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Cenotes Map

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The “Filo di Arianna” is located in Chemuyil, in the centre of Riviera Maya, where “Cenotes” and cave systems are: The world’s top place for cave diving. Chemuyil is on the coast of the Mexican state of Quintana Roo, in the Yucatan Peninsula, 40km south of Playa del Camen and 18km north from Tulum.

To better understand the origins of the unique scenery, we need to know that this vast area of caverns and “Cenotes” has a very particular geological history:

The whole Yucatan peninsula, was a submerged limestone platform that can be as thick as 2300 meters. This platform formed between the Cretaceus and Tertiary periods. That is between 144 and 63 million of years ago. The foundations of this platform were corals and marine sediment.

The formation of the caves and caverns forming the systems criss-crossing the Yucatan Peninsula, depended upon three independent yet complementary mechanisms:

1. The whole Tulum surrounding area receives approximately 1.5 meter of rain water per year. This absorbs the atmosphere’s carbon dioxide, enabling the formation of carbonic acid. The terrain’s permeable structure, and the absence of a permeable “strata” rends practically impossible the formation of rivers and lakes; water penetrates the terrain and finds its way to the oceans via the fractures in the limestone structure.

2. The fluctuation of the sea levels occurred at any of the glacial era, originated the second lever of the mechanism. As the water froze by and large at the poles, the sea level in the equatorial’s area diminished considerably. This in turn drained away the galleries and the highest caves.

3. As the water drained away, it wasn’t able to sustain the cavern’s structure any longer, and they consequently collapsed. This event opened up the “windows” (or the Mexican call them, Cenotes) along the cavern systems. During the glacial eras, acid rain continues to infiltrate through the limestone, dissolving it and slowly depositing it inside the caverns. This slow-ripping process originate the stalactites and stalagmites structure, an amazing feature of this area that can be easily accessed and viewed today.

About 18,000 years or so, at the end of the last glacial era the sea level raised of about 100 meters, submerging again the caverns and caves system. In the deeper passages, we can still find sea water, above which rain water layered upon. The rain water remains on the surface as it is less dense. And it is this rain water that, as it makes its way to the sea continues the limestone erosion process.