Christmas in Cancun - Part V: Chichén Itzá, Hubiku Cenote, and Ek' Balam

December 26th:

The next morning Andie, Luke, Ryan, Kayleen, Josh, and I woke up early to catch our tour van at 5:40 AM! We had a LONG (2.5 hours) drive to Chichén Itzá. About 45 minutes before we got there our tour guide woke us up and told us all about Chichén Itzá, the Mayan calendar, and how to count in Mayan.

We then arrived at Chichén Itzá and headed straight over to the Great Ball Court.

Our tour guide told us all about the Mayan game and how it was played (which is debatable, but I digress). He had us stand in rows and clap our hands so we could hear the seven echos. 

We then walked over to the Skull Platform.

He then took us to the best place to get a picture of the Temple of Kukulkan (since not all sides were restored).

We walked to the base of the Temple and our tour guide had us clap again so we could hear how good the acoustics are. 

He then told us about the temple and the "Feathered Serpent" god Kukulkan.

We then headed over to the Temple of the Warriors. At this point our tour guide cut us loose and told us to meet him at the front in an hour.

We headed to the Osario, El Caracol (a proto-observatory), and La Iglesia ("The Church")

[Osario]

[El Caracol]

[La Iglesia ("The Church")]

[One last peek at the Temple of Kukulkan]

After exploring the ruins we headed to Hubiku to eat lunch and go swimming in the cenote!

[Walking down the steps to the cenote]

The cenote was completely underground with just a small opening at the top where water and sunlight were coming in. The water is 27 meters deep, so I decided to not take any risk and took my Apple Watch off before I jumped in the water.



[Just us and the catfish]

The water was so clear, clean, and refreshing! We swam for a while before headed back to the bus to start our journey to Ek' Balam.

After just a 30 minute drive we arrived at Ek' Balam!

[Arco de Entrada]

[Stela]

[Hidden ruins]

[The Oval Palace]

[Ball court]

[Cistern]

We made our way through the site visiting the Entrance Arch (Arco de Entrada), the Oval Palace, The Twins, the Chapel, the Ball Court, and an ancient cistern before arriving at the Acropolis! 

This large temple contains the tomb of the King.

We climbed to the top and enjoyed the view of the ruins.

After climbing the Acropolis, we headed back to the Oval Palace to get a few more pictures.

[Top of the Oval Palace]

[Bees]

We then found our tour guide and started the LONG journey back to the hotel. It was a very, very long day, but I highly recommend going and seeing the ruins while you are in the Yucatán! It is definitely worth the drive!

While we were off being explorers, the rest of the group stayed at the Vidanta all day! They hung out by the pool, ate fish tacos, and drank coconut water straight from the coconut! 

Thanks mom and dad for watching Theo again!