Why doesn't Tulum deserve its poor reputation?

I'm lying on soft, white sand, at the ideal point when it's balanced to suit me like a foam of memory, listening to the tide break close to my feet. "We can't stay here one just said, listening to the tide, and to the tourist cluster standing behind me. "This is terrible."

It seems like the same rich bohemians who made it an aspiring destination in the first place are fighting a battle against Tulum, Mexico. In the nineties, the short stretch of jungle and beach on the Caribbean coast, close enough to Cancun for comfort and far enough to be a distant memory for its ugly resorts, made its name as a hippie hangout. Its quasi-mystical aura, surrounded by Mayan ruins, turned the sleepy Mexican town into a meeting place for all kinds of yogis and crystal-hoarding meditators.

Tulum soon went popular, as with so many backpacker destinations, think anywhere on the banana pancake trail in Southeast Asia. Now, individuals come to paradise to buy a week, which is where everything begins to go wrong.

Recently, a form of seaweed called sargassum has overwhelmed the beaches of Tulum. It really isn't that big a deal for a Brit used to the pebble beaches of Brighton and Essex: the sea is tinged with a light red hue, and you have to wade through some weeds to get to clearer water.

"I thought that's exactly what the sea looked like," I told an unbelieving American tourist, asking how I could go on a holiday in such unbearable circumstances. But tourism in the area has plummeted by an astounding 35 percent because of it in desperation, wealthier resorts now pay locals to wheelbarrow it away from their pristine beach fronts. Some of the more enterprising locals have begun to build houses and hotels built from dried seaweed bricks.

1/10Best Beaches of the World 2018

"A recent headline warned, "Tulum goes from beach paradise to eco-nightmare. The tourist boom's environmental effect, seen in landfill overflow and water pollution, is undeniable, but is the answer really to leave the region?

Who got Tulum killed? "Last week an article asked. Tourism did: and as with similar eco-nightmares in Southeast Asia (for instance, the closure of Maya Bay in Thailand), it was left to pick up the pieces by the local government. Tulum became the first sustainable tourism zone in Mexico at the end of last year, paving the way for local authorities to implement tighter construction standards and to prioritize money for green initiatives. Recently, the Environment Secretariat blocked the development of a 520-room resort in northern Tulum, and five similar resorts were forced to suspend construction earlier in the year. The tide is turning, and against reckless growth, it is turning.

But what really is Tulum like?

It was heaven when I was there last in the off-season for a month (which runs late August-December, but is really any time outside the peak seasons of Christmas and mid-April). The beach lane, a bumpy path that runs between the sea and the jungle, from Tulum town to the beach strip, was almost silent; on a whim, you could walk into the hottest restaurants; hotels that typically charged $10-20 (£7.50-15) a day for a spot on the beach let me lounge all day for the price of a nacho coffee or cup. My twice-daily yoga lessons were always one-on-one, conducted 20 steps from my bedroom in an open walled shala set back in the jungle. This saved me £ 40 a night, including breakfast. I dived in cenotes between classes-giant, cool, underwater pools and cave systems; I pottered up to the Mayan Clay Spa one day, and since it was 40 percent off for the low season, I treated myself to a 90-minute massage that almost made me melt through the table. I pulled friends from my yoga classes into my yoga classes at night.

The jungle road will roar with taxis if you visit Tulum in the high season, the beach loungers will be booked, the restaurants heaving. But the playa will always have spirit, because that's preserved in the jungle sounds that startle you when you're walking home at night; when you discover them with a diving torch at the bottom of the dark cenotes; when you trust a yoga instructor that coaxes you into a pretzel-like pose that you could never do at home.

Of course, if you're just in it for Instagram, or if a clump of seaweed will ruin your holiday, Tulum's soul can evade you. Hopefully, a brief decline in tourism would give local businesses space to breathe and a chance to have an effect on new pro-environment policies. The outcry against Tulum may be the best thing to happen to it if the high season becomes the new low season.

It's a little bit of a walk to Charly's Vegan Tacos, but well worth it the Chicharron Prensado tacos are out of this world, crackling with pepper sauce and garlic aioli.

Michelada, glasses of beer flavored with hot sauce and lime, and generously filled $2-$3 tacos are served at the loud and pleasantly un-hip Ice Cream Counter.

Yoga Shala provides twice-daily yoga lessons and a variety of accommodation and is one of the cheapest places to stay at the playa. Double from £45 with shared toilet, B&B.

At the luxurious end, Dos Ceibas offers a truly environmentally sustainable stay. Entirely solar-powered, to avoid adding to traffic, it sources its own water from a well and aims for zero-waste. Doubles from GBP 180.

British Airways has a £ 362 return flight to Cancun. Tulum is two hours away by car.