The next day we left the Caribbean coast for the last time and headed west to the ruins of Chichen Itza. 
These are probably the most famous Mayan ruins and were recently voted as one of the seven new wonders of the world. The main attraction at the site is El Castillo, the Castle, a four sided pyramid that is perfectly aligned with the sun. Every spring and fall equinox the sun is aligned with a face of the pyramid and the shadows form a serpent slithering down the side. Directly north of the pyramid is a cenote, or water hole, and this is where the Mayans believed was the home of the rain god and sacrifices to the rain god were performed to prevent droughts. They have recovered over 30,000 remains at the bottom of the cenote and many more were destroyed beyond recovery. There are many other temples, buildings and carving throughout the site, including a huge ball court and an astronomical observatory that was used to calculate the position of El Castillo. After Chichen Itza we continued west to the city of Mérida, the largest city on the Yucatan. It was Sunday evening and the central park was alive 
with live music and people dancing in the streets. The city has a very colonial Spanish feel and is home to the oldest cathedral in North America. We checked out the government building for the state which was full of huge beautiful murals which told the history of the Yucatan in a compelling way. We also found a theater near the center park that was providing a free concert. We watched several members of the Mérida orchestra perform popular older Mexican music. After the concert we caught an overnight bus south and out of the Yucatan.
The bus arrived in the town of Palenque the next morning and I had managed to get some sleep, despite the frigid temperatures on the over air-conditioned bus. We checked into hostel that was situated in the middle of the jungle, surrounded by trees and streams chock full of rain water. We headed to the nearby ruins of Palenque which is known as the most beautiful of the Mexican Mayan ruins. The ruins were situated atop a group of hills in the lush jungle and were mostly built by a king who reigned for 69 years and his son. Most of the temples were actually burial locations for rulers and important members of Palenque and one of them contained an empty sarcophagus that was open to the public. The main attraction was a large Palace that contained a tower unlike any other Mayan ruin. There was also a stream diverted by the Mayans through the city that flowed off the hill in a beautiful waterfall.
The next day we went to a couple of waterfalls outside of Palenque. The rain that continued to come down had turned them into huge torrents of water. The first was a single impressive drop and you could walk behind the waterfall if you didn't mind getting completely soaked by the spray. The second was known as Agua Azul, Blue Waters, but the rain had turned it into Agua Chocolate. It was a series of powerful cascades that were almost overflowing. I walked the path that followed along the river and the cascades and rapids continued for 2 or 3 kilometers. There was a Mayan village along the path on the other side of the river and I watched as a group of kids used a little tram hooked up to a cable to pull themselves across the fast moving river, the only way to access this village. The end of the path came to a beach with a view of the river bursting out of a narrow canyon. I tried to follow a faint path through the jungle to find a better view of the canyon but it disappeared after about 15 minutes. We finished the day by arriving in the mountain town of San Cristobal de las Casas where we got soaked in the cold mountain air trying to find our hostel.
The next morning was still cloudy but no rain and I walked around the city. It was a very pretty colonial town and every time I turned a corner I ran into another church or park. This was the city that the Zapatistas took control of in 1994 and there are still signs of Zapatista support. I took a minivan to the nearby Mayan village of San Juan Chamul. This village was originally
Catholic but the traditional Mayan religious views transformed the church until it barred priests from coming and stopped holding Mass. The town is very serious about preserving its religion and will expel any villager that changes religion. There are local religious police and they dress in thick white wool coats for ceremonies. The wool coat is popular there because the sheep is one of the most common farm animals. I had to pay a fee to enter the church and was forbidden from taking any pictures. The church had no seats of pews and instead had a layer of pine needles on the floor. There were sculptures of many different saints throughout the room and most of them had rows of candles burning in front of them with villagers praying in front of them. Some of the interesting beliefs of the village include the belief that Christ never rose again and they have an image of him buried in a coffin. They also believe that the bubbles in Coke carry away sins and they use Coke in their religious ceremonies.
The next day I took a tour to the nearby Canyons de Sumidero. This was a river that ran through some incredibly high cliffs. Some of the cliffs towered a kilometre directly over the river. It was my first experience of cliffs this massive and it was awe-inspiring to say the least. My sense of perspective had trouble dealing with the massive distances and a soaring vulture that appeared to be high above the cliffs ended up being barely halfway up the side of the cliff. In addition to the canyons the river itself was also full of wildlife. We saw a number of crocodiles including a nest of about 50 baby crocodiles. We also saw a bunch of spider monkeys hanging out on the trees sticking out of the cliffs. At the end of the river is a huge 300 meter high hydroelectric dam that keeps the river deep and calm in the canyon rather than the rapids it used to be. The four dams on the river provide Mexico with 30% of its total electricity.
That night we took a night bus to the Pacific Coast and the town of Puerto Escondido. The first day we arrived we just relaxed and hung out on the beach enjoying the first little bit of sun that we had seen for a while. The next day we rented surfboards and tried our luck with the waves. The town is famous for it's big waves and we were not quite ready for them and were crushed pretty hard. Even so, it was probably the last time surfing for me for a while and I'll miss it.
We took another night bus to the city of Oaxaca. This city is famous for its chocolate, mezcal and revolutionary politics. In 2006 there were a number of violent protests and the police cracked down pretty hard on them. Now, however, things are much more peaceful but there are still protests going on. When we were there some teachers were holding a three day sit-in in the center plaza and were set up with tents and shelters. There were a lot of communist booths set up as well with the soviet sickle and pictures of Marx, Lenin and Stalin urging revolution. Other than this simmering tension the town was rather peaceful and there were plenty of parks, cathedrals and cafes. The chocolate making section of the city contains a number of chocolate factories and people handing out free samples.
The next day we headed to the city of Puebla, a large city with another pretty center plaza area and a church with an unbelievably brilliant gold altar. We then took a bus to the neighbouring city of Cholula to spend the night. We found a mountaineering hostel in the town because we were interested in climbing one of the three massive peaks in the area. Unfortunately the constant rain eliminating any possibly of making a trek, however it was interesting to talk to the guides at the hostel and I definitely want to come back and climb one of them. In the morning we took a tour of the city and visited a few of the 37 churches. One church is located directly on top of what appeared to be a large hill in the center of town but is actually a huge buried pyramid. The pyramid is the largest in the world by volume and is full of excavation tunnels that indicate a number of different groups have added to the temple. Some of the tunnels are open to the public and we spent a claustrophic half hour exploring them. The church at the top of the pyramid gave a great view of the city and the surrounding mountains.
These are probably the most famous Mayan ruins and were recently voted as one of the seven new wonders of the world. The main attraction at the site is El Castillo, the Castle, a four sided pyramid that is perfectly aligned with the sun. Every spring and fall equinox the sun is aligned with a face of the pyramid and the shadows form a serpent slithering down the side. Directly north of the pyramid is a cenote, or water hole, and this is where the Mayans believed was the home of the rain god and sacrifices to the rain god were performed to prevent droughts. They have recovered over 30,000 remains at the bottom of the cenote and many more were destroyed beyond recovery. There are many other temples, buildings and carving throughout the site, including a huge ball court and an astronomical observatory that was used to calculate the position of El Castillo. After Chichen Itza we continued west to the city of Mérida, the largest city on the Yucatan. It was Sunday evening and the central park was alive 
with live music and people dancing in the streets. The city has a very colonial Spanish feel and is home to the oldest cathedral in North America. We checked out the government building for the state which was full of huge beautiful murals which told the history of the Yucatan in a compelling way. We also found a theater near the center park that was providing a free concert. We watched several members of the Mérida orchestra perform popular older Mexican music. After the concert we caught an overnight bus south and out of the Yucatan.
The bus arrived in the town of Palenque the next morning and I had managed to get some sleep, despite the frigid temperatures on the over air-conditioned bus. We checked into hostel that was situated in the middle of the jungle, surrounded by trees and streams chock full of rain water. We headed to the nearby ruins of Palenque which is known as the most beautiful of the Mexican Mayan ruins. The ruins were situated atop a group of hills in the lush jungle and were mostly built by a king who reigned for 69 years and his son. Most of the temples were actually burial locations for rulers and important members of Palenque and one of them contained an empty sarcophagus that was open to the public. The main attraction was a large Palace that contained a tower unlike any other Mayan ruin. There was also a stream diverted by the Mayans through the city that flowed off the hill in a beautiful waterfall.
The next day we went to a couple of waterfalls outside of Palenque. The rain that continued to come down had turned them into huge torrents of water. The first was a single impressive drop and you could walk behind the waterfall if you didn't mind getting completely soaked by the spray. The second was known as Agua Azul, Blue Waters, but the rain had turned it into Agua Chocolate. It was a series of powerful cascades that were almost overflowing. I walked the path that followed along the river and the cascades and rapids continued for 2 or 3 kilometers. There was a Mayan village along the path on the other side of the river and I watched as a group of kids used a little tram hooked up to a cable to pull themselves across the fast moving river, the only way to access this village. The end of the path came to a beach with a view of the river bursting out of a narrow canyon. I tried to follow a faint path through the jungle to find a better view of the canyon but it disappeared after about 15 minutes. We finished the day by arriving in the mountain town of San Cristobal de las Casas where we got soaked in the cold mountain air trying to find our hostel.The next morning was still cloudy but no rain and I walked around the city. It was a very pretty colonial town and every time I turned a corner I ran into another church or park. This was the city that the Zapatistas took control of in 1994 and there are still signs of Zapatista support. I took a minivan to the nearby Mayan village of San Juan Chamul. This village was originally
Catholic but the traditional Mayan religious views transformed the church until it barred priests from coming and stopped holding Mass. The town is very serious about preserving its religion and will expel any villager that changes religion. There are local religious police and they dress in thick white wool coats for ceremonies. The wool coat is popular there because the sheep is one of the most common farm animals. I had to pay a fee to enter the church and was forbidden from taking any pictures. The church had no seats of pews and instead had a layer of pine needles on the floor. There were sculptures of many different saints throughout the room and most of them had rows of candles burning in front of them with villagers praying in front of them. Some of the interesting beliefs of the village include the belief that Christ never rose again and they have an image of him buried in a coffin. They also believe that the bubbles in Coke carry away sins and they use Coke in their religious ceremonies.
The next day I took a tour to the nearby Canyons de Sumidero. This was a river that ran through some incredibly high cliffs. Some of the cliffs towered a kilometre directly over the river. It was my first experience of cliffs this massive and it was awe-inspiring to say the least. My sense of perspective had trouble dealing with the massive distances and a soaring vulture that appeared to be high above the cliffs ended up being barely halfway up the side of the cliff. In addition to the canyons the river itself was also full of wildlife. We saw a number of crocodiles including a nest of about 50 baby crocodiles. We also saw a bunch of spider monkeys hanging out on the trees sticking out of the cliffs. At the end of the river is a huge 300 meter high hydroelectric dam that keeps the river deep and calm in the canyon rather than the rapids it used to be. The four dams on the river provide Mexico with 30% of its total electricity.
That night we took a night bus to the Pacific Coast and the town of Puerto Escondido. The first day we arrived we just relaxed and hung out on the beach enjoying the first little bit of sun that we had seen for a while. The next day we rented surfboards and tried our luck with the waves. The town is famous for it's big waves and we were not quite ready for them and were crushed pretty hard. Even so, it was probably the last time surfing for me for a while and I'll miss it.
We took another night bus to the city of Oaxaca. This city is famous for its chocolate, mezcal and revolutionary politics. In 2006 there were a number of violent protests and the police cracked down pretty hard on them. Now, however, things are much more peaceful but there are still protests going on. When we were there some teachers were holding a three day sit-in in the center plaza and were set up with tents and shelters. There were a lot of communist booths set up as well with the soviet sickle and pictures of Marx, Lenin and Stalin urging revolution. Other than this simmering tension the town was rather peaceful and there were plenty of parks, cathedrals and cafes. The chocolate making section of the city contains a number of chocolate factories and people handing out free samples.
The next day we headed to the city of Puebla, a large city with another pretty center plaza area and a church with an unbelievably brilliant gold altar. We then took a bus to the neighbouring city of Cholula to spend the night. We found a mountaineering hostel in the town because we were interested in climbing one of the three massive peaks in the area. Unfortunately the constant rain eliminating any possibly of making a trek, however it was interesting to talk to the guides at the hostel and I definitely want to come back and climb one of them. In the morning we took a tour of the city and visited a few of the 37 churches. One church is located directly on top of what appeared to be a large hill in the center of town but is actually a huge buried pyramid. The pyramid is the largest in the world by volume and is full of excavation tunnels that indicate a number of different groups have added to the temple. Some of the tunnels are open to the public and we spent a claustrophic half hour exploring them. The church at the top of the pyramid gave a great view of the city and the surrounding mountains. 
No comments:
Post a Comment