| Despite being one of the most heavily touristed (and I mean HEAVILY touristed) Mayan sites, it is still awesome and well worth a visit. Make sure you get there early to try and avoid the hordes arriving in massive buses from 'sunny' Cancun. Again, a torrential downpour cooled us off which accounts for the grey skies in the background. This is the Platform of the Skulls just across from the Castillo (of which we have no picture as Greg lost his camera!). Everyone has to climb up the steps to the top of the Castillo - it is quite steep and a lot of people freak out so there's a rope you can grab on to if it's all too much for you. Interestingly, you can also enter inside the Castillo as it contains a temple in the interior. At the top of 60 odd steps is a platform containing a red painted jaguar with jade eyes and flint fangs - there is no air in the narrow stone stairway so those 60 steps are very very long and there will be a huge queue of people behind you panting and sweating so definitely not something you wanna do if you're claustrophobic. No photos of that either due to loss of the camera! Doh!!! You can get to Chichen Itza from Merida, but we stayed over in Valladolid, which has a cenote (blue water filled limestone sink hole) right in the middle of town - you can swim in it, which is not a bad idea given that it is so hot and so humid on the Yucatan peninsula. |
