If day 2 was hacienda day, then day 3 was water day. Our first shooting location of the day was in a cenote. I’ve seen pictures of them for years, but never visited one in person before. We went to Cenote Chelentun in the little town of Cuzama. It was a particularly special location as the cenote was about a mile from where we parked, and we were transported to the cenote on horse drawn rail cars. These small horses trotted along the rail line with amazing dexterity. The cenote itself was very beautiful with amazing colors in the blue green water that took on different character as the light from above changed position. The water was accessed down a somewhat sketchy steep stone staircase that went down 30 or 40 feet. The working space was fairly confined, so the 11 of us were kind of working on top of each other, but I was still able to get some interesting and beautiful shots. After two or three hours of shooting, we got some lunch and returned to our hacienda home for a little rest.
Our second location of the day was at a beach in northern Yucatán near San Crisanto, where we had a large cabana and a private area of beach. After my workshop on Kauaʻi I thought maybe I’d seen all the beaches I needed to for a while, but this provided some interesting places to shoot (and some nasty stickers), and of course we had a different group of models to collaborate with. I was able to fulfill a desire to apply some of my recently learned lighting techniques, and I got some nice beach sunset shots with Dasha (with Dima’s umbrella assistance) that were of an iconic style and a bit of a milestone for me.
After the sun had set they had arranged for some local fishermen to provide a traditional dinner for us at the cabana, and we got fresh fish, chicken, rice, … It was a great way to finish up the day.