Mayan ruins, Armed troops and Jaguars?

OK - I lied.  I said my next post would be from Playa del Carmen, but this surprise trip dropped into my lap and it was full of surprises.  I'd just finished my three mile walk and was sitting sweaty in the 98% humidity waiting for what has become my favorite breakfast:  fresh local fruit, topped with homemade yogurt, honey and granola assembled by the tiny cafe under the hostal.  A man walked up and asked what's good for breakfast and I - of all people - offered with my Spanish.  Then another traveler came in and the three of us began comparing notes about the area.  

The breakfast seeker was down from New York (Jersey Actually, but has a B&B at the edge of Manhatten) and another who had just walked away from a tennis coach job in Playa and was off for cooler climbs. As the conversation meandered along, the man from Jersey began talking about raising his twin, eleven year old ADD/ODD grandsons!  I don't know many men who would do that as a single grand-parent and I was really taken by his commitment, humility, grace and sense of humor while also running a few businesses.  As we talked about ADD, I shared some information from the consulting I used to do and before long he invited me to share a trip to see some Mayan ruins I hadn't seen, and surely would not ever see without going with someone who has a car. 

Instinct told me this was a good guy and I kept telling myself this as I went into Uganda mode and grabbed a sun hat, camera, TP, bug spray, water and a loaf of bread, some ham and mayonnaise to build sandwiches on the way.  My steady diet of murder mysteries prompted me to get Alex - the hostal owner - to plug his phone number into my phone and promise to send out the search party if I didn't come back by bed-time.  This precaution was reinforced by remembering what a new friend - a former librarian - told me about the Halloween parties the librarians would throw.  Each person  came dressed as their favorite Dewey Decimal Number.  My friend came dressed as herself, representing 364.1523, because serial killers looked like normal folks...   

Since I've lived to tell the tale, you can assume he was not of the criminal type. Turns out he was in fact a really nice man and a great travel companion. So engrossed in conversation were we that we managed to miss the (badly marked) dirt road several times. Asking directions from some locals who must have wondered about these Gringos, we managed to bracket a lot of  "that-way" hand signals and finally located the small gravel road heading into the j-u-n-g-l-e. 

As we headed  down the road, we nosed into an offshoot that turned out to be the trail to a small, private landing strip.  Realizing our mistake, we backed up and evidently that seemed a little suspicious to the fierce looking occupants of a huge military vehicle, that looked like a tank. Bulging with guys armed with assault rifles literally hanging off the floorboards and bumpers, the tank pulled to the side as we pulled back onto the road. All these big, scary looking men in full camo and decked out for Armageddon jumped off the vehicle and blocked the road with guns at the ready, motioning for us to stop.   Simultaneously we said, "This can't be good..." but considering the lack of alternatives, stop we did.  Neither of us had brought passports and the combined pulse rate in the car escalated as fear fogged the windows. 

Once stopped with the window obligingly rolled down six enforcer-types clumped our way and were looking way to serious.  Oh man - how did I spend all that time in Africa, only to come to Mexico and find trouble? Seems I'd read too many reports of tourists being hauled in at gunpoint, drug deals gone wrong, etc. because these guys just wanted to know where we were going, pointed us down the road and wished us a good day.  It was still unnerving and took a while to get back to normal breathing.  Seems that a while back, there had been a huge drug-drop at this little landing strip and our brief investigation of the road tweaked their radar. There is still some military presence in the area and they are watching....  I guess we didn't look like drug smugglers - although we'd have been the perfect disguise: mild older pair posing as tourists...   I would have loved a picture, but thought I might be pushing my luck to ask them to pose and say "Queso!"

Propelled forward by the adrenaline rush we proceeded on our way and found the ruins, by which time it had begun to rain - again.  Nevertheless, we climbed out and spent the next couple of hours climbing ruins, trudging around in a sprinkle, providing lunch for the mosquitoes and being generally entertained by a local guide.  

Left is a close-up of a bed carved for the King. You can see the beginnings of Martha Stewart DNA in the use of under-bed storage. It was the main bedroom in an area about 1500 square feet.

 Just in case you needed to visit the Underworld, here's the door on the right.   Under the huge platform housing the bedroom and known as The Acropolis, there existed an entire other  structure and this creepy little door is part of that earlier city. Apparently this was common practice among the Mayans - to build one city or structures on top of the previous ones.

Among other vegetation in the area, there were Elephant Ear's big enough to use as a dress, Kapok trees, Bromiliads (?) like the one below and huge trees rooted on top of the ruins, showing how much excavation had to be done to reclaim the ruins from the jungle.

Along the way we'd passed a place named Explorean, a gorgeous all inclusive resort tucked back into the jungle.  On the way back, I was treated to a fine lunch in the gorgeous dining room overlooking the pool and the jungle. We met some great folks here from Key West and learned a group from Texas was there doing a conservation study - tagging Jaguars in the area.

Jaguars? Military?  Where am I?   Ah!  Mexico. I love Mexico.

We fared well in all respects.  Since the Jaguars are a little further in and we manage not to antagonize them or the men with many guns, we had a great time, a fun excursion and a good lunch. Another lovely friendship was born.

It'll be hard to leave new friends found in Bacalar.  Alex and Veronica, the owners of the hostel are fabulous and make me want to open a hostel down here somewhere.  Sorta.....  It's a lot of work of course, but could still be fun.

Can't wait to see what Playa holds in store!

Campeche and Bacalar

Life has definitely slowed down.  To perk things up a bit, I decided I'd take a few days and go to Campeche on the other side of the Peninsula from Bacalar. Having heard it is like going to an old walled-city in Spain, I didn't want to miss it while I'm down here. So at about noon a couple of weeks back I caught a Colectivo - a taxi carrying several people and charging a fraction of a private taxi - boarded a Primero Clase bus for a six hour ride across the peninsula.   Once there I caught a tiny chartreuse taxi and made my way to Hotel Navigante, there not being but a few hostels in Campeche and none of them discoverable online.   Tucked into a cluster of sherbert-colored houses, I'm glad I picked a hotel in the old historic district. Within this portion, everything is concrete - not a patch of grass anywhere as you can see.

I was relieved to escorted to a big room with a balcony, AC, a deep TUB.  I'm thinking, "boy this is going to be great!"   It was already dusk when I set out to find dinner, but had no idea where to go and the desk clerk was singularly disinterested in helping even when I used my best Spanish.  So I ended up grabbing a yogurt from the little kiosk next door, just as the sky opened up and a heavy rain drenched the city.

Perfect night for taking a long hot bath - right up until I discovered that there was no way to get the shower off and the tub faucet on. So I decided to let the shower fill the tub, left the room and looked up to see to see a river of water cascading out of the bathroom because the shower wasn't adjusted properly and would require a ladder to reach it.  So much for the bath idea...

Next day, bright and early I went down for breakfast of weak coffee and five different kinds of bread.  Does anyone know how to boil an egg?  OK - I'm being tacky. This is a hotel for chrissake - not a hostel and even hostels usually have a pretty decent breakfast!  The edge of hunger having been softened, I left with map of sorts in hand and went off to explore and find a decent cup of coffee.  My mood improved dramatically when my search was rewarded with frothy cup of cappuccino and a piece of something like apple pie with fresh apples.

Inside one of the bastions

Campeche lived up to what I'd been told: it is a classic representation of a old walled Spanish city, which began as a Mayan town and  became a completely walled entity because of it's constant bombardment by pirates.   The Spanish built an eight sided wall  around the entire  town, which is now just a small part of a pretty decent sized city.  Not much of the wall remains, but the bastions and portals are still pretty much in tact and a lot of restoration is going on.  One of the bastions has been reclaimed as the town's Botanical Garden and it offered a beautiful place to sit on a hot day.

The gardens

It is quiet town and within this historic district not much is going on.  Many of the streets are entirely devoid of people or cars and one wonders how it survives.  But it's pretty with its rows of colonial houses which share walls and are all meticulously kept and freshly painted.  It was amazingly clean - not a speck of litter anywhere, but has a very serious character about it.  In every town I've visited in Mexico, people are friendly, say "Hola! Buenas dias!" to passersby or at least respond when spoken to.  No so here.  Very few smiling faces and this was later mentioned by Veronica, one of the hostel owners here in Bacalar.  I don't know what created such a personality of a town, but this one has it's own perculiar energy which was not particularly welcoming.

Interesting interface with the Gulf of Mexico though.  There have been so many hurricanes that have hit Campeche that there is no more beach.  It is entirely sea wall, but has a beautifully developed hike and bike trail running the length of the historical area.  There are even stopping points with gym-type equipment to do a workout!   Unlike most beaches I've been to the waves run parallel to the beach, and don't break against the seal wall.  No doubt the geographic configuration of the land, but it's just a little weird.

Mystery flower...

There is a stunning Cathedral there and one street closed to to traffic and devoted to extraordinary sculptures. One of the lovely things abut every town I've visited is the accessibility of art and it's inclusion everywhere in public areas. There were a few old colonial homes turned museum that I was able to visit.  Glad I got to see what all the fuss was about, but not particularly captivated by the feel of the place.  Merida held more interest, but nothing so far has compared to Guadalajara.  I will not make it (this trip) to some of the more interior places that I hear people rave about: like San Christobal, San Luis Potasi, Palenque or San Miguel.  But the alur of the Yucatan Peninsula is definitely Mayan Ruins and beaches.

So, time to go back to Bacalar.  The trip back was an hour longer for some reason I never figured out and was made even more interminable by the kicking of my seat by a small child (old enough to know better) sitting behind me with his only slightly older brother.  The mother and the grandmother wisely sat on the other side of the isle. The kicking started before we were even out of the gate and my Spanish dictionary was tucked safely inside my back pack in the baggage compartment when I desperately needed a word for "kick."  Waiting a while, not wanting to be the ugly American being hateful to a small child, I turned around kneeling in my seat and reached my hand down to try and still his kicking feet and uttered, "Por favor, no."  Well that earned me a look from the mother - who did nothing to intervene, nor did it impress the kid enough to change his behavior.  Obviously I was too nice... Won't happen again.

The kicking continued - and having raised two boys with a lot of energy I realized this kid was just bored, but still...  if he was already bored and we hadn't even gotten on the road, it was going to be a loooong ride.  After three more attempts at being reasonable, I got the mother's attention and using the only Spanish I could muster for the occasion: pointed at the still swinging feet and said: "Por favor, esto es una problema."    Would like to have known how to say  "Dammit, stop kicking my seat or I will eviscerate you!"  But that might have created an international incident and I'm not sure my travel dictionary has the word "eviscerate."  Must learn the word for "kill."

So!  Back in Bacalar, the toursists have all gone home, the rainy season is creeping in a little early and I like it.   It's lovely to be back in this sweet little town.  Every morning I walk my three miles and see the same people building a house on the lagoon, setting up to offer tours or just tending to their chickens, riding their bikes or scooters to work.  On the right is the beginning of my route with some of what I see along the way below: gorgeous Bougainvillea, Flame Trees and bits of jungle.

Coral Bouganvillea

The Mayans are very sweet, friendly - always 
have a greeting and I love seeing them with their families in the Plaza at night.  The kids are happy and there's so much family presence.  Have met a few expats living down here, but am not sure I'm ready for that - still need to be more contributive (not sure that's a word...) than that usually allows. Though this community seems different and more integrated into the regular town and its population than most expat communities.  Houses are tucked in along the way and spread out throughout the area as opposed to being clustered together and a neighborhood unto themselves. 
  

A private path to the lagoon

My free month in a condo a block off the beach in Playa del Carmen is nine days away and I'm soooo excited!  Can't remember if I mentioned that a woman I met in Merida has gifted me the use of her condo for the entire month of June, my paying only utilities.  She lives in D.C. and the condo has no one scheduled for the month.  I feel like I hit the jackpot and am eternally grateful!

Next post: Playa del Carmen!