Chichen Itza and Izamal



Chichen Itza



We were some of the first tourists to arrive at the Chichen Itza ruins, which is one of the big ones, and were surprised to see hundreds of men setting up stalls full of souveniers along every path at the site. Unless you are Jennifer Lopez, you are no longer allowed to climb the pyramid here, so my newly discovered veritigo was kept under wraps for the day.

After seeing the massive cenote, which was a little walk away from the main site, we were met by a mob of tourists on return to the main site, so were pleased to have taken a few pictures without them all in.
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Chichen Itza



Chichen Itza

Richard soon bored of me singing 'Chichen Itza tell me what's wrong' to Abba's Chiquitita, so told me to read from the guide book instead, eager to hear stories of human sacrifice. The sacrificing of losing football teams particularly caught his imagination, and he decided this would have been a much better way to celebrate beating Arsenal rather than just getting hammered in Finsbury Park.

After ticking off another ruin site we headed to up to the town of Izamal for some lunch and to see the Kinich-Kakmo ruins. Nicknamed the Yellow City, sunglasses are a must in Izamal as every building is painted this colour. A policeman came over to us as we parked the car on the plaza square. Immediately we thought we'd need to pay off the policeman thinking we had parked illegally, but he simply wanted to tell us a bit about the town and offer us a map to buy confirming that we watch far too many films.

Izamal - the yellow city

Mexicans can eat a lot. We ordered some panuchos for lunch, which are fried tortillas, filled with refried beans and topped with mountains of shredded chicken. Having eaten all of the free Doritos and dips before hand, we were absolutely stuffed. Mexican waiters just keep on bringing you food, it was like being at your mums.



The rubbled way up



Me struggling up the rubbles

To walk off our massive lunch we decided to climb up the ruins. The steps were really worn and looked like a pile of rubble. I got stuck half way up and was having small panic attack, Richard used the age old Dad trick of saying 'there are little kids that have made it up here'. Not wanting to look totally weak, I struggled up the rest of the way and was pleased I did as the views of Izamal were great.

It was only after we had walked around the top of the pyramid that we came across a clear path that led to a perfect set of newly built steps that we were meant to have walked up. I made my feelings about this quite clear.



The proper way up