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When we get off the bus onto Avenida Tulum, all we can think of is jumping in the sea. A quick 15-day jaunt has brought us to Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, and after a week of hard travel involving cabanas with no running water and obscure Mayan jungle ruins, we aging backpackers are looking forward to a little R&R on the beach at the funky resort town of Tulum.

Our suite, a huge, bright room with king-sized canopy bed, is the best in the atmospheric two-storey Spanish walk-up. Electricity stops at 11 p.m., but there's running water and the beach is a mere 200 metres from our private balcony. Still, I feel trapped. Soon, we are supplementing daily swims and naps with late-afternoon taxis back to Avenida Tulum, where we can shop, dine, drink and people-watch.

In Thailand and India, beach towns generally have a good range of guest houses and huts within a short walk of the water. The beach tends to be ruled by bars and restaurants, so where you sunbathe is not necessarily where you are living and eating. In Tulum, however, beachfront accommodations are literally that, and even if your hotel isn't officially all-inclusive, it feels like it is. Your hotel's bar or restaurant might not own the view it faces, but there is a proprietary air.

Avenida Tulum, on the other hand, belongs to anyone. This dense two-kilometre stretch of Highway 307 is hardly spectacular on first sight. It's not the romantic colonial town of your travel guides; look around and you'll spot North American-style interlocking brick and traffic calming devices. Taxis in the area are unionized, so fares are predetermined, posted and hassle-free. Drivers wait in a most civilized manner, joking among themselves and always motioning to the correct driver in the queue.

Although its true allure is difficult to capture, Avenida Tulum's evolution from what must have been a roadside bus stop to a relaxed traveller's hub is oddly compelling. There is a grassroots, vibrant and entrepreneurial air to the street, which is lined by Internet cafés, hotels, funky bars, hip, Mexican-run boutiques and a dizzying selection of restaurants.

Yet Mexico is never far away. Every night, hundreds of locals, presumably from the hospitality industry, step off work shuttles and disappear into the side streets. One evening while eating pollo freido ($3.25), I see a teenager in her soccer uniform pushing a baby stroller. On Avenida Tulum, it is possible to sample pricey Italian gnocchi, purchase fresh percolated coffee at a café across from the bus station, and wander two blocks east to the mercado to buy colourful plaid shopping bags for less than $4. Similar shopping bags, once craftsmen adorn them with shiny sequins, can go for 10 times as much.

One afternoon after our swim, we go in search of Melinda's, a hot habanero sauce we've learned to love on our eggs. We find 14 bottles at $1 to $3 each for our friends in Canada, but only after scouring at least 10 mom-and-pop convenience stores. The sheer volume of foreigners indicates that Avenida Tulum has become a place where travellers take a break, or stay indefinitely. We're not the only ones smitten with this dusty road.

In this part of Mexico, it's easy to find mass-produced silver trinkets and sombreros, but far more challenging to find the indigenous treasures you hear of in other states like Oaxaca or Chiapas. On one visit, we hop out of our taxi early and wander through a slower area. There, we find a young Mexican jeweller in a cordoned-off market held together with chicken wire fencing — it looks like a squat. Her handcrafted silver pieces are simple and only marginally more expensive than what you see in most shops. I pick up a dangly earring made of four unfinished turquoise rocks ($25).

Locally run boutiques share a whitewashed, concrete-swimming-pool aesthetic. Vicios Swimwear is sandwiched between standard tourist shops, but its swimwear is sexy and bold while the exotic, ethnic-inspired tank tops are shiny and flattering. At another boutique called Shalom, sequin shoes, cheesecloth tops and chandelier earrings reveal a little-known Mexican fascination with wares from the Indian state of Rajasthan.

Farther down the road is Suwus, run by a bubbly Mexican woman named Ana. Bikinis, bangles and shoes are grouped together by colour, hanging from racks or flat on beach mats. “I focus on the beach,” Ana says. “People come here from the city who wear black and say, ‘Well, I wouldn't wear that at home.' I want to take that out of them and make them feel free.”

I fall in love with a one-of-a-kind, hand-painted T-shirt ($163) by young designer Leon Felipe. Two days later, while eating across the street from Suwus, I resign myself to buying the T-shirt.

On another evening, we watch a film on a projection screen at Akabar while sipping tequila sunrises (about $4.30 each) from the comfort of a red leather sofa. The Dutch-run restaurant and bar sits beneath a thatched rooftop, and would fit in easily on Toronto's College Street or Mont-Royal Est in Montreal. The second floor has pool tables and in the back room, where cushions replace chairs at low tables, a tree sprouts from a hole in the concrete floor. Candles sit in sand-filled paper bags, a common lighting technique in Tulum.

When the film ends, a local DJ starts to play tunes and young, stylish Mexicans mingle with foreign residents. We consider another drink, but decide against it; people are on the dance floor, but our trip is short, so partying will have to wait for another time. Back at the hotel, the electricity is done for the evening, and we'll be able to hear the waves that much more easily.

Special to The Globe and Mail