On Tuesday we went to the site of Tulum, which is located right on the beach as you will be able to see from the photos. It is a perfect paradise and it is quite obvious why the Maya would decide to build a city there. Although it was quite small the site was amazing!! We had perfect weather because we went early in the morning and we were almost the first people in the site so that was good too. It was way different from any other site we have seen so far, and the maintenance on the grounds is the big difference I think. It seems the Mexicans have the money to keep the sites really tourist friendly and also have the ability to put more signs and walking paths everywhere. But tourist friendly it definitely was...it was lucky we got there as early as we did because by 10am there were people everywhere!!! It all got a little too much when you can hardly walk down the path without running into someone. And this is the low season...I´d hate to think what the peak season would be like!
The great thing about Tulum, apart from the beautiful vision, is that there is a beach right in the site. So after walking around in the hot sun you can relax and go for a swim in the beautiful crystal blue waters of the Caribbean. We spent a while at the beach until too many tourists came and it got too loud. We were a little disappointed that we couldn´t go into the main temple because it was closed for reconstruction. But we probably wouldn´t have been able to see much more than we did anyways so its all good. We left and went into the bookshop and I think i´ve found someone who buys more books than I do. Laura bought about 3 books i think, so I think she is well on her way to catching up with me.
That afternoon we were going to go to the Cenote, but by the time we got back to the hotel we were so tired and we all fell asleep. On Wednesday we went to the site of Cobá, which was about 45 minutes away. We got an early start to avoid the crowds and thats exactly what we did. The ticket booth wasn´t even open when we got there at 8am, but they opened for us. The site reminded me of being back in El Mirador because it was in the jungle and it was such a nice feeling. It was quite spaced out so we decided to rent bikes and ride around. It was the best 30 pesos i´ve ever spent because it was so fun...bought me back to my childhood. Bike riding was such a good way to see the ruins and it was fast too. We had organized a taxi to take us and wait 2 hours then bring us home for a good deal so we had to try to see everything in 2 hours. First we went to the main structure that you could climb...it the highest building in the Yucatan area. We climbed and just sat at the top for a while, the view was amazing! Wishing we could have stayed there all day, we realized that we should go see the rest of the site. We saw a round pyramid which is really rare, so fascinating to us then went to a plaza that had heaps of stelae. Unfortunately they were all badly eroded so you couldn´t see many hieroglyphs or pictures on them but still impressive all the same. We timed our tour to the minute because we arrived back at the car park after exactly 2 hours, but then April saw the zip line and decided she had to do it. It was one of the funniest things i´ve seen in a while. She got all harnessed up and we all walked up the stairs, the guy clipped her in and she jumped off the platform....but one of the caribbeaners wasn´t connected properly and kept catching as she went down the line, so it was a jerky zip line. The funny part was that because she wasn´t going fast at all she got stuck in the middle and just hung there over a crocodile infested lagoon. I have no idea how the guy was going to get her back, but she managed to clip the thingy back onto the line and then went normally down to the end. Luckily she took video of the whole experience, which is very funny to watch back.
On the way back to Tulum we decided to go to another small site called Xel-Ha. It was by no means as impressive as Tulum or Cobá, but to me it was just as interesting. It seemed like some of the buildings were miniatures; as if they were build primarily for ceremonial purposes, because they could not have served a purpose at all. It was really pretty though because there was a cenote at the site and it was surrounded by little structures and trees and there was sun shining through them...perfect.
Tomorrow we leave to meet up with Amy and Rob in Cancun, which I am looking forward to. I don´t know how long we will stay in Cancun, as I don´t think April is too keen to go there, but i´ll post more blog when we get settled again and after we have done something interesting. PS Will post photos asap as soon as i have fast internet!!
