Casting Off: Mexico - Part 3. Chichen Itza and cenote swimming

This is where we started to do some more interesting things. It was on our second last day and we decided to book a tour, through the agent in PM who'd been chatting to us every day about this great tour to Chichen Itza. I bargained him down a little bit, but not much - but clearly enough for the bus driver later to ask me to keep to myself how much I'd paid, as the others had all paid much more, but I'd still be receiving the luxury service. Maybe he said that to everyone though.

Anyway, we were picked up for our trip at 8am from in front of the Church. For the day, whenever the tour leader called out who had to get off where, I was 'Berenice of the Church' (as opposed to Senors Smith from the Hotel Paradisus, etc). I liked that.

The bus was very squashy, but we met some nice Canadians and chatted with them a bit, and we got lots of drinks etc offered to us, and a good commentary about the Yucatan (which is actually Mayan for "I don't understand" - their response to the Spanish when they arrived and asked 'What is this place'?

It took a couple of hours, which went quickly, to get to our first stop, which was a "cenote" - an underground cavern filled with water (View upwards from the middle of the cenote, and Angus in the cenote, pictured right).

It was really beautiful, with tree roots raining down from the ground above, high cliffs on each side - we saw a few iguanas resting on ledges - and green, green water.

We both swam in it, me happy to do so as it was a stinking hot day - over 35 degrees celsius, and this was winter! In summer it would be an unbearable place. So, we both just jumped in from the top of an old wooden ladder. I realised on trying to climb out that the ladder into the water didn't actually extend under water, which resulted in a rather unattractive hauling of myself out using some creative rolling motions (required because of my having a frozen shoulder at present!) to hook my leg over the bottom rung and then use my arms and shoulders as well. It wasn't easy. I was offering for others go first, but no-one wanted to. They all wanted me to go first. I guess so they could watch. There were lots of people in there, and the more adventurous could dive in from higher up the cliff walls. I didn't agree to Angus doing so, though.

After we got out, we dried off and went back to the bus, which took us through a 'traditional village' on very narrow roads, to a hotel for lunch. We were very near Chichen Itza. In the traditional village, some school children gave us traditional hand gestures as we all stared out of the bus window at them. Couldn't blame them!

We had a lovely buffet lunch while we watched a very contrived traditional dance routine. Then it was back to the bus for the 5 minute drive to Chichen Itza.

Chichen Itza was very interesting, but it was incredibly hot and uncomfortable and difficult to walk around in the sun for too long. There were hundreds of people selling things. Our tour guide took us around the 'new city' (around 1400s I think) and we learned what an incredibly bloodthirsty civilisation the ancient Mayans were. The stadium had lots of murals detailing the rules of the game - the losing team gets decapitated. Still, apparently it was a great honour to play, and everyone volunteered.

We also learned how the cenotes were used for human sacrifices, mostly of women and children, who walked the plank really, and fell to their doom in the cenote below. I felt a little queasy at the thought of what we'd been swimming in earlier.

The great pyramid was quite spectacular. Elton John is playing a concert there next month. It has amazing acoustics - we tried several of the built-in effects, like the bird call effect, when you clap at the bottom of the pyramid stairs (behind Angus in the photo), as well as visual effects, where you can see a snake in sunlight when the sun shines at a certain angle, particularly at the equinoxes (but we saw the general effect anyway). The Maya were pretty advanced in such matters.

After exploring a bit more on our own, it started absolutely pouring and we headed back to the bus for the trip back to 'the Church'. It was a good day.