#142. Explore Fuego (Sunday, December 21, 2025)

What was your best day…of voluntarily signing up for an adventure?

Given how epic my first night at Cancun’s Coco Bongo had been (#4), you’d think I’d have waited less than a decade to return.

Of course, since that moment of pure delayed nightlife satisfaction, I had been to enough other nightclubs—in enough different exotic (#24, #41, #62) and non-exotic (#26, #63) places, including the Coco Bongo at Punta Cana—to see that spot for what it was. A legit, well-known, high-production-value club in a packed tourist area that had once played an invaluable role in my life; but nothing more than that.

It still formed the anchor of the weeklong solo Cancun trip I took during that year’s Christmas holidays. A trip that was almost strange in how exactly in line with expectations it turned out. The Coco Bongo night was objectively pretty awesome (though the place literally felt twice as small than it did in 2015), my resort the Royalton Chic was affordably high-quality¹, I spent a lot of time swimming in the crashing waves (even with a double-red flag warning²), I met a lot of cool people at the wet bar and the after-hours lounge (like #69), and I drank a lot of strawberry daquiris and ate a lot of tacos.

Between all this, my last night there was pretty epic, where I: (1) randomly met two hedge fund brothers while waiting for the (non-functional) elevators: (2) talked with them a lot about hedge funds (naturally, since that was my main topic of research at work those days), (3) joined them at their resort steakhouse dinner where they shared their three-hundred dollar wine with me, then later, after a few more hours of drinking, (4) unconsciously assembled a group of about ten others³ to head over to that cow-themed nightclub (#5) in the Club Zone where we danced until four in the morning.

For my one “adventure” this trip, I decided to book an excursion to the Xplor adventure theme park, which contained an extensive zipline complex above the trees, a giant waterslide, sprawling forest terrains for buggy drives, and a series of rivers in caves that you could swim and paddle through. Pretty cool. But I took it one step further, by booking the more expensiveness Xplor Fuego package—which lets you into the park at night.

And naturally, it being dark outside elevated all of these activities to something else. Everything gains a more mysterious, more “you’re trapped in this alternate dimension” air—even the massive dinner buffet all the underground cave-swimming (which is dark and creepy either way) by proximity. And it also increases the perceived danger of all the outdoor activities.

In fact, heading into it, I was genuinely concerned that my general clumsiness could (emphasis on could) put me in mortal danger at a place like this if I was not careful. Embarrassing as it might be, Xplor Fuego was an active step outside my comfort zone. And that fear was at the forefront of my mind all through my bus’s arrival and me putting on the swim vest and protective headgear (mandatory for all activities) before the adventure.

And as it turned out, even though I felt appropriately safe through all this, there were a few small things that suggested this place did carry some legit hazards.

First, the main attraction, the ziplines. They went far, far above the trees—up to fifty meters above the surface—and offered a pretty spectacular view in motion. They have professionals there, and you’re all anchored properly while riding the ziplines. But… right before they actually strap you in on each platform, there’s a few seconds where you’re standing on an angled surface about two meters from the edge, with nothing beyond that but an abyss of trees. I was extremely careful in those parts.
There were two zipline routes: I took the shorter one while it was light outside, and planned to do the longer one—which went through a literal ring of fire at one point (hence the “Fuego”)—when it was dark. But then, as I got partway up, they shut the whole route down, because somebody just ahead of me had a “serious medical emergency”. I never found out what that was, but in any case the fire route did not reopen for the rest of the night.
Then, there was the dune buggy drive, which lasted forty-five minutes across an uneven, curvy, and (in some places) water-filled terrain. As has been well-established, I am not a good driver (#52, #129), and I was driving solo, so I was anxious to start off. But it all went smoothly for me. However, on two separate instances, I saw the buggy ahead of me get stuck in some pit or some heavy patch of mud and had to be rescued by the park staff. The first time, literally all four people in the buggy had gotten out of the vehicle (which I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to do), and were all vigorously trying to push the buggy out like it was an emergency. That would’ve been one of the most hilarious sights I’ve ever seen—if I wasn’t so deathly afraid at the time of the same thing (or worse) happening to me shortly…

So, not quite the same adventure in Cancun as the one that defined the fourth best day of my life, but an interesting (and shelter-breaking) adventure nonetheless.

The only notable downside was the 14-story building being served by only three working elevators for the majority of my stay. (Three were under repair.) The value-over-replacement of getting even one of those fixed would’ve been far greater than any other amenity Royalton could’ve spent the money on.
In fairness, the wind on that day likely didn’t warrant such a warning. And everyone was else was swimming as well, so I followed the logic of simply not going as far out as the furthest person out.
Which included this girl, Salma, I had a small theoretical crush on. “Theoretical” because it vacation and I was not in that state of mind at all. (And in her case, she actually lived in Ottawa as well. Which, ironically, made it even more “theoretical” to me in the context of this exotic trip.)