The Joneses Visit Mexico: Tulum and Turtles

We saw this bird EVERYWHERE in Cancun. He was at every site we visited, he flew around the dining room as we ate, he even perched on our balcony one morning. He's black or brown or blue or green, depending on the lighting, and he's pretty scraggly-looking. I've decided he's a great-tailed grackle, despite his lack of a great-looking tail.

Not surprisingly for a tropical land, we saw lots of bugs, including mosquitos that chewed my ankles raw, and ants, which our tour guide warned us to stay clear of. This looks like a grasshopper on steroids.

We saw these signs everywhere. You probably think this sign translates as "stop". I did too, but it obviously means something else. We never stopped, slowed, or yielded when driving past this sign. I didn't see anyone else paying any attention to it, either.

Like public places everywhere, Mexico has plenty of "do not" signs like these:
Do not smoke

Do not eat junk food

Do not walk on all fours

Do not let doves loose



Do not cross your legs when sitting (my mother always told me that, too)

and my favorite: Do not put paper in the toilet. Yep, Mexico has astonishingly bad sewer systems. Every bathroom had a small garbage can by the toilet, overflowing with used toilet paper. Most of the toilets didn't flush anyway.

                                                       

But I digress. On Thursday, we headed to Tulum, a Mayan city on the cliffs of a seaport.

Naturally, it was raining. This is rainy season.

Rain makes for beautiful foliage, so it all works out. This is a Ceiba tree, the Mayan tree of life. It is an important symbol in Mayan society, and is divided into three sections: the underworld (roots), the trunk or middle (present life), and heaven (the branches). The roots of this tree are deeper reaching than other local trees, and the other trees often tap into the roots of the Ceiba tree to get water and nourishment. 

An example of the Mayan depiction of the tree of life.

Close-up of the Cebia tree. I don't think I'll attempt a climb.

The topsoil in Cancun is only 3-4" with limestone below, and with the exception of the Ceiba tree, the roots are very shallow.



 

 

The city of Tulum is surrounded on three sides with a wall with little doorways like this one. The wall was originally about 16 feet high. Can you imagine the labor that went into this wall? The fourth wall was the sea.

The main structure is the castle, set on top of the hill, facing east.

 

This is the Great Palace. Tulum seems to be in rougher shape than Chichen Itza. This building would have had a thatched roof.

Same ruin, from the back.

It's easy to imagine how beautiful this city would have been when thriving.

Remind you of the leaning tower of Pisa? It was likely a house for a wealthy family.

 

 This building is famous for its Murals, although you can no longer go inside to look. You can see the underpinnings on the bottom left, intended to keep the leaning from becoming a topple.

The city of Tulum is famous for its depiction of the Descending God. You can still see the red paint, the feet up, the arms down. Our guide seemed to be a little befuddled by who this represented, and one of the informational signs I read described the Descending God as "an unknown God". Someone in our group mentioned our LDS beliefs about Christ's visit to the people of the area, something our guide had never heard.

Detail at the Temple of the Descending God.

If you look closely, you can see the round columns at this building, not unlike the ones in Chichen Itza.

This is one of the last cities built and inhibited by Mayans, and was occupied for another 70 years after the arrival of the Spaniards.



It's hard to see in this picture, but several of the buildings had a distinctive red handprint, the "signature" of the architect. 

This was once a city of around 1500 people.

 

 

There were several foundations of former homes or buildings left behind.





The most important building would have been the castle. It is a temple with two small rooms downstairs and a larger one on top. Hmmm. Where have seen a configuration like that before?

 

Another Descending God depiction.

The back of the castle, facing the ocean, has two small windows, one square, one rectangle.

Yes, this is a hurricane region.



One of the three surrounding walls.

Stan and I walked down through the jungle on our way out. It's beautiful, quiet and serene. I often had a "sacred grove" feeling, walking through these beautiful jungles.


Coconut tree.

After viewing Tulum, we ate lunch at a seaside restaurant.

The food at these places was always really good-better than the buffet at the hotel. They were made on site, using typical local menus. I think Americans over-spice cheap ingredients in the US when cooking Mexican. The food here was simple, lots of chicken, beans, rice, and vegetables with delicious homemade tortillas.

After lunch we headed for our next adventure: swimming with the turtles. That cute, young girl in the center of the picture was our snorkeling instructor and guide. She is from Sweden and met her boyfriend when vacationing here four years ago. She now lives here, and she was a delightful guide.

Unfortunately, we don't own a waterproof camera and there were no photographers to record Stan and yours truly snorkeling, but this is what it looked like. The turtles eat sea grass off of the ocean floor, a little like a grazing cow. We also saw several stingrays and a variety of colorful fish.



Dinner that night was at the Italian restaurant.

It was very tasty and

included a yummy dessert.