Our last port of the trip was Cozumel. By this point I was kind of wishing we had another day at sea, just for a little break. But that was for the next day, and besides, with the itinerary we had planned we had plenty of time for er... relaxing. Kind of. Not really. You'll see.
Some of you have wondered if we were just exhausted from everything we had done on the cruise. Nope. Sure, we were usually pretty tired by the end of the day, but it was a happy, pleasant kind of tired. The kind of tired that could easily be cured with a quick trip to the International Cafe or room service bringing up a plate of cookies and milk. Plus, we weren't dragging any kids around, which made everything 295 times easier than normal. (Yes, I did the calculations.)
See? Even though we had now traveled 1370 nautical miles (1577 land miles) I was more than ready for our shore excursion to see the Mayan ruins at
Coba! (Yes, I did the calculations again.)
We got dressed, ate yet another delightful breakfast, walked off the ship, down the pier, and promptly got onto another boat for a 45 minute ferry ride to the mainland.
But first, a few very random side notes that have just come to mind:
- We often ate breakfast outside on deck. To me there is something so very pleasant about eating breakfast outside. Especially when you have a wonderful view of the ocean and the tropical port you will be exploring that day, a slight tropical breeze blowing through your hair, and waiters who will take care of all the cleaning up.
- The french toast on board was just about the best I have ever had. I'm pretty sure they deep fried it or something wonderfully heart-stopping like that, but I didn't care. It was good.
- There was a Hard Rock Cafe and Jimmy Buffet Margaritaville at every port we went to. I don't know why, but this was terribly depressing to me, probably because these things just scream "AMERICAN TOURIST". Now, I know that cruising is really not a good way to get to know the land and culture of the places you visit; it's just not really possible with the limited time you have in port. But still; it'd be nice to get away from stuff like that. Also, the Margaritavilles were always really tall and REALLY LOUD. There'd be lots of people on the patios and balconies, all fairly (or very) drunk and dancing and such. It reminded me of nothing more than the loud and spacious building in Lehi's vision. (Just a little reference for my LDS friends out there.)
- Despite the very American presence in the ports we visited, I never saw a single McDonalds. But I did see several KFCs and Burger Kings. Odd.
Meanwhile, back in Mexico...
So we had a 45 minute ferry ride from Cozumel to the Yucatan peninsula. This was... boring. And a little gross because some poor girl close to us kept getting sea sickness.
But we made it and landed at Playa del Carmen, a very wealthy beach resort. Tres nice. The first thing Lance and I noticed were the wonderful beaches. We kicked ourselves for not deciding to have a beach day there; the beaches were beautiful and there was an actual surf you could play in! Oh well. Maybe we have to go stay at one of the resorts there some day.
Our group was soon met by our tour guides for the day. We walked through parts of Playa Del Carmen, following the little Coba sign. Tres touristy.
Most of the group got onto a huge and comfy looking tour bus - but we got... lucky... and ended up in a small and rather crowded passenger van. I'm pretty sure we were the leftovers. Oh well.
Our tour guide's name was Andres. He was very proud of the fact that he is a descendant of the Mayans. So proud, in fact, that he proceeded to give us the entire known history of the Mayan people, starting from the dawn of time until the present. Unfortunately, Andres' voice and the motion of the van were both very soothing; I think all of the passengers slept at some point during our hour and twenty minute ride inland.
While I was awake and (partially) listening to Andres, it was interesting to watch the scenery: dense dense dense jungle, spotted here or there with little huts or cinder block homes, all with thatched roofing. And rocks, lots of rocks everywhere. Seriously, I'm not sure how anyone could get through that jungle with how thick it was and all those rocks on the ground. I was impressed. But obviously not impressed enough to take any pictures. Doh.
Anywho, we fiiiinnnaallly made it to Coba. For the first time of the trip it was really quite hot, which was oh so good because we were about to start a brisk five mile hike around the site. (No really, Lance and I figured that's probably about how far we walked that day. That's okay; we had to work off those breakfast calories somehow!)
We visited the "church", which was not really a church but that's what the first explorers thought it was and so the names stuck.
Note: all of these ruins were much more impressive in real life. Sorry.
We checked out some Mayan archways, which are a bit pointy. Andres talked a lot about keystones and such, but I wasn't really listening because I was enjoying the nice, cool shade. Okay, I just don't remember what he said. (It's been awhile. Yes, blogging about this trip is taking longer than the actual trip itself.)
Then we we learned about the ancient Mayan holy game,
poc-ta-tok, which Lance and I like to call "The Game of DEATH" BAH-BAH-BUUUMMM! (That last part is supposed to sound really ominous.) Anywho, the Mayans were really into this game. Really into it.
They'd have these huge matches, some of which could last for days, and then they'd kill the captain of the winning team. You read that right. They weren't just killing people for the fun of it; they were making sacrifices to the gods so that it would rain. And you can't offer up some loser and expect any results; that just doesn't make sense.
So the whole city would come out and climb to the top of this structure to watch the game. I'm sure it was a pretty good time. What I want to know is, how did you know that the players were actually trying their best? Seems to me there might have been a little incentive to throw a match here or there. Just a thought.
We saw lots of Mayan roads, which were actually pretty impressive. They were usually 2 meters high and 10 meters wide, really straight, and some as long as 200 miles. Lots of people can't figure out how they built these since they didn't have the wheel. (Circle, very exact calendar - but no wheel. Irony.) I say, with enough slave labor you can build just about anything, let alone some measly 200 mile roads. Just look at the pyramids. But what do I know...
It should be noted that our guide kept mentioning the fact that no one knew where the Mayans came from or where they they went; it's a huge mystery, and speculation runs from the sane (a land bridge from Asia) to the insane (they were aliens and all those straight roads were runways for their space ships). Lance and I kept wanting to tell the guide "Here, we have a book for you with all the answers." (Just another bit of humor for all my LDS friends.)
Here's a stone tablet, or stelea, and part of our tour guide. It had a picture of some important Mayan guy, disfigured head and all, who had been buried there. (The Mayans were into deforming their babies' heads as a symbol of their social class and beauty. They'd also put stuff on their noses to make them go cross-eyed. Yes, death games, human sacrifices, and deformations - good times in ancient Mayan civilization!)
I studied these a ton in my freshman year history class at BYU. I hated that class. (But loved this tablet! No hard feelings!)
And here's the underside of the thatched roofing over it; I just thought it was interesting.
I also thought it was interesting that most of the thatched roof houses we passed by had satellite dishes on top. I'm not quite sure what that says about current Mayan civilization. (Probably that they like ESPN en Espanol.)
Ah, here's the fertility temple.
Bah! Too close to the fertility temple, Maren! Step away, step away!!! We already have enough babies at home right now. (Cole is more than enough baby for us right now!)
Lance, in front of an Aztec-inspired pyramid. (Notice the rounded corners.)
Some cool trees that I liked. I know, really exciting. But look how tall and straight they are. Now multiply them by 100 and add in a bunch of vines and other types of trees and you've got the jungle. Heaven only knows how the Mayans were able to fight off the jungle from growing back all the time.
Finally, the highlight of the tour: the Nohoch Mul pyramid. Yep. We hiked all 140 feet of it. (Trust me - it's a lot taller than it looks in the photo.) Why? Because it was there. Because it looked cool. Because it was that or stay with this whining, complaining older lady in our group who was kind of a buzz kill and who was wearing flip flops, for Pete's sake. (Read your tour guide much, lady? It said there'd be lots of walking - so stop complaining!!!)
The hike up wasn't that bad, actually. A little treacherous at parts and certainly not kid friendly, but not that bad.
And the view was spectacular.
Well, not the view of those two weirdo tourists there. Why didn't our cameraman tell me about my hat hair?! Or about how attractive I looked with the backpack strap up front? Oh well.
Here's another look down.
And another look up - at some sculptures at the very top.
And here's the handsome Lance.
And the goofy Maren in her goofy hat. I told you I don't look good in hats. But it did it's job of not letting my face get fried, so whatever.
Lance practically ran down the temple. I took my time, mainly because I'm afraid of the pain that would be associated with tumbling down large Mayan temples. Also, my feet were sweaty, which made my sandals slippery. So Lance killed time by taking some pictures.
We spent about three hours total in the park. At the end we were hot, sweaty, tired, extremely thirsty, and all out of water. It was because of these factors that we had no problem whatsoever on buying and gobbling down $2 Frescas and Mexican ice cream bars. And they were good.
I think everyone slept on the way back to the ferry. For a while we listened to some traditional Mexican music, which was nice and made the scenery more fun to look at. Then we listened to something along the lines of "Greatest Hits of the Early 90's As Sung By Someone Other Than the Original Artists", which was not as good as the Mexican music.
My feet were filthy by the time we got in line for the ferry. You could barely see my toenail polish. These feet are saying "¡Qué asco! Tenemos todas las ruinas mayas sobre nosotros! " Also, "¿Podemos tener otro Fresca?" (For my gringo and Google translation impaired friends: "Yuck! We've got Mayan ruins all over us!" and "Can we have another Fresca?")
The ferry ride back was actually kind of fun. A singer came on board and we all sang fun songs to pass the time. I thought he was pretty good, although Lance wasn't as impressed. (Snob. Oh yeah, I went there Lance.)
Here's a cool shot of getting back on the boat. We were parked... wait, are ships parked? Anchored? Ported? Whatever. We were right next to a Norwegian cruise liner.
Unfortunately, we got back to the ship right at the time we should have been sitting down to dinner. Oh well. We showered, dressed, and made up for all of our lost calories at the buffet, which I remember being extra yummy that night because of all the fresh shrimp. Yummers.
That evening I talked Lance into going to Movie Under the Stars. You lie on a deck chair and watch the movie outside on deck, while waiters and waitresses bring you cookies and popcorn and such. They even give you blankets, which was nice because it got a little chilly. We watched "Avatar", which means we are no longer the last people on earth to see that movie. It was pretty good, although I suspect it would have been better in 3-D. It also would have been better if James Cameron had put a little more thought into the name of the stuff they were trying to mine. Unobtanium? Really, James Cameron, really?
I don't think Lance enjoyed it very much, but I did, mainly for the novelty of it all. Thank you, Lance! You're a good sport.
