Mayan ruins at Uxmal, Mexico
We
spent three hours at the ancient Mayan city of Uxmal, Mexico, walking
through air that dripped with humidity. There was so much
information to soak up that I eventually just took in the landscape
instead. So this post is short on information, but long on
pictures.
There
are literally dozens of Mayan ruins on the Yucatan Peninsula. We
chose to visit Uxmal because it is the second
best. All of the tourists flock to Chichen Itza, which is reputed
to be the very best on the peninsula, with the result that the
government had to close off most of the structures to protect
them. At Uxmal, we were able to explore and climb everything
except the Magician's pyramid.
The
Magician's pyramid was closed off while it was undergoing
renovations. Workers were carefully marking each stone, taking
them off, then mortaring them back in place, all while standing
on a flimsy scaffold made of tied together saplings. The human
element softened the ruined stone buildings and captured my imagination.
Even
more tantilizing were the stone sculptures coating the walls of various
buildings. I love the flat animal sculptures with intricate
linear patterns, and it's hard not to like the endless versions of
Chaac like the one on the right, with his long hooked nose. Chaac
is the rain god --- I wonder if our visit to Uxmal will bring us yet
more rain?
Of
course, being who I am, as soon as the tour guide turned me loose I
headed in the opposite direction from the rest of the group, toward the
woods. The Yucatan Peninsula is covered with dry, scrub forest
due to very thin topsoil over limestone. Trees were short, and
many were legumes --- presumably the poor soil gives trees that can
make their own nitrogen an advantage. Butterflies abounded, as
did huge iguanas that had taken up residence in the abandoned rooms all
around the ruins. Swallows soared and chittered, Africanized
honeybees gathered pollen in the grass, and Mark and I sat in the shade
and lived Uxmal.
This post is part of our Moundville and Cruise to Mexico honeymoon
series.
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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