Day Four: Chichen Itza and the Maya
Day: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
 

The site is litterally in the middle of a scrub brush jungle. People are not allowed on these pryamids.

It was very hot and humid at this site. It is massive and had been built over the course of nearly 1000 years.

You can see the difference between what they call the "classical period" and the "late classical period."


This sink hole is at the site.

No swimming allowed.

This sink hole was five stories down.

That's Joe standing at the edge.
This is the king's throne box outside the ball court.
This outside view of the ball court shows us the king's box on ground level and his viewing box above. Its not Lambeau Field, but its even older!

 

This tower is a reconstruced corner of a pyramid showing a Mayan god with an elephant nose - eventhough there were no elephants in the Mayan world.



It seemed nearly everything was covered in these picture carvings.

This temple and colums has pictures of "heros' carved in them.


A close up of a small temple with its water alter.
These picture carvings are from the ballcourt. See the man about to be killed?


This ball court was one of the highlights of our trip. See how there are small sloping sides you could jump up on to help your shot? This is about the size of a football field. The rings are more than twenty feet off the ground. You got the feeling of what it was like to have people - maybe 30,000 or more- watching as you fight for victory (and maybe your life) with a hard rubber ball you have to hit with your hip.

The guide said this was the largest ball court and that many others were found around the area. We passed by a smaller one that was in great disrepair. It was the size of a hand ball court.

This is a pyramid from the older period.
This is the observatory, the only ruins you can climb on - but by the time we got to it, we were finished climbing on rocks. They tell us the tower goes down so far that the Maya could have seen the stars in the middle of the day.
Day: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5