But wait there are more ruins

Date: 21/11
City: Chichen Itza, Mexico
Kilometres ridden: 219
Cumulative kilometres: 26868

We had breakfast and talked to two German guys which booked in yesterday. They have a week to travel through Yucatan before they meet their families for a holiday in Tulum. We left and rode to our first ruin of the day – Kabah. When we arrived I thought I should practice picking up my bike, so I dropped it (again) after I stopped and picked it up. It worked as well as it did the last time. I guess practice makes perfect πŸ˜›

After this morning exercise we had a look at the palace

a 3D stone sculpture, which is rarely seen in Mayan ruins.

and finally at the Arch, which terminated the Scabe (Mayan causeway) which connected Kabah to other Mayan cities.

We hopped on our bikes and were heading towards Merida. On the way we found a bike shop that sold spare parts, but they didn’t have chain oil or synthetic oil for the bike. They did, however, give us some drawings of where to find the Suzuki shop in Merida. So when we arrived in Merida we tried to find the Suzuki shop which was, shall we say, a littleΒ  difficult…Β  Lukily Hanibal, a Mexican motorcycle rider came to help us. We were stopped at a traffic light when he asked us where we are from and where we are going to. We asked him about the location of the Suzuki dealer and he said just, ‘follow me’. So we did and finally arrived at the Suzuki dealership πŸ˜€
We took a picture of our saviour, exchanged email and blog addresses and went to the workshop.

These guys were great, I paid for the oil and they changed it for me, tensioned the chain and changed my front break pads :). 90minutes and a carton of beer later we were on our way again. Below are the mechanics, including the apprentice in the middle.

We continued to Pista, a town a couple of kilometers away from Chichen Itza. We looked at a couple of accommodations, but it took a while before we found something suitable. The rooms were reasonable priced, the hotel was built at the side of a Maya ruin (left), and it had a huge pool (right)

The interior and exterior had references to Mayan history (right picture shows the head of a stone turtle).


 

 

Date: 22/11
City: Chichen Itza, Mexico
Kilometres ridden: 8
Cumulative kilometre: 26876

We went to the ruins a bit later, waiting for the weather to be a bit warmer, and most of the tourist busses had arrived at that time.

The Chichen Itza ruins cover a large area and the number of tourists disappears in the size, but not the number of “sales people”, aka hawkers. They lined every path to a ruin, so it was easy, just follow the stalls and you will reach the next ruin πŸ™‚. It’s amazing what you find when you have a closer look at the things sold. Australia gold, no, not beer. It’s sun screen πŸ™‚

Anyway, the main pyramid looked impressive, but we couldn’t climb it. Bummer, I would like to stand on top of one of those pyramids and have a look from the top. The guys on the top are the maintenance crew; walking up with a bucket of cement to fix some stones at the top (they looked fit).


There was also the ball arena, where the captain of the winning team was sacrificed; here the ring was also still intact. On the right picture is the area where the sacrifice would be done. The idea was that only the best can be sacrificed and will be received by the gods with open arms. If you are not perfect (the looser of the game), then you are not worthy to be sacrificed. It sort of makes sense; I’d still like to be on the losing team though πŸ˜‰


We also found the plaza of a thousand columns, which was the major place for trading goods.

And we saw the observatory, where the Mayas observed the starts and the Maya calendar was created.

We took plenty of pictures; they will all be all on Facebook πŸ˜‰. On our way to Belize we will pass by Tulum, which has ruins of a Mayan port :D, looks like we are really hooked on Maya ruins! πŸ˜€

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