![]() Prices range from $350,000 to $1.25 million per unit in the El Taj, which coincidently is the same location as the $7 per night hostel that Perlman once stayed in. The top floor is an homage to an Ewok Village with palapa roofs and gardens that create the feeling of some sort of forest canopy or sky world. The trunks of Balinese palms make up the pillars and hand carved woodwork, onyx stone, and the occasional image of the Buddha feature prominently throughout the complex. For his latest development, El Taj (two complexes and a beach club), Perlman, who travels to Indonesia often, brought several containers of woodwork back from Bali. Each project has a theme ranging from Mayan to Mediterranean. his five condohotels are still smaller boutiques properties with a few dozen rooms. Some might say this was opening Pandora’s Box, but so far Playa has managed to grow somewhat controlled.Įven though he is backed by investors such as the owner of Equinox Gyms in the U.S. Perlman helped bring American-style title insurance to Playa and transparent business practices. When he first bought property here he paid someone who said “from the pole to where that bird is.” There were no titles. Perlman can now be credited with changing the atmosphere of Playa del Carmen almost as much as anyone. He found a cheap hostel for $7 a night right on the beach. He made it to Playa del Carmen, just a small fishing village with ferry dock, but missed the boat to so had to stay the night in town. “Yes, because the road is all dirt and the only cars that will make the drive are the ones that have already had their windshield cracked from the loose gravel.” They said to take a taxi with a broken windshield to Playa del Carmen to catch the ferry. After seeing a Cancun with a Planet Hollywood and All Star Café, he asked where he could find a similar atmosphere as the one he found six years before during his previous visit.Everyone told him to go to Cozumel. Playa del Carmen is still a town, and while the massive resorts cover the route there from the Riviera Maya, they have managed, for the most part, to stay out of the center. True there is a Wal-Mart now and a Señor Frogs, Häagen – Dazs, Starbucks, and McDonald’s, but the other side of the highway is still endless expanse of green jungle. Playa del Carmen, the largest town on the Riviera Maya, still has its charm. ![]() In Cancun, where the entire “hotel zone” sits isolated on a sand bar away from the main city, any smidgen of local culture remains segregated from visitors. When the mariachi is done he packs his things up in a wooden crate and covers it with a black garbage bag and walks off into the night.Įl Fogón is just a five-minute walk from La Quinta, Play del Carmen’s main pedestrian avenue lined with shops, restaurants, and small hotels. It’s lively and local, though a few tourists wander in. Three bowls of hot sauce sit on every table. Waiters race across the restaurant with trays of Alambre Beef, Chorizo Quesadillas, and Tacos and Tortas of various fillings. ![]() Beers are served michelada, with hot sauce, limejuice, Worcestershire sauce, and a salted rim. He’s cutting off pork from a tower of spit-roasted meat, a Shawrama like cooking style brought to Mexico by Lebanese immigrants. One large horno a la leña, wood fired oven sits on one side of the restaurant. Across from the Mega super store the world’s saddest looking mariachi is playing to a packed open-air grill, Taqueria El Fogón.
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