Mexican Road Trip: To the Yucatan and Back
Back in 2015, the year I retired, I took two huge road trips. The first one, a bucket-list drive to Alaska, was documented in a Field Report that I posted here on RTA: Arizona to Alaska and Back through 24 National Parks: The Mother of All Road Trips. (The title truly does say it all!) Six weeks after I returned from that “trip of a lifetime,” I took off on a second major excursion, an 8,000 mile, month-long expedition through Mexico, all the way south to the Yucatan and back. I’d wanted to see the Mayan ruins for most of my life, and boy, did we ever! In the course of that month we visited 14 different Mayan sites, and along the way, we attended colorful festivals in five different Colonial cities, ending with the amazing Day of the Dead celebration in San Miguel de Allende. All in all, my Mexican Road Trip was some of the best fun I’ve ever had, and I don’t make that statement lightly!
The trip was extremely well documented. I shot thousands of photographs, as did my friend Mike Fritz, my shotgun rider, who also shot hundreds of videos with a Go Pro camera. I’ve got lengthy text messages and emails in which I described our experience to friends as we went along, and with all of that, I’ve been able to reconstruct everything that happened with remarkable clarity.
Over the next several weeks, I’ll be posting a new Field Report that I’m calling Mexican Road Trip: To the Yucatan and Back. It’s going to be another long report, and I’ll have to ask for your patience, because a lot of it isn’t written yet (and these things take time!)
I’ve consolidated the many tips and precautions that I learned while road tripping in Mexico, and I created a planning guide that serves as a sort of prelude to the “Mexican Road Trip” series on my blog, (rcquinn.com). Mark posted a link to that article last week, but, in the interest of keeping things tidy, I’ll repeat it here:
Mexican Road Trip: How to Plan and Prepare for a Drive to the Yucatan
As for the trip itself, I’ll begin at the beginning:
Heading South, from Laredo to Villahermosa
In October of 2015, shortly after I returned from my Alaska RoadTrip, my old friend Michael and I packed up my Jeep and drove it to the Yucatan. I’d wanted to see the Mayan ruins for as long as I could remember, but considering all the negative reports I’d been hearing about Mexico, I realized going into it that I’d have to take a few precautions. Recruiting Mike to ride along with me was one of them, because everything I’d been reading, including the Mexico Travel Advisory put out by the U.S. Department of State, advised against traveling alone. I took that to heart, and gladly, because it was a lot more fun that way. In my experience? Road trips with old friends are the best kind of fun that there is.
I rendezvoused with Michael in Austin, and we left from there. My research told me that the Eagle Pass/Agua Prieta border crossing was the easiest and least congested, but Laredo was 100 miles closer, which gave it the edge for the sake of convenience. Austin to Laredo is a simple enough drive, 235 miles south/southwest on Interstate 35, a freeway that’s as straight and flat as any you’ll find. The trip takes about 4 hours if you don’t make any stops, and the city of Monterrey, where we planned to stay that first night, was another three hours south of Laredo. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect at the border, or how long it would take, but the drive itself was only seven hours altogether, so I figured we were allowing plenty of time. We had a liesurely breakfast in Austin, then ran some last minute errands. All that took longer than I expected, so we didn’t get on the road until almost 10:00. Looking back with 20/20 hindsight, that lack of urgency was a definite mistake.
We arrived in Laredo about 2:00 PM. I had not pre-purchased my Mexican auto insurance, but I saw signs advertising the service in the windows of at least half a dozen offices in the downtown area. All I had to do was park, but do you think I could find an empty parking space in that busy downtown? Oh, hell no! The traffic so near the border crossing was totally nuts, moving at a snail’s pace on confusing one-way streets. After at least half an hour of circling, I finally got lucky and snagged a spot, then rushed into the closest Insurance brokerage, where it took another half hour to fill out the paperwork and pay the fee. By the time we finished, it was after 3 PM, which was hardly ideal. I made a firm resolution, then and there, that the next time, I would
A.) Buy my insurance online, and
B.) Get an earlier start!
At that time, in 2015, thirty days of insurance coverage set me back about $160. The cost in 2023 is a little higher (naturally), but they give you six months of coverage for the same price as one month, so it isn’t all that bad. Once we had the insurance in hand, we were ready to cross, so I followed the signs that said “MEXICO.” And that’s where the adventure began:
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DAY 1: THE HIGHWAY OF DEATH, FROM LAREDO TO MONTERREY
The Rio Grande runs smack through the middle of Laredo, separating the storied town in Texas from Nuevo Laredo, its’ Mexican counterpart. When you’re headed south from the U.S., there are three different bridges that will take you across the river, and each of them leads directly to a Mexican Customs facility. I’ve been told that the least congested of the three is the Colombia Crossing, the bridge that’s off by itself, 25 miles upriver from the other two. I didn’t know about the Colombia bridge when we crossed, so I chose the main bridge in the middle of the city, and that one was busy as the dickens.
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We’d packed for a month-long trip through several climate zones, so we had a wide range of clothing, along with too many cameras, a laptop, and other assorted road-trip gear. The inspector asked where we were headed, and when I told him the Yucatan, he suddenly came on full alert. “Yucatan” wasn’t the usual answer, so he asked more questions as he dug through our luggage, paying special attention to the photo equipment. Michael had a drone that he’d brought along, hoping to get aerial shots of the Mayan ruins. It was in a box right on top, so it was the first thing the inspector came across. As it turned out, drones are prohibited practically everywhere in Mexico, so the mere fact that we had one made us that much more suspicious. The inspector had just started pawing through our stuff in earnest when there was a sudden flurry of activity and excited shouting in the next lane over. They apparently found some actual contraband in a minivan full of college students, so our guy abruptly wrapped up our inspection, wished us a “Buen viaje,” and rushed off to assist with the bust. Feeling a bit like I’d just dodged a bullet, I closed up my Jeep and skedaddled the heck out of there.
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When you cross the border into Mexico, there are differences that are immediately apparent. The signs are suddenly all in Spanish, the streets and sidewalks swell with crowds of pedestrians, most of them selling one thing or another, and everything, from the pavement to the buildings to the window displays in the shops, it’s all a little bit funky, outdated, and crumbling around the edges. Some of that is the natural ambience that goes along with the border towns; the rest is Puro Mexico. You get used to it. You might even learn to love it!
Our next stop was Immigration, but I didn’t see any signs, so I ended up driving away from the border area, deeper into the city on one-way streets. By the time I got my bearings, we were already on the highway headed south. I found a place to make a U-turn, which was a lot harder than it should have been, and we ended up back at the Customs area. I still didn’t see Immigration, so I parked and started messing with my phone, hoping Google Maps might be of service. Just then, a guy came up to the Jeep and rapped on my window.
“Are you guys lost?” he asked in English. “I saw you drive away, and now you’re back.”
“Which way is Immigration?” I replied, leaving my window rolled up.
“My name is Jose,” he said, smiling, and giving us a friendly wave. “I work as a tour guide. For ten bucks, I’ll take you there myself.”
Mike and I exchanged a glance. “Why don’t you just point the way?” I replied.
“Ten bucks,” Jose repeated, holding out his hand.
I’d already wasted too much time driving in circles, so I extracted a ten from my wallet, lowered my window, and gave it to him.
He tucked the bill in his pocket, then pointed at the building across the street. “That’s Immigration.”
“No way!” I protested. “That’s customs! We’ve already been there!”
“Immigration, Customs, same building, different parts. You have to go up the ramp to that glass door, and get in line.” He had me, fair and square, and I felt like an idiot. We weren’t even officially in Mexico yet, and we’d already been hustled!
Inside the building, there was a row of service windows, and each one had a long line in front of it. After waiting half an hour for our turn at the Immigration window, we paid the fee of $30 apiece for our tourist cards (FMM Visas) and got them stamped. Next, we got into the line for the Vehicle Import Permits, where we waited another half an hour, only to be told, when we finally got to the front, that we were doing things out of sequence! We were supposed to go to the Banjercito Window first, to pay the required deposit! So we got into the third line, a bank teller’s window, and waited yet another 30 minutes. I put a $400 charge on my Visa card that would serve as a deposit for the Vehicle Permit; the teller explained to me that when I left the country again and properly cancelled the permit, they would simply reverse the $400 charge, back onto the same credit card. We got back into the Vehicle Permit line once again, and we waited, once again. This time, fortunately, we had everything we needed. They went outside with us to visually inspect my Jeep and compare the VIN number, then they affixed a holographic sticker to the inside of my windshield.
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It was already after 5 PM at this point, and we still had a three hour drive to Monterrey. I realized, with a sinking feeling in my gut, that there was no way in hell we were going to make it before dark. Monterrey is a big city of well over a million people, a relatively sophisticated center of industry and commerce anchoring the third largest metropolitan area in the entire country. Monterrey itself is generally considered safe, and is often referred to as one of the most livable cities in Mexico. Under the surface, however, the Cartels are unreasonably active, using the city as a base for a broad range of criminal activity, and one of the areas where they are MOST active is on the highway between Monterrey and Nuevo Laredo. The press refers to that 137 mile stretch of MX 85 as the “Highway of Death,” in reference to all the shootouts, mass kidnappings, and murders that have taken place along that road. I didn’t know any of that at the time. What I did know was the simple fact that driving it at night was a bad idea!
I already knew the way out of town, and we already had a full tank of gas, so we got straight to it. MX 85 was a divided highway with a fair bit of traffic. We’d no sooner gotten up to cruising speed when we ran into what appeared to be a military road block, a lot of trucks and troops, stopping everyone passing in either direction. When it was our turn, soldiers in SWAT gear surrounded my Jeep, and an officer with a machine gun gestured for me to roll down my window. He asked me where we were going. I’d learned my lesson in customs, and knew better than to mention the Yucatan. “We’re going to Monterrey,” I said, without elaborating.
He checked our ID’s and our travel documents, then handed them back. “Don’t stop along the way,” he advised. “You need to get off this road and to a safe place as quickly as you can.” As if I needed to be told!
At the halfway point, MX 85 changed to MX 85D, a toll road. There was another checkpoint by the toll booths, this time the National Police, and they were even more heavily armed and armored than the soldiers. We had no license plate on the front of the Jeep; Arizona is one of several states that no longer issues front plates. The Federales saw us coming and pulled us out of line, demanding an explanation for the missing plate, wanting to know what we’d done with it. My rusty Spanish was coming back surprisingly well, so I was able to explain that my home state was “too cheap” to give us two license plates. They actually thought that was pretty funny, so we all had a good laugh, and they waved us on, after cautioning us not to dawdle along the way. While we were talking to them, I noticed a carload of young Mexican guys getting yanked out of their vehicle. Half a dozen cops in full SWAT gear had them spread-eagled on the ground, while another half dozen cops literally tore their car apart, even ripping open the upholstery on the seats. Michael watched all that for a moment, then turned toward me, raising one eyebrow quizzically. “Welcome to Mexico,” I said with a smile.
We fairly flew down that highway, not slowing down for anything other than the roadblocks and toll booths, and we rolled into Monterrey just after 7:30. The sun had long-since set, but the city was lit like a Christmas tree, with crazy traffic zooming along wide boulevards.
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We knew nothing about the place and had no idea where to stay, but we were so rattled by the tense drive south from Laredo, we would have been fine with just about anything. I spotted a La Quinta Inn. It was new, fancy, and undoubtedly expensive, but I really didn’t care; I was desperate to stop driving! I whipped in, we checked in, and got a room with a great view, all the way up on the 10th floor. We’d made it, and that felt like a victory!
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Next up:
Day 2: From Monterrey to Queretaro: The City with the Drive-In Bordellos
Day 2: Monterrey to Queretaro
That first morning, we took advantage of the complimentary breakfast at our hotel. There were a few other travelers in the dining room, but most of the guests were Mexican businessmen, and if it wasn’t for that, we could easily have been at a La Quinta Inn across the border in Texas, or anywhere else in the U.S. Mike and I made a pact over our scrambled eggs: from that point forward, we were going to try to AVOID American chain hotels and restaurants. We were in Mexico, after all, and it made no sense to settle for homogenized lodging that was the exactly same as what we would have found at home.
We checked out and hit the road a little after 8:00, anxious to get moving, and hopefully cover some distance. Unfortunately, the City of Monterrey had other ideas. It was rush hour, and the traffic was packed so tightly together it was nearly impossible to change lanes. We kept missing our exits, and before long it was obvious that we were driving in circles. There were mountains behind the skyline to the south, so I kept one eye on on the tallest peak, and the other eye on the compass on my dash board. That got me going in the right direction until I finally saw signs for Saltillo, the next big town along our line of travel.
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I’d mapped out a route that stuck to the toll roads, using an App provided by Mexico’s Secretary of Transportation: <<Traza de Ruta: Toll Calculator and Route Planner>>.
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Checking my printout from the Toll Road route planning App
The tolls are actually a bit expensive, but well worth it; the toll roads, known as Cuotas, save time, because they bypass all the small towns. They’re also better maintained, and safer, since they’re more frequently patrolled.
Our plan for the day was to take MX 40-D to Saltillo, then MX 57-D south from there, to San Luis Potosi and Queretaro. I wasn’t really sure how far we’d get that day. I figured we’d just play it by ear, and see where we were when the sunset hour approached.
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Scenes along the road south of Saltillo
This was strictly a driving day. I hadn’t planned to make any stops, focused instead on putting as many miles as possible between us and the border. We were clearly still in the danger zone, because the army was everywhere, with more of the mobile roadblocks and truckloads of soldiers on the highways.
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There were camo-painted Jeeps with 50 Caliber machine guns mounted in the back, and even a few armored personnel carriers. It reminded me of the years I spent driving around in Colombia, back in the early ’70’s, when that country was under martial law, and in the throes of an ongoing civil war. Mexico clearly has a war going on as well. Hearing about it was one thing. Seeing it in person was something else again!
The Cuotas are expressways, in the sense that they are divided roads with limited access and no intersections. In and around the big cities like Monterrey and Queretaro, they’re built to modern standards, and carry high volumes of traffic, just like the expressways in the U.S. and Canada. Once you get away from the cities, little differences creep in, the most obvious being the presence of unexpected hazards in the roadway that require an added level of vigilance.
It’s not uncommon to see pedestrians in unlikely places, not to mention burros, goats, and chickens, as well as potholes large enough to damage your car if you hit them straight on. You’re not supposed to stop along these roads, much less park, but that doesn’t stop vendors from setting up stands along the shoulder selling everything from lemons and strawberries to homemade “licor de café,” (a concoction that’s presumably similar to Kahlua). The more rural the area, the more prevalent these distractions, so it definitely behooves you to hold down your speed, and keep your eyes peeled.
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That afternoon, I realized that we’d be passing within 25 miles or so of San Miguel de Allende, a charming colonial city I’d always wanted to visit. I figured that might be the perfect place to pull up for the night, so I made a slight detour off the main highway, and we drove to San Miguel. As it turned out, our timing couldn’t have been worse. There were roadblocks manned by Federales on all the roads in or out of the town, and the central plaza was completely cordoned off by the police. It seems there was a celebrity wedding going on, and they’d taken over the whole place! I started checking hotels, but everything in the area was booked solid.
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Appreciating the Scenery in San Miguel de Allende
What little we saw of the town truly was charming, with steep cobblestone streets, and beautiful colonial architecture. “We’ll just have to come back here,” I said to Michael. “Maybe at the end of the month, on our way back north.”
Queretaro, a much larger city, was only an hour away. I figured we’d have unlimited options for lodging in a place that size, so off we went, arriving there just as the afternoon faded into evening. Queretaro turned out to be almost as confusing as Monterrey.
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Central Mexico
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We cruised around searching for hotels, and simply weren’t seeing any, not until we turned down a road on the perimeter of the city, where we found a half dozen possibilities, lined up in a row. They looked more like villas than hotels, but there were neon signs advertising rooms at remarkably low prices, only $450 Pesos (about $25).
I pulled in to one of them, but didn’t see an office, just a gate that seemed to be locked. There was a call box on the wall, so I pushed the button, and a charming female voice asked what she could do for me. I inquired about rooms, and she said that they had one. I asked if the price on the sign was correct: $450 Pesos for the night? The woman giggled. “No,” she said. “It’s $450 for an hour, but that’s only if you bring your own companion. It would be more, of course, if you use our other services.” My eyes went a little wide, and I busted out laughing, no help for it. We’d stumbled into a whole neighborhood full of drive-in bordellos! I made our excuses, still laughing, and we drove back down the hill.
Making our way through the city, I spotted a Staybridge Suites, right alongside the freeway, so I took the next exit, and after a bit of confusion involving one-way streets, we parked in front of the lobby.
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What was it we’d said to ourselves about American chain hotels? This was part of the same chain as the Holiday Inn, but after our adventure up on the hill, we just wanted a bed for the night, so we swallowed our pride and went for it. The hotel was clean, and well appointed, but it was a boring clone of every business class property I’ve ever stayed in. Somehow, we were going to have to do a better job of finding hotels!
Next Up: Day 3: From Queretaro to Villahermosa: Artfully Dodging the D.F.
Day 3: From Queretaro to Villahermosa
Over breakfast the next morning, we took a hard look at our maps. We’d driven 600 miles since crossing the border, and we still had almost 700 miles more to go before we’d reach our first real stop: the ancient Mayan city known as Palenque, all the way down in Chiapas, the southernmost of the Mexican states. We didn’t have any fixed itinerary beyond that. Mayan ruins were going to be a major focus of our Road Trip, and I knew which sites I most wanted to visit, but at that point, I was playing everything by ear. We were considering pushing on into Belize, possibly even Guatemala, but a lot depended on how well things went for us, and it was too early in the trip to make those decisions.
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Nuevo Laredo to Palenque: From the Rio Grande to the Lacandon Jungle in a mere 24 hours of driving!
One of my biggest concerns on that 3rd day was Mexico City. I’d recently learned about a law that was in force in Mexico’s Capital, and in the surrounding State of Mexico. Called “Hoy No Circula,” (Don’t Drive Today), the law requires all drivers to leave their vehicle parked one day per week, as a way to reduce vehicle emissions. Air quality in Mexico City is literally the worst in the world, so they’re serious about enforcement, and anyone caught driving on a day when they’re not supposed to gets a citation and a significant fine. Every vehicle on the road is subject to these regulations, even tourists, like us, who are just passing through.
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Residents have special holographic decals on their license plates, and they all know perfectly well which days and hours are restricted for their vehicle. The restrictions for visitors are determined by the last digit on their license plate. There is a web application, sponsored by the Mexico City Government, which drivers with foreign plates can use to figure out their schedule: <<¿Que Dias No Circulo?>> (Which Days Don’t Drive?) In my case, the last digit on my Jeep’s plate was a “4.” Under “Hologram” I select “Autos Foraneos,” (Foreign Auto), and under “Ultimo Digito” I select #4.
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With these choices, the App tells us we won’t be allowed to drive anywhere in the D.F. (Federal District), or in the State of Mexico, between the hours of 5 AM and 10 PM on Wednesdays or Saturdays, nor could we be on the road between 5 AM and 11 AM on any weekday! There’s a workaround for tourists who plan ahead: every six months, vehicles that are model year 2008 or newer are allowed a 14 day exemption, known as a Pase Turistico. (Either 14 continuous days, or two 7 day blocks). You have to apply for the Pass in advance, and carry it with you in your vehicle at all times.
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I figured I could avoid the whole business by driving directly to Puebla, and steering well clear of the capital. The only problem with that was the zig-zagging border of the State of Mexico: the most direct route between Queretaro and Puebla crossed in and out of the State of Mexico three times, and since we had no Pase Turistico, every time it did that, we’d be at the mercy of any cop who felt like pulling us over. Sitting there at breakfast, I very carefully plotted out a route that stayed to the east of the problem area. It was really close, so we’d have to be extremely careful not to miss any turns.
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Route from Queretaro to Puebla that avoids entering the State of Mexico (the area delineated by the dotted red line)
We made it to Puebla without incident, so I’d have to say that my plan worked out for us. One strange thing that we noticed when we got to Puebla was the open manholes. All over the city there were manholes missing their covers, and there were no warning barricades, so drivers were veering all over the road to avoid hitting one of the holes straight on and breaking an axle. I found out later that local thieves made a practice of stealing the covers for the value of the metal, snatching them almost as fast as they can be replaced. Frustrated local residents have taken to putting up their own makeshift barricades, to avoid serious accidents. Apparently, this has been going on for years!
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After Puebla, we turned east toward Orizaba, making our way down out of the mountains, heading toward Mexico’s Gulf Coast. This was a fantastic drive, zooming downhill on wide, smooth highways. The mountains were green, tropical, reminding me so much of the Andes that they put a nostalgic tear in my eye.
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Picturesque villages nestled in the folds of the valleys, little changed since the Colonial era. Mike and I traded off on the driving and made excellent time. We couldn’t decide where to stop, so we kept going, all the way to Villahermosa, a total distance of almost 600 miles.
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Day 3: Queretaro to Villahermosa, avoiding Mexico City!
That was really too much for a single day, but it felt great to have covered so much distance. Villahermosa was just two hours from Palenque! The town of Villahermosa was nothing special, but there were plenty of hotels to choose from, so we found ourselves a moderately-priced room, had a quick dinner, and went straight to bed.
Next up: Day 4 (Morning): Running Road Blocks in Chiapas
(Which Days Don’t Drive?)
is this still a thing in Mexico?
What a crazy thing to have to contend with.
Enjoying the photos!
Mark
With the exception of Sheri's Ranch
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Rick Quinn
Not even in Nevada?
Well, there are a hand-full of bordellos left in Nevada, but the Web and smart phones have pretty much removed the need for such establishments. And of course, they only exist in counties with small populations.
With the exception of Sheri's Ranch -- I can't think of any brothel in Nevada that would double as a motel.
But technically, I guess it is similar to what you found!
Mark
Day 4: From Villahermosa to Palenque
After three long days and more than 1,200 miles of driving, we’d made it from Laredo, on the border with Texas, all the way to Villahermosa, in the Mexican State of Tabasco. We stayed the night there, but we didn’t stick around long enough to check out the town. Palenque, our first official destination, was just two hours away, and we were anxious to get on the road! We hopped onto MX 186, the toll road, and drove east/southeast toward Catazaja and the intersection with MX 199, a distance of just 75 miles.
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Paying the toll east of Villahermosa
From there, it was another 15 miles south to one of the most spectacular ancient cities in the Americas. Ancient ruins are my passion. This was my first trip to the land of the Maya, so I was looking forward to this day the way a kid looks forward to Christmas.
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The Normal Route from Villahermosa to Palenque
We had smooth sailing the whole way, until just before we reached the road junction. That was where all the traffic came to a halt, a line of buses, trucks, and private cars that stretched out further than I could see. The truckers had all shut off their engines. Many of them had bedded down in the shade underneath their vehicles, and were taking an early morning siesta; some sat together in small groups, playing cards. Vendors were walking up and down the line selling sodas and other refreshments to the stalled drivers, and from the look of things, everyone was settling in for a long wait.
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Zapatista Road Block, Stopping all traffic on MX 186
I asked one of the truckers what was going on, and he explained that this was a Bloqueo, a protest mounted by the Zapatistas, a group of indigenous political activists, and they were stopping all traffic on every road leading into the State of Chiapas. They apparently did this sort of thing on a regular basis. This time, they were protesting the proposed construction of a “Super Carretera,” a modern highway that would run from Palenque to San Cristobal de Las Casas. The existing road was dangerous, and notoriously slow. A new toll road would cut the travel time in half, enhancing commerce, improving safety, and attracting more tourists to the region.
The Zapatistas felt that a road like that would only benefit outside interests, to the detriment of local residents, and that it would degrade the natural environment. To call attention to their position, they parked several 18 wheelers sideways across the highway by one of the toll plazas, and refused to move them, bringing all traffic to a halt in both directions. The Federales showed up first, followed by a squad of soldiers. The opposing factions faced off against each other, the Zapatista commanders exhorting the crowd with bullhorns, and before long the news media arrived, undoubtedly hoping to document a lively head bashing and mass arrests.
That was about the time that Michael and I got there. We walked up closer to the head of the line, to see what we could see: soldiers and police with rifles, campesinos waving signs, and at least one television news crew. I asked someone how long it was likely to last, and was told that it would probably end at sundown. “But it could stretch out for two or three days,” they said. “You never know with these guys.”
I wasn’t about to spend even one whole day sitting in a traffic jam, no matter how much sympathy I might have for their cause, so that left us with two choices: Option 1: we could make a U-Turn and head back to Villahermosa, then take the coast road north into the Yucatan, saving Palenque for another day, or: Option 2: see if we could find a back road to Palenque that bypassed the Zapatista Road Block.
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Guia Roji, a Mexican Road Atlas
I had a spiral bound copy of the Guia Roji, a Mexican road atlas that’s a bit like Rand McNally. I turned to the page with a map of the area around Palenque, located the highway intersection where they’d put up the road block, and then traced backwards along MX 186, looking for an alternate route–and I actually found something! There was a State Highway, #243, that intersected MX 186 about 25 miles back toward Villahermosa.
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Route 243, a State Highway, as depicted in the Guia Roji, with the location of the Zapatista Road Block marked
Route 243 crossed the line into Chiapas just before reaching a town called Salto de Agua (Waterfall), about five miles from the main highway. From there, it continued southeast through the countryside, and connected with MX 199 forty miles south of Palenque. It was marked as a secondary road, so it was probably paved, and since we’d already decided not to wait where we were, I figured we had little to lose. “It’ll be an adventure,” I said to Michael. As it turned out, truer words were never spoken!
I had no reason not to trust the Guia Roji, but since I had a decent signal on my smart phone, I figured it would be wise to double check that back road using Google Maps. I found State Route 243, but when I tried to match it with what I was seeing in my road atlas, it appeared as though Guia Roji’s map artists had smoothed out some serious curves. The road began and ended in the right places, but the countryside in between was something else again!
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Route 243 on Google Maps, quite different than the Guia Roji!
The distance to MX 199 was 75 miles, and Palenque was 42 miles further. According to Google, I’d need a bit more than 5 hours to drive it. That’s a very slow road, barely averaging 20 mph, with one switchback curve after another!
One nice thing about Google Maps is the way it lets you zoom in to view an area in greater detail. When I zoomed on the little town of Salto de Agua, I spotted yet another road, this one even smaller, that seemed to be a shortcut, connecting Route 243 with MX 199 in half the distance, and requiring less than half the time.
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A shortcut that we found on Google Maps that was NOT in the Guia Roji Map Atlas
This road didn’t appear at all in the Guia Roji atlas. I’d been burned by Google Maps enough times to to be cautious: the mystery shortcut might be nothing more than a cart track, or a footpath, in which case I’d have to stick with Route 243. Either way, the first step was to drive to Salto de Agua. Once we got there, the locals would know the best way to go.
MX 186 was a major regional highway that carried a ton of traffic; the line of vehicles backed up behind us had grown by almost half a mile, just in the time we’d been stopped. Many drivers were turning around and going back the other way, so I made a U-turn, and joined the pack. I assumed that there would be plenty of other drivers with the same idea as me, but when we got to the junction with Route 243, ours was the only vehicle that slowed and made the turn. It was a smaller road than what I expected, so small we almost missed it. Calling this road paved was a serious stretch: half the asphalt was missing altogether, and the rest had potholes big enough to cause damage. We bumped and bounced our way past a sign that read, “Welcome to Chiapas.” That was encouraging! Nobody was trying to stop the traffic on this road–it wouldn’t be worth their time.
We reached Salto de Agua, and almost immediately came to an unmarked fork in the road. This was the point where we were going to need some guidance, so I looked around, and spotted a policeman, standing on the corner. He was staring at us, obviously curious, so I turned around, and drove over beside him.
“Good morning,” I said cheerfully. “Can you tell me which of these roads is the best way to Palenque?”
“Palenque?” he said, looking a bit perplexed. “You should go back to the main road. That’s the way to Palenque.”
“The main road is closed today,” I informed him. “Nobody is moving past the crossroads.”
“Ah. The Bloqueo. But even so, that’s the only way to Palenque. You’ll have to go back the way you came.”
“My map says that this road goes on to Palenque.” I opened up the atlas and showed it to him, explaining about the long way around on Route 243, versus the shortcut I’d found on Google Maps. “I’m wondering if it would be possible to get through on the small road. It’s not on my map, but it would be right alongside the river, just north of it.”
The policeman studied the lines on the map, tracing them with his finger, looking even more perplexed “Yes,” he admitted with a shrug. “It is possible, but you really don’t want to go that way. It’s a terrible road!” He said something else after that, but I didn’t quite catch it, and besides, he had me at “terrible road”. I drive a Jeep, after all, and I love a challenge!
The guy wasn’t kidding about the road. The first couple of miles were paved, because we were still in the town, but after that, it went to the dogs, with wheel ruts so deep, it was like driving across a plowed field. According to Google Maps, the road followed a river. We hadn’t actually seen it yet, but we were supposed to be crossing it on a bridge at any moment. We rounded a curve, and sure enough, there it was, but there was a gang of guys with machetes who seemed to be waiting for us, and they had a chain stretched across the road, blocking the way.
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An unexpected Zapatista Road Block on our unmarked short cut, manned by Mayan men with machetes
“More Zapatistas?” Mike asked.
“If we’re lucky,” I replied. “If it’s anybody else, we’re in serious trouble.” I drove slowly up to the roadblock, and lowered my window.
“Good morning,” I said. “We’re driving to Palenque. Will you allow us to pass?”
The leader of the group, a young Mayan lad, walked up beside my Jeep, and fixed me with a menacing glare. “The road is closed,” he said, keeping his hand on the hilt of his machete. “By order of the Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional!”
“Is it closed to everyone?” I asked innocently. “How about if we pay a toll? How much would the toll be?”
He gave me an even more menacing glare. “That will cost you everything you’ve got,” he said gruffly, brandishing his machete, while his companions did the same.
I didn’t like the sound of that. Not at all, so I gave him a blank look and said, “No entiendo.” (I don’t understand).
“No entiende?” he repeated back to me. He wasn’t quite sure how to respond to that.
“How about you take ten Pesos,” I said in English, pressing a large, gold-colored coin into his hand. He stared at the coin, worth about 60 cents. It was such a ridiculous offer, he couldn’t decide if he should laugh in my face, or chop off my thumbs. The other guys took his uncertainty for acceptance and dropped the chain, so we sped away across the bridge, before they had a chance to reconsider.
There followed more than two hours of incredibly slow going over what really was a terrible road, but it was beautiful, and driving it was great fun. This was the most rural area we’d been through yet, tiny subsistence-level farms, so far off the grid, it was like observing life in a previous century. The only connection with the modern world was the road, which remained terrible for its entire length.
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Rural scene along remote back road in Chiapas
When we finally got to the other end, just before we rejoined the paved highway south of Palenque, we ran into another roadblock! The Zapatistas weren’t done with us yet. At this road block, they had a long board with nails driven through it from the bottom side, and they’d laid it across the width of the road.
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Board with nails, crude but effective way to stop traffic at a road block
We slowed down as we approached, and watched as they pulled their board back to allow a small local shuttle van to pass. Those little vans were the only transportation available to local residents, and they were apparently allowing them through the blockade. I saw that as an opportunity: while the van scooted past the stop point headed west, I shot around them headed east, just barely making it past as they attempted to jam their board full of nails under my tires, loudly yelling at me to stop. Needless to say, I kept going!
We made it to Palenque about half an hour later, found ourselves a room, and headed for the famous Mayan ruins on the outskirts of the town. With all the roads to the outside world sealed off by the Bloqueo–even the smallest roads, as we’d discovered–the only visitors to the archaeological park that day were people who were already there in Palenque before the roadblocks went up, a small fraction of the usual number of visitors. When we pulled into the parking area by the ruins, we attracted a curious crowd, and one of the men asked how we’d gotten through.
“We took a back road,” I told him.
“You found a road with no bloqueo?”
“There was a small bloqueo,” I replied. “But they let me pass when I paid the toll.”
He laughed, but then he quizzed me about that, wanting to know how much I’d paid, and on which road, and I realized that he might be some sort of Zapatista organizer, trying to figure out which of their people had failed at his job. I really didn’t want to get the guy at the road block into trouble, so I was deliberately evasive, claiming that I was lost out there, and didn’t even know which road I was on. He didn’t much like that answer, but he didn’t press me any further.
Running those roadblocks provided one heck of an adrenaline rush, but, in hindsight, it was more than a little foolish. We were extremely lucky that it didn’t end with punctured tires, if not punctured torsos.
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The Zapatistas are a serious organization with serious concerns. We were in Chiapas, which is their turf, so I really should have shown more respect. The wise move, under these circumstances, would have been to simply leave the area, and find somewhere else to go until the protest ran it’s course, and the road opened once again.
Next up: Day 4 (Afternoon): Palenque! My first Mayan City, and it was a Doozy!
Day 4: After the Roadblocks: The Ancient Mayan City of Palenque
As a photographer, my favorite subject has always been beautiful landscapes, of the sort that you find in our National Parks, but ruined buildings, especially those that are ancient and iconic, run a very close second place. The Mayan cities in the Yucatan had been at the top of my bucket list for decades, but it wasn’t until after I retired that I finally had the free time, along with the wherewithal to actually make the long drive south, to see them for myself. Anticipation had been building since we started this road trip, through the course of four days, more than 1,300 miles, and some truly one-of-a-kind adventures. We’d spent the first half of this 4th day bashing through the countryside, evading Zapatista road blocks. Now, at long last, it was time for the good stuff!
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Location of Palenque relative to the Yucatan Peninsula
The Yucatan was our nominal goal on this road trip, but I’d decided to make Palenque our first stop, mostly because it was the first Mayan city that we came to on our way south from the border. Palenque was one of the southern Mayan kingdoms, at its peak during the Classic Era, more than a thousand years ago. It’s located in the State of Chiapas, in an area known as the Lacandon Jungle, which is south of the Yucatan Peninsula. We drove to the town of Palenque, which I assumed was named after the ruined Mayan city. As it turns out, it’s the other way around. Palenque, the town, is one of the oldest in southern Mexico, founded in 1567, with a current population of more than 130,000 residents. Palenque, the ruin, just five miles away, is the singular tourist attraction in the area, and the only real reason for stopping there.
Palenque is one of the most famous Mayan cities, not because it’s the biggest or the most elaborate, rather because it was the first to come to the attention of the outside world, as far back as the 17th century. Traveler’s descriptions of the ruins, illustrated with detailed drawings, inspired much debate among the European intelligentsia, who argued about the origins of the remarkable stone buildings that had been discovered, buried in the steaming jungle. Many scholars assumed that the ruins must have been left by Romans, or Phoenicians, while others saw them as remnants of the lost city of Atlantis! No one thought it possible that the primitive people native to the area could have produced such wonders on their own. Later research proved them all wrong, of course, because the modern day Maya, primitive though they might seem, are the direct descendants of the pyramid builders, and not so very far removed.
Of all the Mayan ruins in Mexico, Palenque is one of the most thoroughly and extensively studied. Today’s scholars actually do know a fair bit about the place, and by deciphering the glyphs in the Temple of the Inscriptions, they even know much of the ancient city’s history. (If you’d like more details, consider checking out my blog: Palenque: Mayan City in the Hills of Chiapas.)
The drive from Villahermosa to Palenque shouldn’t have taken more than two hours, which would have put us there mid-morning. Thanks to the Zapatistas, we’d been forced into a detour that took us at least four extra hours, so it was already mid-afternoon! That left us just enough time for a brief visit to the archaeological park. First order of business was grabbing a hotel. (We did good! More on that below.) Then it was off to the ruins! There are small vans called combis that shuttle visitors from the town to the park for a reasonable fee, but we had my Jeep, so we simply drove ourselves.
The road to the park is lined by jungle on both sides, and there are several resort hotels along the way; conveniently located, but a good bit more expensive than the lodging in town. We arrived at a ticket booth, where we paid two bucks apiece to enter the Palenque National Park; they made sure to warn us that this fee did NOT include entry to the ruins.
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Location of the Palenque Archaeological Park, in relation to the town of Palenque
We came to a secondary entrance to the grounds, across the road from a small museum. I attempted to buy our tickets, only to be told that they don’t sell them in that spot, that I needed to keep driving, on to the main entrance, a bit further up the road.
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Asking directions at the lower entrance, where they do NOT sell tickets!
While walking back to the Jeep, we were accosted by a half dozen guys, loudly offering their services as tour guides. They were overly aggressive, visibly angry with me when I turned them down, and when we got back in the Jeep and drove away, several of them actually chased us down the road, shouting at us to stop! I found out later that these weren’t authorized guides, they were local hustlers. If we had agreed to hire them, there was a good chance they would have taken our money and disappeared with it!
A word to the wise about tour guides: if you need a guide at Palenque, or at any of Mexico’s archaeological parks, it’s okay to hire someone on site, rather than through an agency, but you should always use the certified guides at the main entrance.
We came to a small parking lot with several empty spaces, but when I attempted to pull in, I was met by a local who made a great show of “guiding” me into the spot, using elaborate hand signals. He was in charge of this space, he informed us, and for a mere 100 Pesos, he would personally insure that our vehicle would be safe and secure for the duration of our visit. Did that mean it would NOT be safe if we declined to pay him? That was definitely the implication. Feeling a bit like I’d just been extorted, I handed over the 100 Pesos (a little over $5.00), then I made a great show of setting my extremely LOUD car alarm before we walked away toward the ticket booth. Entrance to the ruins was another $3.00 apiece, but even when you add all those charges together, I thought it quite reasonable. (Bordering on cheap!) If we had elected to hire a guide, it would have set us back an additional $60 for a two hour tour. That’s still cheap, in the larger scheme of things, but it was more than we wanted to pay, so we decided to skip it; I had a guide book that would tell us most of what we needed to know.
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Palenque Archaeological Zone
I’d studied my little book in advance, at least briefly, and I’d read quite a lot about Palenque, everything from illustrated articles in the National Geographic to my old college textbooks about the Maya, so I thought I knew what to expect. We walked up the entrance road, and when we caught our first view of Palenque’s main plaza, I stopped dead in my tracks, literally struck dumb by that view!
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My first view of the ruins: Three pyramids and a Palace!
As is so often the case with the world’s ancient wonders, no photograph can possibly prepare you for the extraordinary sight of the real thing, up close and in person. The most important buildings were right there, three pyramids lined up in a row, plus the huge Grand Palace with its four story tower, and so much more! There were crumbling temples crowning the hills in every direction, and the jungle crowded in close on all sides, threatening to swallow it all. Mayan ruins in the jungle–it was utterly fantastic! The only thing missing was Indiana Jones in his fedora!
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We spent a quite wonderful afternoon exploring the ruins. There were very few other visitors, because the Zapatistas and their road blocks had prevented all the normal traffic from getting through to the town. We took full advantage of the minimal crowd, and I got some great photographs. At the busier Mayan sites, they no longer allow visitors to climb on the pyramids, and the buildings are surrounded by barrier ropes, to prevent you from getting too close. In 2015, when our visit took place, that hadn’t happened yet at Palenque. Some stuff was off limits, but we got to climb around on many of the buildings, up the steps, through the courtyards, so we really got to feel the place, the sights and sounds, the musty smells, the rough texture of the stone. I tried to imagine what it must have been like when it was a living city, the buildings stuccoed and painted in bright colors, murals and frescos on the interior walls, and people everywhere, including the priests and royals in their colorful finery. It must have really been something to see!
The park closed promptly at 5:00 PM, and they did a good job of herding everyone out before they locked the gates. We weren't done with our visit--there were sections of the ruins we hadn't even seen yet--but we were planning to come back again first thing in the morning. Our hotel was just minutes away, so we headed back there to relax and regroup.
Comfort Inn Palenque/Hotel Maya Tucan
We’d vowed to avoid staying in boring American chain hotels, but we made an exception for the Comfort Inn in Palenque. One look at the pool and gardens and we knew, absolutely, that we were not in Kansas anymore, (or California, or anywhere else north of the border).
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The tropical foliage was one clue, but the real kicker was the tropical birds: parrots, scarlet macaws, and an extremely comical pair of toucans that chased Mike around the pool deck, trying to bite his shoes.
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We were there two nights, and I can definitely recommend it. (The property changed names since we were there, and is now called the Hotel Maya Tucan.)
Next up: Day 5 (Morning): Palenque, by the Dawn’s Early Light!
Palenque, all to ourseves in the Morning Light
The next morning, Day 5 of our Road Trip, we were waiting at the entrance to the Archaeological Park a half hour before they opened for the day. We were the only ones there, so they let us through early, and I had the glorious privilege of photographing that wonderful ruin in the golden light of early morning, without a single fellow tourist cluttering my view. We hadn’t originally intended to spread our visit across two different days, but in the end, it all worked out quite well!
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Our first visit to the park, the previous day, was unfortunately rushed, because we got such a late start. We’d checked out what’s known as the North Group, a set of smaller temples located apart from the grand structures on the main plaza, but we’d postponed the path that led down the mountain from there, into the area called the Arroyo Otulum, the lower section of the ruins. A stone staircase led the way into a steep sided gorge filled with jungle growth, and mossy, overgrown ruins. This was a for real rain forest, perpetually damp, humid, all but stifling within the confines of the ravine. It had been decades since I’d hiked in a jungle. This place brought back quite the mixed bag of memories!
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Ruins in the Arroyo Otulum, green with moss. The unusual orange fungi was found sprouting from a fallen log
There were several beautiful waterfalls in the Arroyo Otulum, including a wide, multi-tiered cascade known as the Baño de la Reina, the Queen’s Bath. Was it actually used for that purpose by Palenque’s nobility? I’m not sure if that’s ever been established as fact, but it paints a lovely picture.
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The Maya loved water, especially flowing water, and Palenque, in it’s heyday, featured aqueducts, pools, and streams that ran through channels. There was even a flowing stream beneath the palace, engineered to sweep clean the toilets!
At the bottom of the hill, we emerged back out onto the road, right by that secondary entrance where we’d stopped the day before. I was afraid we’d run into the phony tour guides again, but they didn’t seem to be around this early in the day. We checked out the small museum, which had some very interesting exhibits of precious objects that had been recovered from the ruins, including jade funerary masks and molded stucco heads.
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The artistry is extraordinary, adding a human dimension to this ancient city in the jungle. Glyphs on these objects, as well as surviving examples carved into the stucco on the inside walls of the temples tell the story of the great king Pakal and his sons, the dynasty that ruled Palenque at the height of its power. The largest pyramid at the site, the Temple of the Inscriptions, was Pakal’s final resting place, a massive mausoleum with a hidden burial chamber, in the manner of the Egyptian pharaohs. After leaving the museum, we had to trudge back up the hill to the main section of ruins, and in that climate, it was no easy task!
By the time we finished touring the ruins a second time, I felt we’d done justice to Palenque, and I was ready to try something different. We’d been told about a particularly beautiful spot that was a short drive up the highway, so we decided to head out that way, and see for ourselves.
Next up: Day 5 (Afternoon): A BIG waterfall, and More Roadblocks in Chiapas
More Adventures, On the Road in Chiapas
About 12.5 miles west of Palenque, a short detour off the main highway takes you to a parking area and a path that goes downward. There’s a pervasive roar and a fine mist in the air from the elephant in the room, the cascade known as Misol Há, a beautiful waterfall that drops more than a hundred feet straight down into a circular pool of clear, blue water.
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Misol Há, a 100 foot waterfall in the Lacandon Jungle of Chiapas
The path leads to a viewing area at the base of the falls, and goes on from there to a slippery ledge carved into the rock behind the thundering cascade. If you don’t mind getting wet, you can get VERY close to this waterfall, and if you feel like a swim, the path continues all the way to the edge of the lagoon. This is a truly magnificent spot, and during the brief time Mike and I were there, we actually had it all to ourselves!
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It was barely past noon when we finished exploring Misol-Ha. When I studied my map, I saw that San Cristobal de Las Casas, a place I definitely wanted to see, was only 100 miles away. A hundred miles? Heck, even on a slow mountain road, that should only take three hours at the most! Or so I thought. That stretch of highway is heavily used by trucks and buses that are often dangerously overloaded. The road consists of one steep curve after another; those heavy trucks are doing quite well if they hit 10 mph on the upgrades, and 15 mph rolling downhill in compound low. There are no passing lanes, nor is there much point in risking your life to get ahead of the pack, since every vehicle on the road is equally slow. A hundred miles on THAT kind of road takes closer to six hours, and it’s exhausting!
The highway went through the middle of every small town along the way, which meant slowing down even more for speed bump after speed bump, all the while dodging potholes and free ranging chickens and goats. In one tiny community, we slowed for a group of children trying to sell us some sort of fruit, portioned out in plastic bags. We noticed that a young girl standing just ahead of the others was holding a string that she’d tied to a tree on the far side of the road. When she saw us approaching, she pulled her string taut, and held up her other hand, which was holding some of the bags of fruit, and shouted for us to stop.
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Her string obviously wouldn’t have stopped us if we’d elected to keep going, but I didn’t want to spoil their game, so I told Mike to stop just short of it, and I rolled down my window.
“Buenas tardes,” I said. “Can I help you?”
“You must buy these guavas,” said the girl.
“I don’t want them,” I replied. “I don’t like guavas.”
“If you don’t buy, you must pay the toll,” she said, her face very serious.
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"How much is the toll?"
“One Hundred Pesos.”
“That’s ridiculous,” I replied. “I won’t pay it.”
She stepped closer, peering through the passenger-side window, taking stock of the cameras and other expensive equipment cluttering the front seat. “Five Pesos, and those gafas.” Mike was wearing a pair of Ray Bans worth at least a hundred bucks. Clearly, the young lady had taste!
I handed her a ten Peso coin, the same amount I’d paid the young Zapatistas the day before. She scowled, but she dropped her string, and we drove on toward Ocosingo, a town near the halfway point between Palenque and San Cristobal. I was beginning to wonder if we would EVER get where we were going, but right about then, all the traffic on the highway came to a halt, stopped dead, all the way through the town. I pulled over to the side of the road, and one of the truck drivers walked over and greeted us. This was another Zapatista Bloqueo, he explained, and this time, they were stopping all traffic headed to–guess where? San Cristobal de Las Casas! The trucker chatted with us for quite awhile, and he was definitely passionate about his grievances.
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It would seem that support for the Zapatistas and their road blocks is far from universal. A lot of people in the region make their living, in one way or another, from the transportation of goods. Not just the truckers, but the farmers, the shop keepers, ordinary people who have nothing to do with the Zapatistas and their politics. Many other people are dependent on the tourists, and when the roads are blocked to keep them out, everyone loses income. There’s also a lot of mistrust, a widely held belief that the Zapatista leadership is cutting back room deals with the government, and lining their own pockets, at the expense of everyone else. These are complex issues, and they are ongoing: the events in this post took place in 2015, more than eight years ago, and according to current reports on the news media, as well as social media, very little seems to have changed.
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We bade goodbye to our trucker friend, then we turned around and drove back to Palenque, where we spent a second night with the toucans at the Comfort Inn.
Our drive from Palenque to Ocosingo and back, with the stop at Misol Há, was some of the prettiest countryside we’d seen, so the day wasn’t wasted. Still, I’d have to admit that I shouldn’t have attempted the drive to San Cristobal de Las Casas. In hindsight, that was a rookie move. I’d underestimated the difficulty of that stretch of road, so it was just as well that we’d been forced to turn around. It actually made a lot more sense logistically to save San Cristobal for later, AFTER our circuit of the Yucatan, so that we’d only have to drive that crazy highway ONCE! Meanwhile? The Yucatan, and all its wonders, was waiting for us, just down the road.
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Sign along the highway when you enter the State of Chiapas. Translated, the sign reads:
Northern Zone: Good Government Board:
We strictly prohibit weapons trafficking, planting and consumption of drugs and intoxicating beverages, illegal sale of wood, and the destruction of nature!
Zapata lives, the fight continues
You are in Zapatista Territory!
In rebellion: here, the People rule, and the government obeys
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Scenes along the highway in Chiapas
Next up: Day 6: At last, the Yucatan!
Amazing and slightly intimidating!
Yeah quite the adventure!! Although the roadblocks were a real pain at least you got the pay off of a quiet visit to Palenque, which made it even more special!
Great pictures!
Dave
At Long Last, the Yucatan!
What with all the Zapatista roadblocks, and the ill-fated attempt at driving to San Cristobal de las Casas, it was beginning to feel like we were spinning our wheels. We were already almost a week into our Mexican Road Trip, and, quite frankly, it was past time to come up with a realistic plan for the rest of it. When we started out, I had a general idea of the places I wanted to see, but I stopped short of creating a day-by-day itinerary. I rarely make advance reservations when I’m road tripping, because I prefer having the freedom to add destinations, or to skip them, or to change the order of them based on what I see and hear when I get closer to where I’m going. Southern Mexico didn’t lend itself all that well to that style of travel, because there were simply too many possibilities! And then there was the time factor: Michael, my traveling companion, had a fixed date when he had to be back home in Arizona, which only gave us three more weeks, including the time that would be required to drive back north. Under the circumstances, it made sense to impose some structure on our little expedition.
At the hotel in Palenque, we studied our maps, and a reasonably logical sequence began to take shape: I wanted to see Mayan ruins in the Yucatan. Some of the big ones, like Chichén Itzá and Uxmal, those were a given, but I still hadn’t decided about the rest. I figured we could start in Merida, and circle the peninsula clockwise, stopping at as many Mayan sites as possible along the way. After that, back to Chiapas to make one more attempt at driving to San Cristobal de Las Casas (another of my “must-see” destinations), and finally, back to the border, with a stop in Oaxaca, and a longer stop in San Miguel de Allende, to take in the Day of the Dead celebration. We’d originally hoped to cross into Belize, and possibly Guatemala, to visit ruins in those countries, but considering our time constraints, and the aggravating complexity of multiple border crossings, that was beginning to seem unlikely. Two, maybe three beers later, I had a rough sketch of a plan tucked away in my pocket, and we were ready to hit the sack.
The next morning, Day 6, we checked out of the Comfort Inn, and headed north, destination: Merida, capital of the Yucatan, a mere 333 miles away! The main road going to or from Palenque is MX 199, the same road that the Zapatistas shut down with their bloqueo when we first arrived in the area, two days earlier. This time, there was no sign of any road block, and we merged smoothly onto MX 186, the principal east/west route across the bottom of the Yucatan peninsula. This highway was a main road, but it wasn’t an expressway; there was traffic in both directions, and access was not limited, so there were hazards in the right-of-way ranging from slow moving donkey carts to topes, (toe-pays), the bone-jarring speed bumps installed to slow traffic through populated areas.
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Day 6: From Palenque to Campeche
After 20 miles or so the road crossed a river, the Usumacinta, which served as the boundary between the State of Chiapas and the State of Tabasco. I had to smile when I noticed the sign marking the Usumacinta.
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Many years ago I wrote a novel that I called Chivor, an adventure yarn set mostly in Colombia. The flawed hero of my story was a treasure hunter named Sam, and in the first scene, I had him sneaking into Mexico from Guatemala, smuggling a jade figurine illegally dug from a ruin. He gets ambushed and shot by bandits while traveling down the Usumacinta River in a canoe. When I wrote that, I’d never been anywhere near the Usumacinta River. I chose the location after studying a map, a traditional paper road map, because this was at least fifteen years before Google gave us easy access to all that wonderful satellite imagery. At that time, I had no idea what the area actually looked like. The World Wide Web hadn’t been developed yet, so there was no easy way to find out. My descriptions of the terrain as written in my novel were based solely on my imagination, and now, after all those years, I was actually there, close enough, anyway, crossing the Usumacinta on a highway bridge! It wasn’t exactly Deja vu, since I knew I’d never seen it before, but it was a similar, eerie sensation!
The first leg of our drive this day took us northeast to the town of Escarcega, where we left MX 186, and merged on to MX 180, headed due north to the city of Campeche. We had a choice between the Libre (free) version of the road, which hugged the approaching coastline, passing through a half dozen tiny towns, and the Cuota (Toll Road), which would take us to Campeche more directly. Rule of thumb when driving in Mexico: when given a choice, always take the Toll Road, if only to avoid the damned topes!
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Statue in Escarcega, dedicated to the Women of Campeche
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Toll Road, or Free Road? Whenever possible, choose the Cuota, the Toll Road!
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Toll plaza outside Campeche
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Signs warning of Topes (speed bumps) dead ahead!
The Yucatan peninsula is bordered by the Gulf of Mexico to the west, and the Caribbean Sea to the east. As we entered the city I could smell the ocean, the salty tang of it, and I could feel it in the air, bringing back some really great memories of my youthful adventures on the coast of Colombia (more than 50 years ago).
Campeche is one of the oldest cities in Mexico, founded by the Conquistadores in 1540, eighty years before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock. The historic city center is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, but passing through like we were, we didn’t see ANY of that. We had at least two more hours of driving before we’d get to Merida, so we decided to save Campeche for another day, when we had more time to explore, and perhaps stay the night. This time, we merely paused for lunch. The local specialty is shrimp, courtesy of one of the largest fleets of shrimp boats in the Gulf of Mexico. An open air seaside restaurant served up some of the best I’ve ever eaten!
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Now that's what I call coconut shrimp!
After Campeche, the Highway veered inland. It was a Toll Road, a true expressway, relatively new and in excellent condition, so we made short work of the 111 miles to the big town.
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Merida was not only the capital of the State of Yucatan, it was the largest city in southern Mexico, with a population of almost a million. Statistically, Yucatan is the safest of Mexico’s states, and Merida is widely considered the safest of all Mexico’s cities. There’s a relatively large population of expatriates, Americans and other foreign nationals who reside in Merida on a permanent basis, so I was very curious about it, wondering what it would be like to actually live there.
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Route from Campeche to Merida
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Welcome to the Yucatan!
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Traffic circle in Merida
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Roundabout on the Paseo Montejo in Merida
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Tired from the drive, our first order of business was finding lodging, and because we didn’t know the city at all, we weren’t sure where to look. The main drag is the Paseo Montejo, a wide boulevard lined, at least in part, with stately old homes. We followed that toward the city center, until we spotted a likely prospect, the City Express Hotel. We booked a room, and even though the place was perfectly nice, I had immediate regrets. The hotel was a Marriott property, and that left us batting 1.000: every single hotel we’d stayed in so far was connected to an American chain, and I was quite certain we could do better than that, if only in price! Sitting in our room, using Google to figure out where to eat dinner, I had a flash of inspiration, and did a quick search on “cheap hotel rooms in Merida.” The search results included a link to the Mexican version of Expedia, and a quick search on that site helped me find a place that sounded perfect for us: The Dolores Alba Inn, near the old city center, and at $35 per night (in 2015), it was less than half what we were paying at the City Express. We planned to stay in Merida at least one more day, so I used Expedia to book us a room for the following night.
I had never used online booking sites in the past, because I always figured I could get a better deal by walking in off the street and negotiating. The booking sites take a portion of the hotel’s profit, and they charge a fee to the traveler, so I blindly assumed that the bottom line cost would always be higher. I was also leery about reserving a hotel room sight unseen, not sure if the travelers’ reviews posted online could really be trusted. But I had an open mind. There was an obvious advantage to the consolidated listings, and the ability to compare prices and amenities, especially in an unfamiliar town. If the cheaper hotel proved to be even half as nice as it sounded in their ad, I just might have to revise my attitude!
Next up: Merida, the White City
Hitting the Pause Button in Merida
Day 7: Over breakfast the next morning, we planned our next move. I figured we should spend at least one, possibly two full days in Merida, and I wanted to hold the driving to a minimum. Traffic in the city was terrible, one confusing roundabout after another, and the streets were filled with idiots who apparently considered driving a blood sport.
Our reservation at the Dolores Alba was all set and paid for, but the room wasn’t supposed to be available until 3:00. We drove over there anyway, and presented ourselves at the desk, to see if we could finagle an earlier check in. That wasn’t possible, unfortunately, but they did agree to let us leave the Jeep in their parking lot, and that was almost as good. The Dolores had a much better location than our first hotel. It was just three blocks from the main plaza, so we’d be able to do practically all our exploring on foot.
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The Dolores was actually nicer than we expected, with a double courtyard, a pool on one side, and a dining area on the other. Prints of Frida Kahlo’s surrealistic paintings hung on the walls, setting the tone for the place.
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Prints of paintings by famed Mexican artist Frida Kahlo hang on corridor walls throughout the hotel
$35 per night for a double room seemed like an unusual bargain. I asked about their prices, and was quite surprised to learn that our rate was a special discount that was only available through Expedia, a big savings that more than offset the booking fee. If we had walked in off the street, they would have charged us $50 for the same room, which was the opposite of what I would have expected.
Merida is a Colonial City with a long history, dating all the way back to the 16th century. There is no “modern” downtown with steel and glass skyscrapers of the sort we saw in Monterrey and Queretaro. Instead, Merida, known as the “White City,” has a core of historic buildings, fine examples of the Spanish Colonial Architecture that once dominated this part of the world, featuring arches, colonnades, wrought iron, and elaborate cornices decorating old buildings plastered with white stucco. The cathedral on the main plaza dates back to 1562, and was built, at least in part, using stone recycled from ruined Mayan temples.
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Scenes in and around the main plaza in Merida
We spent the day wandering the area near the Plaza. The sky was cloudy, threatening rain, on and off, so it was a bit humid, yet not overly hot. The climate in Merida is a lot like South Florida, with balmy winters and steaming hot summers. This was October, so it was pleasantly in between.
Merida was a walled city at one time in its history, fortified against the occasional native uprising, and some of the old city gates are still standing, as monuments to a very different era. Touring the downtown in a horse drawn carriage is a popular activity for tourists, as well as for locals.
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There was quite a bustle of activity around the square, preparations for the big Festival of the Maya that would be taking place over the next 10 days. That first night, the big event was going to be a recreation of the ceremonial ball game that was played in the ancient Mayan cities, and the following night, a huge celebration with costumed dancers. We met several local people that day, and they all made a point of inviting us to the festivities. We knew nothing about any of that in advance, so our excellent timing was purely a stroke of good luck!
One gentleman in particular, on the pretext of practicing his English, gave us a lengthy spiel about Panama Hats.
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The real ones come from Ecuador, and I knew a bit about them, because I used to live there, and I’ve traveled in the Province where they’re traditionally made. Our would-be friend informed us that they made them in the Yucatan as well, just as good and much cheaper! I expressed some skepticism about all that, and the next thing I knew, he’d steered us into a dingy, cluttered shop on the next block. This was his uncle’s store, he explained, and he’d get us the best deal in town.
The “uncle” came out of the back and started in on the hard sell. A real Panama hat costs $200 or more, and these were just 1500 Pesos, a bit more than $80. I examined the weave, pointed out that it wasn’t all that tight, and offered him half that amount, $40. He threw up his hands, claimed we were trying to rob him, and countered with $60. After some back and forth, Mike and I each bought a hat, and paid just $50 apiece. The price seemed fair, and we felt pretty smug about our bargaining skills, until later that day, when we discovered that everywhere else in town, the same hats were selling for $30!
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Merida was a friendly town, and we didn’t feel unsafe in any part of it, not even when wandering in the public market, or down by the bus terminals, traditionally the sketchiest neighborhoods in any city. There were numerous displays of public art on and around the Grand Plaza, but my favorite had to be the Staircase Murals, painted by Mexican artist Fernando Castro Pacheco in the early 1970’s. They can be seen above a staircase in the courtyard of Merida’s Palace of Government:
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The Staircase Murals, by Fernando Castro Pacheco
By the end of that day we were pretty well beat from all the walking, so after an early dinner, we headed back to our room, and skipped the Mayan Ball Game. (One of many lazy decisions I later regretted!)
Next up: Festival of the Maya (a very colorful affair!)
this is quite a narrative!
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Rick Quinn
Day 7: Over breakfast the next morning, we planned our next move. I figured we should spend at least one, possibly two full days in Merida, and I wanted to hold the driving to a minimum. Traffic in the city was terrible, one confusing roundabout after another, and the streets were filled with idiots who apparently considered driving a blood sport.
Sounds like my kind of town! Have you ever driven in Montreal?
Seriously, this is quite a narrative!
Mark
Which ruin is the coolest, Uxmal, or Chichén Itzá?
DAY 9:
Uxmal vs Chichén Itzá? There wasn’t really a competition between these two Mayan cities, it was more of a question that I’d been asking myself. I’d seen plenty of photographs of both, so I knew more or less what to expect, but I also knew that photographs never really capture the true nature of such places. The two Archaeological Parks, both UNESCO World Heritage Sites, are located relatively close together, so we planned to visit them back-to-back, and I was quite curious to compare them, and to decide for myself, which was the most impressive.
Uxmal is said to be the most wonderfully preserved and restored of all the Mayan cities, with some of the finest surviving examples of post-classic Mayan architecture. Chichén Itzá, on the other hand, has that perfect pyramid, the one called the Castillo, which was designated one of the new Wonders of the World, alongside Machu Picchu, the Great Wall of China, and the Taj Mahal. Chichén Itzá is by far the most popular Mayan site, receiving as many as two million visitors in an average year, while Uxmal peaks at around 300,000. The difference has nothing to do with the quality of the ruins, and everything to do with the relative distance to Cancun. Starting from the beaches of Margaritaville, Chichén Itzá is just three hours away on an air conditioned tour bus, six hours there and back. Add in some time at the ruins, it’s a perfect day trip, and you’re back at your hotel in time for Happy Hour. Uxmal, on the other hand, is four hours away, so you’re on a bus for eight hours, altogether, and you don’t even get a Wonder of the World. It should come as no surprise that most of the sun loving vacationers opt to skip it.
We were starting from Merida, so none of that applied to us. From Merida, Uxmal was actually the closer of the two, only an hour away to the south, so our plan was to drive down early, and try to get to the Park by 8:00 AM, when they first opened for the day, a tactic that worked quite well for us in Palenque.
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Route from Merida to Uxmal
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We used Expedia.mx to find lodging in Merida, and we were so pleased with the result that we decided to try it again with Uxmal. There was no town or village near the ruins, but there were several hotels, including a relatively new one called the Uxmal Resort Maya. The rooms were quite reasonable, less than $50 per night for a double back in 2015. (This year-2024-the same room can be had for $62 per night. Still quite reasonable!)
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Uxmal Resort Maya, a great hotel just minutes from the ruins
The drive down from Merida was a straight shot on MX 261, a State highway, complete with potholes, livestock in the road, and topes (killer speed bumps), but it still took less than an hour, and that put us ahead of schedule. The hotel was right along the way, and since we had time, we stopped to look it over. The place was even nicer than we expected, but there were surprisingly few guests, almost as if the hotel was so new, it hadn’t been discovered yet. October is the off season in the Yucatan. Everywhere we’d been was what you might call “lightly-touristed,” but this was extreme (and very much to our advantage).
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The drive back to the parking area at Uxmal. Through the doors of an unassuming building lie wonders that will blow your mind!
The Archeological Park was just minutes from the hotel, and we got there just as they opened the gates to the parking lot. Unlike our experience at Palenque, there were no hustlers lurking about, demanding payment for “keeping an eye” on my Jeep while we explored the ruins.
From the parking lot, the building where they sell the tickets looks a bit like the entrance to a shopping mall, or a multiplex, but the moment you step through the door, you’ll discover that it’s actually a time machine. That entryway is a portal to the world of the ancient Maya, a thousand years into the past.
In its heyday, Uxmal was home to as many as 25,000 people, spread across a territory of several square miles. Today, there are building foundations, ruined temples, and other minor archaeological remains scattered about in every direction, much of it unexcavated, centered around a relatively small sector of the ancient city, the administrative and ceremonial complex at the heart of it.
Back in 2015, we paid a buck and a half to park in the lot, along with our entrance fee of about $16 per person–twice what we paid at Palenque. (New taxes imposed by the State of Yucatan have raised that fee to a bit more than $30 per person in 2024.)
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Walkway to the ruins, and a map of the archaeological zone
A tree-lined path with wide, shallow steps leads up a slight rise from the entrance, and the first thing you see after you walk out into the open is a pyramid, and not just any pyramid: rising 115 feet from an eliptical base, this thing is a monster, and what you’re looking at is the back side of it, which features a massive staircase climbing all the way up to the temple at the top.
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My first look at the Pyramid of the Magician. “Dwarfed” by the massive structure, I paused to take a quick photograph.
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Several views of the Pyramid of the Magician, also known as the House of the Dwarf
Walking counterclockwise around the pyramid, you can see that it’s really five different temples built one atop the other. Legend has it that the structure was created in a single night by a magician, a dwarf with magical powers, but in reality, the building of it spanned several hundred years. I was in awe of that thing, deeply disturbed at the thought of all the lives used up during its construction, and all the blood spilled down those steps from the altars of human sacrifice at the top.
The area in front of the pyramid was a courtyard, a gathering place where the people once stood to watch the colorful, sometimes gruesome ceremonies taking place at the top of the structure. On the far side of the courtyard is a wall penetrated by an arch, and through the archway is another courtyard, this one known as the Nunnery Quadrangle. (The name was given by the Spaniards, who thought that the small rooms in the buildings resembled nun’s quarters in a convent.) The level of detail on the upper sections of these structures is extraordinary, a type of mosaic comprised of thousands of pieces of carved stone. This merger of art and architecture is known as the Puuc style, and Uxmal is where it developed, and reached its ultimate expression.
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From the Nunnery, we made a beeline to the second most famous building at Uxmal: The Palace of the Governor (another name supplied by the Spanish, that might or might not reflect the original purpose of the structure). The Palace is actually three buildings joined together to form one massive edifice, 320 feet long, 40 feet wide, and 26 feet high. The mosaic frieze surrounding the upper section is 300 meters long, and was assembled from twenty thousand individually carved elements, some of which are as much as a yard long, weighing hundreds of pounds. Considering the complexity of the design, and the perfection of its execution, there are many experts who consider the Palace of the Governor to be one of the greatest architectural achievements of all time.
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We spent the entire day exploring the ruins at Uxmal, and in that entire time, we saw no more than a few dozen other visitors. The “uncrowded” conditions at our hotel obviously carried over to the Archaeological Park, and I, for one, was loving it! Not that I have anything against my fellow tourists. It’s just that crowds have a way of spoiling the ambience at a place like Uxmal, and the fact that we had the place practically all to ourselves made the experience that much more enjoyable. I don’t know if this would be considered typical for mid-October; I think it’s more likely that we just got really lucky!
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View of the Ball Court from the top of the Grand Pyramid. On the day we were there, we saw no more than a few dozen other visitors.
The ruins are surrounded by thick tropical vegetation, and thanks to an especially wet rainy season, many of the trees were in bloom. Mayan cities are known to have been quite colorful, the buildings stuccoed and painted, many in bright shades of red. With a few rare exceptions, the pigment has long since flaked away, reduced to faint traces on the bare stone. I don’t know if the flowers are there at other times of year, but during my visit, they provided a beautiful contrast with the otherwise drab stone walls. The overall aspect of Uxmal is simply stunning, and the splashes of color from the flowering trees adds significantly to the beauty of it.
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Flowering trees surround the temples and pyramids
Like all Mayan cities, the jungle surrounding Uxmal is constantly encroaching, threatening to reclaim the ancient buildings. Uxmal has more funding and more staff than many of Mexico’s archaeological parks, but even with almost continuous maintenance, it’s impossible to keep up with the growth. Windblown seeds land in the cracks between the stones, and find just enough windblown soil to sprout. Add rain, and the next thing you know, you have tropical plants growing sideways out of the walls, faster than the landscaping crews can chop them away.
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It takes no time at all for the jungle to reclaim these ruins
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The Great Pyramid, 90 feet high and 300 feet wide; in 2015, they still allowed visitors to climb it.
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The restoration of the ruins is an ongoing process. In some areas, cut stone still litters the ground
As impressed as I’d been with Palenque, Uxmal had that place beat by a mile. Everything about it seemed bigger, more elaborate, and our visit was perfect, with so few other tourists, and decent light for photos throughout the day. There was supposed to be a Festival of Luz y Sonido (Light and Sound), a sort of light show among the ruins with music and colored spotlights, scheduled at 9:00 PM. Unfortunately, it started pouring rain, right after we finished our dinner, and they ended up cancelling that evening’s performance. We hung out in our room instead, with our sliding glass door opened wide, content to watch the rain as it churned the water in the swimming pool into froth.
If I’ve piqued your interest about Uxmal, and you’d like more information, you might be interested in reading my blog post: Uxmal: Architectural Perfection in the Land of the Maya. There’s more of everything, especially the history of the site, and there are many (many!) additional photos.
Next up: Moving on to Chichén Itzá: Is it really worth all the hype?
Chichen Itza: The New Wonder of the World
Day 10:
The morning of our tenth day, the sky was solid overcast and threatening rain, so there wasn’t going to be any morning light that might have made it worth going back to Uxmal for more photos. But that was okay. Our visit the day before went so well, there was really no need, so we checked out of our hotel right after breakfast, and set our sights ahead to our next major stop: Chichén Itzá! To get there, we reversed course on MX 261, back through the outskirts of Merida, and then headed east on MX 180, the well paved, mostly divided highway that leads from Merida to Cancun. The ruins are located more or less halfway between the two.
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Our hotel In Merida, the Dolores Alba Inn, had a sister property near the Archaeological Park, the Doralba Inn Chichén Itzá, We’d reserved a room in advance, and it was a good thing we did, because unlike Uxmal, all the lodging in this area was fully occupied. The Doralba Chichén was different from their main location in the city. That one was old and historic, with a colonial era feel, while this one was newer, and more typically tropical, with thatched palapas on the grounds, and ceiling fans in the rooms. As usual, we were too early to check in, so we just stopped long enough to confirm our reservation, and after a quick lunch at the hotel restaurant, we drove to the ruins.
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Unlike Uxmal, the parking lot was full to overflowing, much of the space taken up by tour buses from Cancun.
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There was almost a carnival atmosphere by the entrance, with crowds of people milling about, boarding and unboarding buses, assembling into groups for the tours. A troop of performers with face paint and feathers posed for pictures with the tourists:
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When you headed toward the ruins, you had to run a gauntlet of vendors selling everything from painted plates to sugar skulls, some of it interesting, and some of it seriously tacky:
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In 2015, we paid about $25 apiece for admission to the archaeological park, and another $5.00 for parking. Just as at Uxmal, the State of Yucatan has since added an additional fee, which, along with inflation, triples what we paid before, to a whopping $76 per person in 2024. In 2015, admission to Chichén Itzá was double the cost of Uxmal, and today, the difference is even greater.
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A sign by the entrance provided the basic layout of the park: “X” marks the spot for “You Are Here,” along with the relative location of the major buildings. I had a small guidebook in my camera bag, so I took a minute to match up the map in my book with the map on the sign. That done, we set off down the path, to a continuous chorus of “Ssst! Hey, Meester,” as all those people selling stuff tried to entice us to buy.
There were quite a few tourists walking back and forth, some on their own, but most of them bunched up in groups, following their tour guides like so many flocks of ducklings. I had to keep reminding myself that this was the off season, and I tried to imagine the place with double or triple the crowd, like Disneyland in July. Not a good image.
When we left the entry path and moved into the open, there it was: the Castillo, the famous Wonder of the World, in all its glory. The pyramid looked amazing, just like every photo I’d ever seen.
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There were rough areas on two of the four sides:
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But the other two sides were fully restored and geometrically perfect, an extraordinary accomplishment, given the relatively primitive building techniques used by the ancient Maya. (I did some research on that subject, and what I found was quite interesting. If you’d like to read the real story behind the vaunted “perfection” of the Castillo, see my blog post: Chichén Itzá: Requiem for the Feathered Serpent).
The huge structure was surrounded by open space, and it was also surrounded with people.
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I started snapping pictures anyway, but it was impossible to compose a photo of the whole thing without getting at least a few brightly dressed tourists in the frame. “We need to come back tomorrow,” I said to Michael. “Right when they open for the day. I don’t know if we’ll have it to ourselves, like we did at Palenque and Uxmal, but it’s got to be better than this!”
On our left as we walked into the central plaza was another famous attraction: the Grand Ball Court. Every Mayan city has a court for playing their ritual ball game, where opposing teams clad in leather armor tried to knock a heavy ball made of natural rubber through stone goal rings, without using their hands. Chichén Itzá’s ball court is the largest that’s ever been found, and it’s been very nicely restored, but it was tough to get a good photo.
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Just like the Castillo, the Ball Court was chock-a-block with tourists. Nice for providing a sense of scale, not so great if you’re trying to capture the ambience of an abandoned ancient city.
I’ve been shooting pictures in crowded places for decades, and I know how to work around the people to capture images that don’t include them.
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Sometimes it’s just a matter of stepping to one side, and zooming in:
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Sometimes, having people in your photos is a good thing. Editors looking for travel pieces often prefer pictures with people; better yet, if you have people interacting with the scenery, in ways that their readers can relate to. A few random tourists, properly spaced, can add a splash of color to a composition that might otherwise appear a bit drab and lifeless.
Too many people, on the other hand, really does spoil what might otherwise have been a much better photograph, from an artistic or documentary point of view. Since we were definitely planning to come back the next day, hopefully early enough to beat the crowd, I used my zoom lenses to focus on details, saving the wide shots for later.
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Since we’d arrived in the park relatively late in the day, we made no attempt to see everything, instead focusing our attention on the main plaza: the area surrounding the Castillo, and some of the adjacent structures. The second largest building at Chichén Itzá is the Temple of the Warriors, a high platform with steps leading up:
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And an iconic reclining “Chac Mool” sculpture at the top.
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There were plenty of people milling about in front of the temple, but nobody on the steps, because climbing is not allowed; in fact, throughout the park there are rope barriers in place, preventing visitors from getting too close to most of the buildings. That made it simple enough to step back and use my zoom to compose images with no tourists in view–in spite of the crowds.
They started moving people toward the exit a little before the 5:00 PM closing time–but I didn’t mind. I had what I needed, plenty of good closeups, along with a solid grasp of the layout, so that when we came back the next day, I’d know exactly where to go. The weather report called for rain over most of the next 24 hours. I kept my fingers crossed (as well as my toes), in hopes of completing our second visit to the ruins before it started.
Next up: Day 11: Chichén Itzá, Without the Crowds!
Chichén Itzá without the crowds!
Day 11:
We were up early on Day 11, packed and checked out of our room by 7:30 AM. The sky was definitely threatening rain, but there was none falling just yet, so I crossed my eyes, to go along with my crossed fingers and toes, to forestall any downpours until after lunch. I was so determined to be first in line that we skipped breakfast, and drove straight to the archaeological park, arriving there at least 20 minutes before they opened.
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We waited, a bit impatiently, for the attendants to open the gate to the all but empty parking lot. The day before, we were lucky to find a single space in that lot, but this time, we had our pick. Once parked, we made a beeline for the ticket window just inside the entrance. Tickets are only good for a single day, so we had to pay another $25 apiece to get back in, but as far as I was concerned, it was going to be well worth it. Just one other person showed up for the opening, a young Canadian tourist who arrived in a taxi. He was actually more eager than we were: the second they opened the entry gate, he took off at a dead run, probably headed for the Castillo.
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The Castillo, aka the Temple of Kukulkan, as it appears at 8 AM, before the buses arrive!
The light wasn’t as good this day, thanks to the heavy cloud cover, but the plaza was wide open, with not a single soul in sight (not even the Canadian sprinter). I took at least three dozen unobstructed photos of the big pyramid, and then I turned to the Grand Ball Court. Because it’s so near the entrance, that space is NEVER free of people during the day, but for us early birds, it was completely empty, and I was able to take as many photos as I liked, free of distractions.
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The Ball Court is massive when compared to the courts at Palenque and Uxmal. The high, sheer-sided walls would have made it nearly impossible to score a goal here.
We had the whole place practically all to ourselves for at least an hour, and I made good use of the time, taking uncluttered photos of all the structures nearest the entrance. That done, we headed for the south forty, the section known as “Old” Chichén, which we had not visited the day before.
One of the best known attractions in Old Chichén was the building known as the Caracol, the Conch (or Snail), named for the spiral staircase in the center, reminiscent of the spiraling chambers inside of a Conch shell.
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The main section of the building is round, which is highly unusual in the world of the Maya. It’s thought that openings in the walls align with certain celestial events, so the Caracol in it’s original form, may have been an observatory, used by the Maya to predict solstices, crop cycles, and other dates important to their agrarian society.
Chichén Itzá was built over the course of many hundreds of years. New temples were built atop older temples, and, depending on the era, the construction utilized a variety of architectural styles and building techniques. The main plaza, “New” Chichén, was the domain of Kukulkan, the feathered serpent, whose carved likeness seems to be everywhere. “Old” Chichén, built before the arrival of the Toltecs and their scaly deity, was the province of Chaac, the Mayan rain god, whose hooked proboscis protrudes from every corner of every building, as well as from most of the spaces in between.
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We walked back to the main plaza, and from there we followed the sacbe, the raised, stone bordered walkway that leads from the plaza to the Sacred Cenote, the Mayan well of Sacrifice. It was a little bit of a hike, from the south end of the complex all the way to the northernmost section. The Cenote was nothing more than a natural sinkhole in the limestone bedrock. It didn’t look like much, but in the age of the Maya, pools such as this were vitally important sources of fresh water, in a region without lakes, rivers, or streams.
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This particular cenote served an additional purpose: it was considered a sacred portal that led directly to the underworld, and as such, was frequently used as a receptacle for sacrificial offerings, including human sacrifice. Pretty creepy!
About the time we finished checking out the Cenote, the first buses from Cancun pulled in to the lot, and disgorged the first batch of the day’s crop of visitors. Most of the new arrivals headed straight to the Snack Bar (and the Rest Rooms), while the rest charged toward the Castillo, at which point our “exclusive” photo session ground to a halt. The clouds were thicker than ever, and as we walked toward the exit, the first few drops of rain spattered down on us. It felt pretty good, to have timed our visit so perfectly!
From Chichén Itzá, we were headed for Cancun, about a 2.5 hour drive on a paved divided highway. I wasn’t all that excited about going there, even though I’d never been. Cancun is a great place for vacations if you like beaches and nightclubs–but it was the wrong time of year for the former (the tail end of the rainy season), and, while I can’t really speak for Michael, my own days of partying in night clubs are pretty well behind me. Mostly, I was just curious to finally see the place for myself, after hearing about it for forty years!
As for Uxmal and Chichén Itzá, we’d seen enough of both Mayan cities to at least form an opinion. What was the final verdict? From the beginning, I’ll admit to being biased in favor of Uxmal, mostly because I found the crowds at Chichén Itzá such a turnoff. We’d successfully resolved that issue by going back a second time, before the daily herd of tour buses arrived. Stripped of that major difference, and focusing strictly on the ruins themselves, the competition pretty well evens out. Both sites are an incredible testament to the skill and the artistry of the builders, and each of them has unique features that you won’t see anywhere else. Anyone who is seriously interested in the Mayan Civilization owes it to themselves to visit both. The rest of you (90% of you, anyway) will ignore everything I’ve said, and you’ll follow the herd to Chichén Itzá. But, hey–it’s not like that’s a bad thing!
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Next up: Cancun, Tulum, and the Riviera Maya
It would be quite the adventure
Joey,
Nice to see you on here.
Mark
It even looks kind of creepy.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Rick Quinn
This particular cenote served an additional purpose: it was considered a sacred portal that led directly to the underworld, and as such, was frequently used as a receptacle for sacrificial offerings, including human sacrifice. Pretty creepy!
It even looks kind of creepy. Like swimming in there would never be a good idea.
Enjoying the photos and commentary!
Mark
Cancun and the Riviera Maya
DAY 11: Back on the Road, from Chichén Itzá to Cancun
Mexico has always been well known to international travelers for the popular tourist destinations on its Pacific coast, places like Acapulco, Puerto Vallarta, and Cabo San Lucas, but prior to the early 1970’s, there were no equivalent options on the Atlantic side of the country. A visionary coalition of developers and financiers teamed with the Mexican government to correct that imbalance, by creating a Caribbean resort on what had been an essentially empty beach. They called their development Cancun, after the sleepy fishing village that was bulldozed to make room for their chicken wire and stucco shangrila, a sunny paradise of new hotels and nightclubs backed by white sand beaches and the sparkling blue expanse of the Caribbean Sea.
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Cancun in 1970
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Cancun more recently!
In the subsequent half century, Cancun grew from that sleepy fishing village into the second largest city in southern Mexico, transformed into a tourist mecca that sees as many as twenty-five million visitors in an average year. The Cancun of today is, hands down, the most popular destination in ALL of Mexico, but for me, personally, it was somewhere down near the bottom of my list of places I wanted to see on our road trip. Why such a negative view? Cancun is all about the beaches and clubs; this was mid-October, the tail end of an active rainy season, so it was a terrible time to be visiting beaches, and as for the clubs, as much as I hate to admit it, I’m getting too danged old to enjoy that sort of thing. My original inclination was to drive by Cancun and wave, without actually stopping. As far as I was concerned, the place has more in common with Miami than it does with the rest of Mexico, much less with the rest of the Yucatan, and we hadn’t driven this far south just to see a bunch of our fellow gringos wandering around in shorts and flip-flops.
We hadn’t been quite sure where we were going after Chichén Itzá, so the night before, while hanging out in our room at the Doralba Inn, I logged into Expedia.Mx to check the availability and prices of hotels in several of the towns on the east coast of the peninsula, including Cancun, if only for comparison purposes. What I found among the listings changed everything: the Hotel One in downtown Cancun, moderately priced at $62 per night, was advertising an amenity I hadn’t seen anywhere else: free, overnight laundry service! After 11 days on the road, the notion of a full complement of clean clothes had enormous appeal, and that, all by itself, was reason enough to overlook my misgivings, and book a room smack in the middle of gringo central.
It actually felt good to have a plan for a change. We’d mapped out the route, so we knew exactly where to go, and how to get there. All we had to do was…get there! The rain clouds that had been massing along the horizon throughout our morning at Chichén Itzá had rolled overhead, and about the time we left the archaeological park, the first fat drops started falling. The timing of our visit to the ruins worked out perfectly, but our timing for the drive was lousy. We were facing 125 miles of toll road that would normally take at least two and a half hours. From the look of the sky, it was likely to pour the whole way, and that was definitely going to slow us down.
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MX 180D, toll road from Chichén Itzá to Cancun
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It was the kind of rain that windshield wipers can barely keep up with, even at their fastest speed;
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the kind of drive where you keep one eye glued to the white line, and white knuckles wrapped tight around the steering wheel for mile after intensely focused mile.
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Water accumulated on the roadway faster than it drained off, creating a dangerously slick surface, where any abrupt maneuver can lead to loss of control (hydroplaning), almost as bad as black ice.
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I was beyond thankful for my Jeep’s legendary traction, and my all weather, all terrain tires.
We didn’t get to enjoy the scenery along this stretch, but there wouldn’t have been much to see, even on a clear day.
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There were no towns visible from the highway, and few signs of civilization, not until we crossed the border into the state of Quintana Roo, and got closer to Cancun.
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We passed one roadside business selling pink plastic flamingoes, in several sizes, all lined up in rows,
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and we dodged motorcycles being used as rickshaws, transporting passengers down the rain-soaked highways.
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When we arrived in Cancun, the streets were clogged with those moto-taxis, along with a bazillion regular taxi cabs. We spotted our high rise hotel easily enough, and drove straight to it.
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We checked in, dropped off our dirty clothes, then headed back out to find a restaurant. That’s when the rain abruptly intensified into a true tropical downpour, roaring down in sheets! There was no food at the hotel, and we were starving, so I said “screw it,” (or words to that effect), and off we went, into the breech! We only drove maybe two blocks, plowing through water in the streets all the way up to our axles. There was a surprising amount of traffic, though several smaller vehicles, mostly taxi cabs, were stalled alongside the road, engines flooded by rainwater that was running from curb to curb, overwhelming the storm drains. I don’t remember our meal that night, don’t really remember the restaurant, but I definitely remember that drive through Cancun’s flooded downtown streets!
The same weather system devastated the nearby city of Chetumal, further south along the coast, where they’d endured five straight days of heavy rain. This newspaper tells a horrifying story of destructive flooding. If we had been going on into Belize, as we originally intended, Chetumal would have been our border crossing point, so it was just as well that we’d changed our plans!
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Por Esto! Local newspaper with a story about the storm
The weather became a major concern, if only for the next few days. There were more storms coming in from the Atlantic, and there was also a powerful hurricane bearing down on the Pacific Coast. There were fears that the systems would collide over Central Mexico and combine to form something seriously dangerous. I remember remarking to Mike about the mixed blessing of the information age. Everywhere we went, there were televisions tuned to weather reports warning the citizenry about the potential “super storm,” and being on a road trip, we couldn’t help but worry about it. There was a strong potential for washed-out highways (or worse), and for more disasters like what happened in Chetumal. We could be left stranded, or forced to alter our route, perhaps dramatically. After several days of being told by all the televisions and newspapers that the sky was about to fall, the hurricane surprised everyone by veering north. The “super storm” never happened, so all our worry was (thankfully) for nothing. In the old days, it’s doubtful that we would have heard a word about any of it until after it was over (if then). There was so much less media when we were younger, it was easy to avoid, especially outside the U.S.. Chances are, we would have been blissfully oblivious, and none the worse off for it.
Next up: Day 12: Cruising the Maya Riviera
Cruising the Riviera Maya
Day 12:Beginning in Cancun
Over breakfast the next morning, Mike and I talked about how different Cancun was from everything else we’d seen in Mexico. Newer, more modern, a lot less funky, though if you looked hard enough, you could still see the third-world poking through, not quite covered by the glitzy signs (most in English) and the fresh coats of paint. The millions of tourists who fly directly to Cancun from the U.S. or Canada are seeing the place out of context. They can’t possibly appreciate the fact that they’re 2,000 miles south of the border; a whole country, a whole culture, a whole history away from the U.S.A. Just looking around, on the surface? The second largest city in southern Mexico could easily pass for a beach town in Florida.
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Downtown Cancun
We retrieved our freshly washed laundry at the hotel, then made a stop at the front desk on our way out. The Jeep was due for an oil change, and Cancun seemed like a good place for it, so I asked the clerk if he knew where we could get it done quickly, without an appointment. He recommended a shop called Lubramax, just up the street.
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Quickie oil change in Cancun
I was using a new synthetic oil blend that wasn’t widely available yet, not even back in Arizona. I figured that might be a problem, so I’d brought along a case of it from home. When I got to the shop, I was told that they only do oil changes with the oil that they sell, and they weren’t allowed to make exceptions. In the end, I talked them into bending their rule, but only by agreeing to pay the cost of five quarts of multigrade that I couldn’t use.
Things like laundry and oil changes aren’t always easy to arrange when you’re on a long road trip, so it felt pretty good to have covered both tasks in a single morning. We gassed up at the Pemex station, then jumped on MX 307 to continue our journey.
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Riviera Maya: From One Hotel to the Maison Tulum
The developers who created Cancun leveraged their success and expanded their project, focusing first on the area between Playa del Carmen and Tulum, then moving north as far as Puerto Morelos, and south as far as Felipe Carillo Puerto, a stretch of Caribbean Coastline well over 100 miles long. This whole area, originally known as the Cancun-Tulum Corridor, has been re-branded as the Riviera Maya, trading on the upscale reputation enjoyed by the French and Italian Rivieras on the Mediterranean Coast of Europe.
There are resorts along this coastline in every category, all inclusive properties that cater to every whim of their guests. There is world-class diving just off-shore, with the world’s second longest barrier reef, and limitless schools of colorful fish and other creatures that make their home among the coral.
What we saw, driving through on MX 307, was a seemingly endless extension of Cancun, brand new, modern developments that wouldn’t look the least bit out of place if you picked them up and plopped them down in any coastal area north of the border. They even had Drive-through Starbucks, the ultimate symbol of advanced civilization!
We used Expedia once again, and we’d reserved a hotel in Tulum, the popular beach town that was about a two hour drive south from Cancun. Tulum was also the location of a very cool Mayan ruin that goes by the same name. So long as the weather cooperated, the rest of our day was set–but it still looked very much like rain!
We drove through Playa del Carmen, one of the beach towns I’d always heard good things about. It’s popular with expatriate Americans, and it was easy to see why. The whole area is so overwhelming dominated by North American style and culture that there’s barely any room left for Mexico.
But then again:
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Billboards
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Warning: Speed Bumps Ahead!
I’m sure we could have found more of the true local core if we’d looked a little harder, but from the perspective of two old dudes passing through? A lot of what we were seeing seemed strangely out of place.
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All of that changed when we reached the town of Tulum, where they promote a hip/funky “New Age” ambience that attracts artists, artisans, and counter-culture types from around the globe.
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At the “fish spa,” you soak your feet in small aquariums filled with fish that nibble on your toes.
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Wait--who's driving that thing?
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Mural painted on a wall in Tulum
They’re trading on a common misperception about the ancient Maya, assuming them to have been peaceful mystics, possessed of great wisdom. (The wisdom part is possible, but peaceful? Quite the opposite!). Either way, Tulum has somehow gained a reputation as a place where you can put yourself in touch with a higher plane of spiritual energy. I didn’t experience any such thing myself…but hey, I came of age in the sixties, so it’s not much of a stretch for me to concede the possibility.
Our hotel, the Maison Tulum, was a rare find.
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A boutique hotel, with maybe a half dozen very nice rooms located above a French Bakery and restaurant. Two blocks off the main drag, I really doubt we would have ever even seen it, had it not been for Expedia. We paid just $44 per night (figuring in a 10% discount for paying cash). In a heavily touristed area like Tulum, that was a heck of a good deal! (Prices quoted were correct in 2015; they’ve gone up since then, but it’s still a great value.)
There was a lovely courtyard at street level,
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as well as a rooftop terrace.
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Our room had a foyer,
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and our towels were folded into swans!
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It had been raining lightly, on and off, through most of our drive down from Cancun, but we considered ourselves fortunate, because just after we got off the road and checked into our hotel, there was another cloudburst. Heavy rain poured down for about two hours, until mid-afternoon, when it stopped as abruptly as it started. Everything was wet, deep puddles lined the streets, but the clouds looked like they were breaking up a bit. Tulum, the Mayan ruin was just ten minutes away, so we grabbed our cameras, and headed over there.
Next up: Tulum: The Mayan City by the Sea
Tulum: The Mayan City by the Sea
Day 12 (Afternoon): Another Day, Another Mayan Ruin
Tulum, the ruin, is second only to Chichén Itzá in the number of visitors that it attracts; almost two million per year, which is far more than Uxmal, or Palenque, or any of the other Mayan cities in Mexico. Once again, this has less to do with the quality of the site than it does with the relative proximity to Cancun; it’s just two hours each way, and there’s even shopping, as well as a beach! As a day trip, it’s ideal, even for people who don’t care two hoots about Mayan ruins.
Our hotel was very close:
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Having a laugh with the parking attendant
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There were puddles everywhere from the rain, and the path between the parking area and the ruins was a flooded, muddy mess.
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It’s a bit of a hike, even without the water hazard–at least a half mile each way–so there are tractor-drawn carts that shuttle visitors back and forth for a nominal fee. On this particular day, a seat on the cart was well worth the additional cost of 100 Pesos– about five bucks each.
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It was already getting late in the day–after 3:00 PM, We weren’t even going to try to see everything on this visit, because we were already planning to return the next morning, when we’d have (hopefully!) better light, and a smaller crowd.
The shuttle deposited us at the entrance to the ruins, and we walked up a shallow flight of steps into the ancient Mayan city of Tulum.
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The expanse of manicured grass reminded me of a golf course, crossed by meandering paths that connected perhaps two dozen partially restored stone structures.
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When compared to the other Mayan cities we’d seen, Tulum was rather low-key. The one unique thing it had going for it was its location, location, location: it’s the only Mayan city of any size with an ocean view.
“Tulum” is the Maya word for “wall,” a reference to the fact that this was once a walled city. Portions of the original wall are still standing, and other sections have been partially rebuilt with the original stone, forming a boundary around the main plaza and all the most important monumental structures at the site. In its original form, the wall was a monumental construction in its own right. Built entirely of stone, it ranged from 10 to 16 feet in height, and it was as much as 26 feet thick, following the contours of the land for a total distance of 1300 feet, with the longest section, on the western side, running parallel to the sea.
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The wall was built primarily for defense, but it also served to separate the priests and nobles from the common people who lived outside the wall, and made up the vast majority of the city’s population.
It’s thought that the original name of Tulum was “Zama,” which means “dawn.” The city’s monumental core is situated atop a forty foot high cliff, facing to the east. The stone temples catch the first rays of the rising sun when it climbs up out of the sea in the morning, the first location in the World of the Maya to greet the dawn each day.
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Whatever you call it, the city was a port, and an important trading center. Some say it was owned and operated by the Lords of Coba, a much larger, much more important Mayan City that lies just a bit inland. According to another theory, Tulum and the many other spots along this coast that were used as ports in antiquity were part of an extensive trading network that was operated by a whole different group, a whole different ethnicity. The inland Mayan cities were ruled by dynasties of kings whose power came from their royal lineage, or from their prowess in war. The Lords of the ports were merchants. The coastal trade, mostly luxury goods, was incredibly lucrative, and the significant wealth that was created gave the merchant class a different, but equally important form of power. Not so very different from the dynamics that determine the pecking order of governments in our modern world.
Tulum was one of the few Mayan cities that was still occupied by its original inhabitants when the first Europeans arrived in the area, but within a very few years after that first encounter, the old world diseases brought along on the Spanish ships decimated the population. The survivors abandoned what was left of their stone cities, and in no time at all, the jungle reclaimed them. No first-hand accounts of life in Tulum were ever recorded, so what little has been written is based on archaeological research that was done prior to the 1980’s. More is needed, but odds are, it might never be allowed.
Because of its prominent location, readily visible from the sea, Tulum, is one of those sites that was never lost, and, given its picturesque setting, it was one of the first Mayan ruins to be exploited for tourism. What started as a trickle, back in the 19th century, has now become a flood. With millions of tourists passing through each year, generating hundreds of millions in revenue, there’s little incentive to do any serious additional digging. No treasure they might find, and no bit of knowledge they might glean could ever be worth more than what they’re bringing in now, just from the ticket sales alone.
When Tulum was an active Mayan port, trade goods arrived in seagoing canoes that plied the coast. Loading and unloading took place on the beach below the cliffs, so they’ve built a wooden staircase for park visitors to make their way down to the water.
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The ocean is beautiful here, the many extraordinary shades of blue that are the hallmark of the Caribbean.
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Try to imagine what it must have been like when the Mayan city was at its peak. It would have truly been something to see!
The staff chased everyone out when the park closed at 5:00 PM. I would have loved to have stayed awhile longer, but I knew we’d be back first thing in the morning, so we’d have another opportunity to finish taking our photographs. So long as the weather cooperated, the early morning light on those eastward facing buildings might well be something special.
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This first visit had been a bit crowded, despite being the off-season. There were at least a dozen tour groups clustered about the park at any given moment, and people were pretty much everywhere in an area that was a good bit smaller than the other Mayan cities we’d seen. The crowd wasn’t quite as bad as Chichén Itzá, but I’m sure the rain kept a few people away, so any other day probably would have been worse.
Back at the Maison Tulum, we had some dinner, then spent a pleasant evening in our room, plotting our next move:
1.) First thing in the morning, we’d revisit Tulum, the ruin.
2.) After lunch, we’d check out Coba, another major Mayan ruin that’s about 30 miles northwest.
3.) In the evening, back to Tulum, the town, and a second night at the Maison.
The following day:
4.) More Mayan ruins! South of Tulum, there was an obscure site or two that we could stop at on our way to Chetumal, on the border with Belize. From there, west across the bottom of the Peninsula, and north to Campeche, visiting still more ruins along the way, and completing the circuit of the Yucatan that we started when we drove from Palenque to Merida.
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Next up: Tulum, one more time, without the crowd!
