Real Estate Agency in Yucatan:

Buena Vida Realtors – Run by Rupert Millautz, Buena Vida Realtors is a small agency that prides itself on providing good service.

Casa Blanca Real Estate – Probably the oldest agency that works with English-speaking extranjeros, the agency is run by Jorge Caceres with offices on the corner of Calle 55 and Calle 66.

Mexico International – Founded by Mitch Keenan, the first extranjero to set up a real estate agency in Merida. His team of agents is based out of their offices in the Fiesta Americana building next to the Sanborn’s restaurant.

Real Estate Yucatan – The husband and wife team of Gabriela Isaac and Alec Stephens, and Gabriela’s brother Isaac Salim, run this agency. Gabriela and Isaac are Yucatecos and Alec hails from Mexico City, but spent many years working and living in the USA.

Tierra Yucatan – This agency is represented by Jennifer Lytle, her socio, David Palomo and a team of agents. Jen has traveled and lived in Mexico for over 30 years after moving here from San Antonio, Texas. Jennifer’s team works out of their renovated colonial office on Calle 66 in Merida’s centro historico.

Nominate Your Favorite

If you know the name of an agency that deserves to be nominated for the 2008 award, please leave a comment with the name of the company, the agent and the website address. We’ll add them to the Poll. Nominations will be accepted until September 1st, giving everyone plenty of time to add their favorite agency. Voting will continue under the very end of 2008, and not a minute sooner!

Reader’s Nominations:

Mayan Living – Jim Mann has run this very successful real estate firm for as long as we’ve been in Merida.

Mayan Realty – A local real estate firm owned by Jorge Mazún.

Bookmark Yucatan Living and come back often to see how your favorite agency is doing. Then, come back again in early 2009 to read about the winners of the 2008 Yucatan Living Readers Choice Awards for Best Real Estate Agency in Yucatan.

It is no secret that it gets hot here. Sometimes, it gets really, really hot. So hot, you think you’re gonna’ die. But there are a lot of ways to beat the heat and we’re going to share what we have learned in that regard. We’ve learned by watching, of course, and paying close attention to what the people who have lived here for centuries do. Of course, there are the basic concepts of loose clothing, hats, clothes made of natural breathing fibers like cotton and linen. But this heat is so hot, you’ve got to know more than that.

One of the important concepts that we learned when we moved down here from the much colder North is "core temperature". We don’t understand the science behind it, but we know the experience. At some point, your body seems to overheat. Drinking a cold drink, which is most people’s first line of defense, doesn’t come close to cooling you down. But there are a number of things that will lower your core temperature rather quickly:

First, get out of the sun. You should be walking on the shadowed side of the street already, and sticking to the shade whenever possible. If you aren’t already in the shade, get there.

Stop moving. This is a time-honored tradition in tropical climates and is probably the biggest single reason that people close to the equator have the reputation for being lazy. Move slowly or don’t move at all, and you won’t be as hot.

Find the breeze. Whether it’s a certain corner of a courtyard, in front of or beneath a fan, or on top of the building, find some moving air. Moving air over your skin helps to cool down that core temperature quite quickly. So quickly, in fact, that some Mayans won’t sit in front of a fan (or stand in front of a refrigerator) when they are hot. They are pretty sure that it makes them sick. Who are we to argue? What we have noticed is that if you are too hot and have been working your muscles, those muscles might not like a blast of cool air right away, so take this step slowly.

Then, take a shower. Or get in the pool, if you are lucky enough to have one. Millions of Mayans don’t have pools (but many have cenotes). They manage to look clean and smell good. How do they do it? Showers. A quick cool shower does wonders. During the hottest months, you might find that you’ll get cooler water by turning off your water heater. When its hot outside, the water from your tinaco on the roof wil be hot, but the water from your turned-off water heater will be cool. Yes, it’s a little known fact, but it works. Try it!

Lie in a hammock. If you get hot at night, try sleeping in a hammock. Hammocks are popular here for a reason, and coolness is one of them. On a hot and sultry night, that mattress is just going to make you hotter. But a hammock is going to allow any breeze that blows to cool you off.

The last resort, or rather, the most expensive resort, is to go into an air-conditioned room. Electricity is the most expensive utility here in the Yucatan (and probably in all of Mexico). It is cheaper in the hot months, gracias a Diós!, but that’s when you use more of it, which is why many Yucatecans don’t have air conditioning. And why many houses only have air conditioners in the bedrooms.

Of course, there are other ways to cool off too. There are places where people go when they just can’t stand the heat anymore. The following are five of our favorite places. Vote on which one is your favorite, or suggest another. We’ll be taking nominations until the end of May.

Best Public Place to Beat the Heat

A Local Shopping Mall – And you thought all those people were buying something? No way. They’re looking. And maybe they are having an ice cream or a coffee, but what they are really doing is enjoying a day of air conditioning. Of course, it used to be everyone went to the Gran Plaza but now there are more malls… Alta Brisa, Citicenter, etc. Wherever you are in Merida, now, there’s a big air-conditioned mall somewhere not too far away.

A Nearby Cenote – Being Working Gringos (and not Retired Gringos), we haven’t spent a lot of time discovering the closest cenote to Merida. We’re sure some of you out there have. Want to share? If all else fails or you can’t think of another one, there’s the cenote at the Dzibilchaltun archaeological zone. Sure, you have to pay to get in (and see the ruins, the ecological trail, the museum… ), but it’s a great open-air cenote and the water is absolutely lovely.

The Beach – Our biggest objection to this cool-off solution is that it takes almost an hour to get there from the Centro. But if you have an hour (or the rest of the day, more likely…), the beach is usually cooler than the city. Why do you think half of Merida spends July and August there? And therein is our other objection to the beach as a place to cool off. At least in July and August, called la temporada, the beach at Progreso is too crowded. We need to go farther away (hmmm… Sisal? Telchac?) or go during the winter months to really enjoy ourselves there. But then? Ahh, it’s a great solution, especially accompanied by some cold beers and a fresh plate of guacamole and chips!

A Museum – Cool off in a quiet atmosphere while looking at art. True, there aren’t a lot of places to sit (ok, there’s nowhere to sit in most Merida museums). But they are some of the quietest public places you can find here and they are cool. Sometimes, an almost-deserted room with art on the walls just does the trick. Just being somewhere so quiet and being so alone cools the spirit, which helps cool the body, don’t you think? Our favorite happens to be the MACAY downtown, but the Anthropological Museum or the City Museum are also good ones. They may not be as cool and quiet as the MACAY on a sunny afternoon, but they are just as well air-conditioned!

In The Countryside – We often refer to Merida as a ‘waffle-iron’ when the days heat up. That’s what our city looks like to a cloud. But get outside the city, and you’ll notice a definite drop in temperature, especially at night. All that stone and cement soaks up the heat during the day and radiates it back in the evening. Not so in the pueblos throughout the Peninsula. A hot summer night is a perfect time to find yourself staying over at a hacienda or the Yaxcopoil guest house or with a friend who lives in Izamal… you get the idea.

Which of these is your favorite place to go when Merida heats up? Or do you have a different idea? Send us your nominations and we’ll add them to the list. And then vote on your favorite place to beat the heat!

As we are fresh from the experience of a mini-onslaught of out of town visitors, whom we were required to take out to dinner on multiple occasions, we decided it was time to poll our readers about their views on the best fine dining experience in the Merida area. We aren’t going to limit this to a dinner experience, because due to the culture here, sometimes you can have a really lovely meal in the early afternoon, followed by an even lovelier siesta. The heat and the culture of flojera (we like to translate this as "going with the flow" but our Yucateco friends liken it more to "laziness") mean that a good meal can take up the better part of the day, given the right setting and good company. And why not? What better describes ‘fine dining’ than the slow and leisurely enjoyment of food and friends?

We begin the poll with our five suggestions for the best places to take your loved ones, business partners or anyone else you want to go all out for. But please remember that all you have to do is add a suggestion in our comments and that nomination will be added to the poll. As always, we welcome your suggestions, as they improve our repertoire of possibilities as well!

Here are our five suggestions, pues, for the Best Fine Dining in Yucatan:

Casa de Piedra at Hacienda Xcanatun – In our mind, Casa de Piedra just about has it all. First of all, the restaurant is located in the excellently renovated Casa de Maquinas of the hacienda. The high ceilings, a large and majestic bar, the grand piano and the dramatic ceiling treatment, as well as the tastefully preserved portions of the old machinery, create a space full of interest and elegance. Outside the impossibly grand French-style doors is our favorite place to dine on most evenings (and Sunday mornings), the terraza. From our favorite table in the corner, we can enjoy the elegance of the restaurant and the tropical lushness of the well-manicured garden. But Casa de Piedra isn’t all about ambiance, because the food is really delicious as well. We still remember the first time we had their cochinita en xcatic chiles appetizer… it was a moment of revelation. Casa de Piedra executes both Yucatecan and international cuisine equally well, and if it wasn’t for the fact that we have to get in our car and travel for at least 30 minutes to get there, we would probably eat there more often. Casa de Piedra is certainly reasonably priced compared to restaurants "back home" that only wish they could deliver the ambiance that Xcanatun provides effortlessly.

Nectar Restaurant – Nectar is the restaurant in Merida where they make art that happens to land on your dinner plate. You might have a salad that looks like something a church lady would wear on their head, complete with something that might pass as a feather but is really a piece of fried parmesan cheese. You never know, and that’s part of the fun. We’ve been to Nectar on an ordinary evening with friends, and we’ve been there for a special lots-of-money-per-person dinner with a visiting chef from Europe. Whatever the occasion, from wherever you sit in the all-white restaurant, you can enjoy a view of the kitchen, where the chefs dressed in black and grey create your future meal with flair and dedication. Nectar is nothing if not incredibly serious about their food. The wine list is usually very good, though often they don’t have everything on the list and the surest way to get something you want with the least amount of trouble is to ask to visit the cava yourself. Desserts are a total indulgence, after all that good food, but not to be missed. Our biggest complaint about Nectar is that sometimes in their exuberant creativity, they miss the mark. Small price to pay for all the times when they hit it right on the proverbial nail.

Trotters Restaurant – The first time we walked into Trotter’s, our mouths dropped open. We’d been to Pancho’s, we’d been to La Tratto (owned by the same family) but none of it prepared us for this. Trotter’s rivals Casa de Piedra in elegance and drama… no, we dare say, it wins the contest. And it appears that hundreds of Merida residents agree, because we have never seen the restaurant empty. Trotter’s different levels and intimate bar, all of which look out to their dramatically-lit garden, allow diners to be seen or to hide away in equal comfort. We love the garden seating on a tropical night, and the indoor air-conditioning on a hot day. We also love the wide assortment of appetizers, including fresh oysters. Trotter’s makes great steaks, roasted chicken and has the only wine list in town where we have ever found some of our favorite California wines. Though it is an incredibly popular restaurant, Trotter’s is big enough to never feel crowded, though sometimes you actually cannot just walk in and sit down. We know some expats that don’t want that ‘big city’ experience here in Merida, but apparently the local Yucateco population doesn’t agree, because Trotter is NOT an expat hangout, but frequented mostly by locals.

Hacienda Santa Rosa – A meal at Hacienda Santa Rosa is going to be an event, no matter how you slice it. If you are staying overnight, then your journey there and your stay is a big event. If you aren’t a guest at the hacienda hotel, we suggest planning a leisurely lunch. From Merida, the drive to Hacienda Santa Rosa is a little over an hour. That means the drive back is going to be the same, and we don’t recommend doing that late at night. If you can spare the time in the middle of the day, then a meal at this out-of-the-way hacienda owned by the Starwood Hotel chain is an event worth indulging in. First of all, the food is really delicious. Our last meal there included one of the freshest and most delicious salads we’ve ever had in the Yucatan, a to-die-for sopa de lima and many other wonderful dishes. The menu is a mixture of Yucatecan and international recipes. The setting is the beautifully restored hacienda, of course, with an outdoor dining room that faces a lush garden. After lunch, take your coffee on the veranda and face the other direction, gazing out over the immense green lawn to the old trees and the unrenovated casa de maquinas at the entrance. Take a stroll to the two different pool areas where all the guest rooms are tastefully tucked away behind arched doorways and stone walls. Before you return to Merida, visit the nearby semi-abandoned haciendas at Granada or Chunchucmil and revel in the history of it all. A lunch at Hacienda Santa Rosa takes the whole afternoon, and is well worth it. (Don’t forget to call ahead to let them know you are coming… just a necessary courtesy for such an out-of-the-way place so they know to expect you).

Hacienda Temozon Sur – One meal has been left out of this list, but we’re about to take care of that. Our favorite place for an elegant breakfast is another restored Starwood hacienda, Hacienda Temozon Sur. Just off the highway on the way to Uxmal, it’s the perfect place to stop for a sitdown breakfast with white linen tablecloths and white-clad waiters on the way to a day at Uxmal or other ruins south of Merida. Only guests who pay the $400+ USD per night for a room can enjoy the huge swimming pool that Temozon features in all its photographs, but you can gaze at it all you want while having breakfast on the verandah of the Casa Principal. After parking near the helicopter pad that President Clinton landed on during his meeting in the Yucatan with then-President Zedillo, you’ll walk up the most dramatic hacienda entrance, between a row of water-spitting stone dolphins to the restaurant. Surprisingly, breakfast at Hacienda Temozon is not expensive, and you can have everything from fresh fruit and juice to American-style eggs and bacon, fresh yogurt, freshly-baked bread and other delicious breakfast meals. The capuccino and espresso are both excellent too. Our only complaint about breakfast at Hacienda Temozon is that sometimes you will drive all that way and get turned away at the gate if Temozon is hosting a private party of some kind, which it does on occasion. If that happens, give up your fine dining ideas, and just go to Hacienda Ochil (across the highway and south a few hundred feet) or to the Pickled Onion down the road at Santa Elena.

Reader Nominations

Acqua: Reader Jim Anthony says Acqua is "a small, chef-owned and -operated restaurant which I love. The food is always delicious, with excellent service. Try the special desserts."

Macanche: Reader (and owner) Alfred Rordame writes "The food is always fantastic, the setting is a tad rustic but beautiful (under a palapa in the midst of one of Yucatan’s finest tropical gardens), and the service is attentive but not over-bearing. The only glitch is that they are not generally open to the public–you have to call ahead and order and reserve your dinner time (988-954-0287) at least one hour in advance. But, don’t let that deter you. Izamal is a great place to visit and you’ll have a great meal to boot. The menu is posted on their website (www.macanche.com) to facilitate pre-ordering and they are always welcome to creating special dishes on the fly (just ask!)." We like to include ourselves in the long list of Hotel Macanche’s fans, and we would add our assurance that the food there is delicious. And it is indeed in the midst of one of the Yucatan’s most beautiful tropical gardens.

Kinich: Reader Susi Villanueva writes "It´s located only 5 min walk from the main plaza (in Izamal) and 1 block from the pyramid Kinich. The owner is very welcoming, they offer Mayan style and Yucatecan dishes. It is also under a palapa. In a separate small palapa there are ladies making handmade tortillas that are served to you with your meal. Here is their webpage."

There you have it, our five favorite fine dining experiences in the Yucatan. Vote for one and/or nominate your own suggestion! The winner will be announced at the end of the year, along with all the other winners of the 2008 Yucatan Living Readers Choice Polls.

In 2007, we began the very popular Readers Choice Polls here on Yucatan Living. The Readers Choice Polls were created as a way for those readers who are familiar with places and services here in Merida and the Yucatan to share their opinions and discoveries with new residents and travelers. And of course, we had a hidden agenda too… we wanted to find out about new, better and different places in Merida that we could enjoy ourselves!

And so, the Yucatan Living Readers Choice Awards was born. The following are the categories, winners and runners up for each category in 2007. We have printed up some very respectable looking certificates, with which we will award the winners and which we hope you will see hanging on the walls of their establishments when you go to visit. We figure a Yucatan Living Readers Choice Award is a Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval, in a way. Thousands of Yucatan Living readers can’t be wrong, right?

Now, without further ado (or drumroll, for that matter!) here are the 2007 Winners of Yucatan Living’s Readers Choice Awards:

Small Hotel Under $100 a Room – For the best Small Hotel with rooms under $100 US within the Periferico limits of Merida, our Yucatan Living readers chose Luz En Yucatan. Luz En Yucatan is located on Calle 55 next to the Santa Lucia Church, and over the years, has built its reputation as a quirky but charmingly comfortable place to stay when in Merida. It appears that the new owners, Donnard and Tom, with the help of Donnard’s lovely wife Fabienne, have managed to maintain this reputation while giving the place a facelift.
The Runner up in this category is the lovely and talented Hotel Marionetas. Read the original poll here…

Bed and Breakfast – The number of B&B’s in Merida grew by leaps and bounds this year, so we expect this category to see a lot of activity in 2008. The 2007 winner of the Yucatan Living Readers Choice Award for Best B&B in Merida is… Casa Esperanza. Casa Esperanza is run by Claudette and her husband Sergio, and consistently has happy clients returning again and again. The rooms are comfortably furnished and Claudette’s breakfasts are legendary.
For this category, Runner up is Cascadas de Merida, another local favorite run by Ellyne and her husband, Chucho. Read the original poll here…

Hacienda Experience – With over 50% of the votes, Hacienda Yaxcopoil was far and away our reader’s most positive hacienda experience. There are many haciendas in the Yucatan around Merida, and we encourage anyone who comes here or lives here to visit Hacienda Yaxcopoil to see what life might have been like here 100 years ago. Then go visit a few more haciendas. Some of them are renovated, some are abandoned. Each one is unique and beautiful… collect them all! By the way, Hacienda Ake, which has a working Casa de Maquinas and a nearby Mayan ruin was the Runner Up in this category. Read the original poll here…

Place to Walk in Merida – Here’s a subject close to our hearts, because walking is such an important activity for us. If we couldn’t walk somewhere in Merida, we think we’d just have to curl up in a ball and die. The grande dame of avenues won this category hands down: Paseo de Montejo with it’s almost-year-round sculpture exhibit and its turn-of-the-century mansions won with almost 50% of the votes. As avid walkers, however, we encourage you to explore the other places mentioned in this poll, especially the Runner Up location, the Acuaparque. Read the original poll here…

Taco Stand - As new residents, we often didn’t feel comfortable eating at a taco stand until we knew someone else had eaten there and lived to tell the tale. That’s why this poll is so valuable. Now our readers have spoken! And any of you newcomers or visitors have at least five taco stands you can frequent with impunity, enjoying everything that Yucatecan cuisine has to offer. The winner in this category was Wayan’e, with El Cangrejito not far behind. Hmmm, we get hungry just thinking about it! Read the original poll here…

Servicio al Domicilio Lunch – Would you believe it? The Yucatan Living Readers Choice for best place to deliver lunch to your door was won by the only German Deli in town… Meyer’s Deli! Meyer’s makes some incredibly delicious sandwiches, potato salad and has the best cold cuts in town, bar none. Next time you’re sitting around the pool or at your desk and don’t want to make lunch, give them a call! And don’t forget the Runner Up, either. Pollo Brujo is a perennial favorite around here and has all those locations because their chicken just tastes so good! Read the original poll here…

Restaurant Near the Zocalo – Visitors and residents alike often find themselves wandering downtown wondering where to eat. This Yucatan Living Readers Choice Poll tried to shed some light on that dilemma by sharing the opinion of the Yucatan Living community. And which restaurant won? Well, a restaurant that appeals to both residents and visitors! Pancho’s Restaurant, owned by the famous Wayne Trotter, beat out the Runner Up, Portico del Peregrino, by a handy margin. Must be those waiters dressed like banditos, with their big hats and their bandeleros filled with wine corks! OK, as residents, we must admit the waiters’ costumes and the flaming Mayan coffee were not factors, but the good food, the friendly bar, the charming owner and the outdoor dining room certainly were. Read the original poll here…

Real Estate Agency – The Yucatan Living Readers Choice Award for Best Real Estate Agency was the most hotly contested category in 2007. There were more votes in this category than any of the other two categories combined! Our Readers Choice for 2007 is Real Estate Yucatan! We know that Alec and Gabriela and their agents work tirelessly to service their clients and that they certainly have earned this award. The Runner Up in this category, Tierra Yucatan, is no slouch either, and it was a very close call. With all the real estate activity going on in Merida and along the Yucatan Gulf Coast this year, these agencies, and the others in town, were incredibly busy and overworked. We congratulate the Winner and Runner Up on maintaining their great customer service in the face of such activity! Read the original poll here…

Well, that’s it! Congratulations to all our Winners and Runners Up… and to our voters and readers, too, because in this contest, everybody wins! We will be visiting each of our winners to deliver their award certificates within the next few weeks, so when you visit, look for them on the wall! And also in the next week, Yucatan Living will start the 2008 Readers Choice Polls with some new categories. The 2007 categories will be repeated again soon too, so if you didn’t get your vote in last year, you’ll have a chance to make yourself heard in 2008.

Thank you to everyone who participated in 2007, and we encourage all our readers to vote (but just once!) in every category and share their knowledge of this wonderful place we live in 2008.

To participate in the first Readers Choice Poll of 2008, Best Place for Fine Dining in Merida, please click here.