Chichen Itza A Cool Place...and on to Tulum

I decided to take an early morning bus to Chichen Itza, and when I arrived at the main plaza with about 5 other people at 9 am, I knew I had made the right choice - especially when by 11 am the hordes of Cancun day trippers took over the place.



Chichen Itza is especially fascinating because the people who built in were definitely influenced by other local cultures - the main pyramid, for example, just doesn´t really look exactly ¨Mayan.¨ But a fascinating site, really a joy to spend most of a day wondering around it, the nearby cenote and ruins.

From there I made it on to Tulum, and today had a really interesting boat tour of the Sian Ka´an Bioshere - a place where cenote-fed wetlands meet with the sparkling Caribbean, resulting in a series of mangrove-entangled ecosystems rich in birds, fish and crocodiles. There is a small, Mayan ruin where a small, freshwater lake empties into a channel en route to the sea. Archaeologists think that this is where the Mayans forced boats to pay tribute who wished to take advantage of this natural outlet to the sea. Here, in the Mexican wetlands, a thousand years ago, dedicated Mayan bureacrats served their countymen by collecting levies on the commerce of the day: here lay the home of the Mayan IRS.

***

Off to see th ruins at Tulum in the morning, then maybe some cenote snorkeling. Off to Playa del Carmen at some point, not sure if I will spend a night or just pass righ through to Cozumel. Scuba awaits.