Cozumel Jeep Rental

Cozumel Jeep Rental Listings

  • Alamo Car Rental – Cozumel, Mexico
  • Avis Car Rental – Cozumel, Mexico
  • Budget Car Rental – Cozumel, Mexico
  • Ernesto’s Rental – Quintana Roo, Mexico
  • Fiesta Car Rental – Cozumel, Mexico
  • Hertz Car Rental – Cozumel, Mexico
  • Less Pay Car Rental –  San Miguel, Mexico
  • Rentadora Aguila – Cozumel, Mexico
  • Thrifty Car Rental – Cozumel, Mexico

Cozumel (Yucatec Maya: Kùutsmil, English: Island of the Swallows) is an island in the Caribbean Sea off the eastern coast of Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula, opposite Playa del Carmen, and close to the Yucatan Channel. Cozumel is one of the ten municipalities (municipios) of the state of Quintana Roo. Cozumel is a tourist destination for its balnearios, scuba diving, and snorkeling. The main town on the island is San Miguel de Cozumel.

It is also a stop for Caribbean cruises by cruise lines Carnival cruise lines, Celebrity cruises, Crystal cruises, Disney cruise line, Holland America line, Norwegian cruise line, Princess cruises, Pullmantur cruises and Royal caribbean international.

Geography
The island is about 48 km (30 mi) long and 16 km (9.9 mi) wide, and is Mexico’s largest Caribbean island. It is Mexico’s third-largest island, following Tiburón Island and Isla Ángel de la Guarda. It lies some 10 km (6.2 mi) from the mainland, and 90 km (56 mi) south of Cancún.

The vast majority of the population of Cozumel lives in the town of San Miguel (pop. 77,236 in 2010), which is on the island’s western shore. The municipality, which includes two small areas on the mainland enclaved within the Municipality of Solidaridad with a land area of 10.423 km² (4.024 sq mi), has a total land area of 647.33 km² (249.93 sq mi).

The land area is covered with an impenetrable jungle which has many endemic animal species. Cozumel island, including offshore islets, has a land area of 477.961 km2 (184.542 sq mi).

History
The Maya are believed to have first settled Cozumel by the early part of the 1st millennium AD, and older Preclassic Olmec artifacts have been found on the island as well. The island was sacred to Ix Chel, the Maya Moon Goddess, and the temples here were a place of pilgrimage, especially by women desiring fertility. There are a number of ruins on the island, most from the Post-Classic period. The largest Maya ruins on the island were near the downtown area and have now been destroyed, but not by the construction of the airport during WWII as some sources incorrectly state. Today, the largest remaining ruins are at San Gervasio, located approximately at the center of the island.
Maya ruins of San Gervaiso, 1994

The first Spanish expedition to visit Cozumel was led by Juan de Grijalva in 1518; in the following year Hernán Cortés stopped by the island on his way to Veracruz. The Grijalva and Cortés expeditions were both received peacefully by the Maya of Cozumel, unlike the expeditions’ experiences on other parts of the mainland. Even after Cortés destroyed some of the Maya idols on Cozumel and replaced them with an image of the Virgin Mary, the native inhabitants of the island continued to help the Spanish re-supply their ships with food and water so they could continue their voyages. As many as 10,000 Maya lived on the island then, but in 1520, infected crew members of the Pánfilo Narváez expedition brought the smallpox contagion to the island and by 1570 only 186 men and 172 women were left alive on Cozumel. In the ensuing years Cozumel was often the target of attacks by pirates, and in1650, many of the islanders were forcebly relocated to the mainland town of Xcan Boloná to avoid the buccaneers’ predation. Later, in 1688, most of the rest of the island’s population, as well as many of the settlements along the Quintana Roo coast, were evacuated inland to towns such as Chemax. In 1848, refugees escaping the tumult of the Caste War of Yucatán settled on the island and in 1849 the town of San Miguel de Cozumel was officially recognized by the Mexican government.

In 1861, American President Abraham Lincoln ordered his Secretary of State, William Henry Seward (who was later to purchase the Russian Territory of Alaska for the US in 1867), to meet with the Mexican charge d’affaires Matias Romero to explore the possibility of purchasing the island of Cozumel for the purpose of relocating freed American slaves offshore. The idea was summarily dismissed by Mexican President Benito Juarez, but in 1862 Lincoln did manage to establish a short-lived colony of ex-slaves on Île à Vache off the coast of Haiti.

Government
Cozumel is part of the State of Quintana Roo (Q-Roo). The Municipality of Cozumel consists of the island of Cozumel (with its offshore islets) and two pieces of adjacent mainland surrounded by the Municipality of Solidaridad. They are Calica and the Xel-Há Water Park. During the 2010 census there were 122 populated localities and 86 unpopulated localities enumerated.

Culture
Festival of El Cedral in Cozumel

To this day a historic festival is held in the small town of El Cedral, in the south of Cozumel Island at the end of April. This annual event is said to have been started over 150 years ago by Casimiro Cárdenas.

Cárdenas was one of a group that fled to the island from the village of Saban, on the mainland, after an attack during the War of the Castes. The attackers killed many other villagers, but Cárdenas survived whilst clutching a small wooden cross.

Legend has it that Cárdenas vowed to start an annual festival wherever he settled, to honor the religious power of this crucifix. Today, the original Holy Cross Festival forms part of the wider Festival of El Cedral, which includes fairs, traditional feasts, rodeos, bullfights, music and competitions. The celebrations last about 5 days in all and are held every year at the end of April or beginning of May.

Info Source: Wikipedia.org

Photo Source: Flickr.com CC