As we walk, my body starts to loosen up and relax, as if someone had oiled my Tin Man joints. Partly it's a matter of welcome exercise after travel. But I wonder if the place itself, with its warm and humid and mineral-dense air, could be acting like a mild, naturally occurring spa.

Speaking of which, I'm looking forward to more unwinding the following night, at one of the growing number of actual spas. At the recently enlarged Kinan Spa at the Maroma Resort, where I'm staying, I go for an Exotico Body Polish: an exfoliating balm of crushed purple grape seeds followed by a layering of volcanic mud and a tension-dispelling coconut spritz. Maroma holds pioneer status as the first and, at almost twelve years old, the most venerable of the small resorts to offer upscale service and amenities. Like a few of the more intimate venues along this coast, it began life as a private residence, built on the grounds of a former coconut plantation. Its white stucco buildings and stone paths today aspire to the atmosphere of a village, with Mayan motifs, a nightly lighting of abundant candles, and the occasional New Age or European touch. The highlights of the grounds, for me, are the ceiba tree near the front entrance, whose engorged-looking trunk calls to mind an enormous vase; the restaurant's main archway, which artfully frames a superior beach; and a big guacamaya parrot. Loud both in its occasional squawks and in its primary-colored feathers, the bird sits on a lower tree branch in a central courtyard looking enviably happy with its lot.

Later that afternoon, I continue south on Highway 307, passing some of the big European-owned all-inclusives. I'm headed to the ruins at Tulum. Post-classical Mayan, they are memorable less for their design than for their magnificent setting on a cliff above the sea. As I drive, I pass a crew of men engaged in the slow, harsh work of widening the highway to four lanes. The road foretells an easier future, but it also challenges the area's scale and character.

Wilma's damage was not as extensive to the Riviera Maya as it was to Cancún. In fact, the farther south you go, the more you hear claims that the coast's already ample beaches actually grew as sand washed down from the north. Damage there was, though, during two frightening days of rain and wind. It was enough to keep some hotels closed throughout the lucrative peak season, from mid-December through early 2006. But catastrophe's aftermath can pry open possibilities.

For visitors willing to accept the weather risk, Wilma's anniversary month, October, has become a season of uncrowded opportunity. From last year's visit to Tulum, I remember a herd of buses in the parking lot and of bathers in the cove below, and an English boy in long shorts who insisted on stomping all over vulnerable temples, reminding me of a bratty child villain out of Roald Dahl. Today, as I stand just beyond the Temple of the Wind and look down at the pale swimming-pool-blue water, it is quiet enough to appreciate its quality of tropical Shangri-la. The Spaniard Juan de Grijalva, having set out from Cuba, sailed by in 1518 and concluded from the size of the formidable Castillo temple at the cliff's edge that this was a city to compare with Seville. The world at large forgot about the ruins, however, until 1842, when Tulum was rediscovered, half-hidden amid overgrowth, by the American explorer John L. Stephens and his English illustrator, Frederick Catherwood, a fascinating figure who was a close friend of the poet John Keats's.