After the night spent in the lovely little town of Ticul, where we last blogged, we had a MAJOR Mayan ruin day. Four ruins in a day. That´s on the verge of overdoing it, even for us (although we did more than that everyday for five days at Angkor). The first ruin was Uxmal, one of the more famous of the Mayan ruins. It is really a good one and was the best of the day. A fantastic pyramid as you walk in with several large buildings surrounding it. I´ll let Amy take care of the details, if she does, but the most fun we had was really going off the beaten track there, taking these little trails back into the bush. Mainly, the tourists stay in the area where the ruins have been nicely cleaned up. But if you just go a few hundred meters back along trails, you are bound to come to a ruin covered in trees and brush, but they still look great.
Yesterday we spent driving through several small Mayan towns. We only saw one other tourist, a young woman on a bicycle. These towns are the real deal. One had a great market, I´d love to tell you the name of the town, but it was some Mayan unpronouncable name that sounded like Ochtoktok or something. They are famous for their oranges and they were getting ready for their orange festival. Amy bought a huipile there that had the flowers painted on instead of sewn on. We had lunch in the next town, called something like TicTacToe and had a delicious ceviche. We indeed got stared at whereever we went here, but they smiled as they stared. The folks here are very nice and are always saying ´hola´or ´buenos dias´.
The only bad part about driving here is that at the entrance and exit to every town are ´topes´, which are these nasty speed bumps. Many don´t have any warning and you really can´t see them, so when you go over them you really feel them. Someone counted the topes between Merida and Cancun and there are 147!! I think I went over at least that many yesterday.
Today, in Merida, I finally bought a Panama hats. I have a couple of really nice Montecristo finos from Equador, but I don´t travel with those because they are a bit too valuable. Here we were quoted from 500 to over 1000 pesos (13 to the dollar), which sounded a little much to me. But in the Zocalo today, where arts and crafts are set up on Sunday, there were several stalls selling Panamas. These, as with the Equadorian kind, you can fold up and they pop right back out into shape. They are made from hennequen fiber, which was the big thing here 100 years ago when there were hennequen haciendas all over the Yucatan. But today I got one that was 250 pesos, so that´s not all that bad.
Now we are in the small town of Izamal, about an hour outside of Merida. There is a huge fiesta here, for the local Virgin of Izamal, where pilgrims from all over. Well, there are people who come here for a pilgrimage and there are others who come here to get drunk. Lots of Sol beer here, as I think they may be a sponser of the fiesta. The zocalo is filled with rides for kids and is surrounded by food stalls and stuff you can buy. But for some reason it is all very expensive. We had some tacos that would normally sell for 10 or 15 pesos, but we were charged 40. Belts I saw in Merida for 70 pesos were 160 here. Not sure whát´s up with that. There are a couple of really cool Mayan pyramids here, right in the middle of town. One takes up a huge city block and is supposedly one of the biggest of all Mayan pyramids. It´s free to climb, so lots of Mexican families were climbing it including little old ladies in huipiles and flip flops. I can´t imagine climbing on these slippery rocks in flip flops! Our hotel here is quite nice, the Mancan Che, and has individual cabins. $55 per night, including breakfast. A nice swimming pool that looks a bit like a cenote.
Sunday, December 7, 2008
Pedicabs in Ticul, ruins ruins ruins, Danzon´ in Merida, Ranchero in Izamal
December 7th today, happy birthday Eberle!
at our last writing, the night of December 4th, our second day on this holiday, craig and I finished blogging and set off in a bicycle pedicab around the lively but soothing streets of Ticul. Ticul is a medium sized town on the border between the absolute flatness of most of the yucatan peninsula and the low hills where the terrain starts to start up towards the mountains of Chiapas. In the front seat for two of the tricycle cart, while our driver pedaled systematically behind us, traveling through town in the darkening evening, we saw small groups of elementary age kids, carrying palm fronds and branches, an activity called 'enramada' singing songs in honor of the virgin of Guadalupe to their neighbors. we are told they do this to raise money to pool together, to buy themselves a pinata for a later party perhaps at chrismastime during the posadas (the parades people do pretendnig to be jesus and mary looking for lodging, and getting rebuffed by their neighbors who don´t have lodging, and finally finding a party instead). Often they had a mom or two along, carrying small candles. We hopped the pedicab partly because we were looking for a restaurant, the Mirador, that our bike-driver said was a long way, so we saw a lot of town before we realized it was definitely closed. Shoulda realized it would be far, because Mirador implies a view and the town is totally flat. Also it was totally dark so what mirador would be open then? dumb gringos. But it was a great journey, by quiet bike in dark one lane streets whizzing past open doorways where people chatted or lounged in their hammocks. lots of christmas lights and christmas trees. many people buy artificial trees, which are for sale in every corner mom and pop store, but, another common way to do a christmas tree, here is to build an enormous cone of palm fronds and drape lights around it. very pretty and can be huge. Every town has lots of fancy neon-like decorations, and now and then there are snowmen and elves, despite this being an area where a temperature of 40 d F is a cold snap.
The next day, Friday, December 5, we had an absolutely fabulous happy time exploring the ruins up and down the Puuc route. some people do this in a single day from merida, and we were really happy to have 3 total days - one day to come down from merida and see the haciendas and caves and small ruins near the highway to chetumal, one day to see Uxmal which by itself took us 4 or 5 hours with lots of exploring of paths leading to ruins in the jungle, and also to see 4 other smaller city-ruins, which we loved, and one day to come back.
On the Puuc route day, visiting the smaller ruins, each one had a really kindly caretaker or two, often a husband wife team, and they were really pleasant. The ruins themselves were each quite unique and extensive and though small compared to Chichen Itza or Uxmaal sized, they were absolutely fabulous. great sized plazas, lots of rooms on courtyards, fabulous old mayan arches the size of the arc de triomphe framing their highways where they take off into the jungle and are now lost. there were many forests to walk through, coming out suddenly onto a pyramid or two or a plaza. we had a great time in uxmal in particular finding unreconstructed sites and wandering in to old-feeling rooms by hopping across heaps of old tumble down city.
Another nice part of being in the Puuc area overnight was the very gracious experience of staying in Sacbe bungalows in santa elena, with scattered cozy cabins on a huge grounds with lots of ornamental and fruit trees of the regions. We got to experience each of the two different tasty comfy restaurants in santa elena. Santa Elena is definitely a rural town. Although on its outskirts there are about three small european run places to stay, and one mexican run hotel that kinda imitates the others, it really has not much as it´s a very traditional village and probably most folks just don´t eat out, but on the main road outside of it, it does have two nice places to eat up til dark, one is mexican called the Chac mool and one is canadian run but has excquisit yucatecan food, called the Pickled onion, run by a nice welcoming lady Valerie Pickles. The Sacbe and the Pickled onion are very close to each other, across the rural part of the highway just south of the main town.
On Saturday, the 6th, we took another long travel day. we started with walking in the fresh morning around the grounds of the sacbe, and having breakfast in their arbor, with tasty coffee finally, thank god... then, we drove through about five or six different small towns, back to merida. we were mostly off of the good highways, which are straight, fast, and wide and bypass the small towns. we caught parts of Ticul again, then a great market-sized town called Oxcutscab in an area full of orange groves, where we negotiated for some pretty dresses and blouses, and the lacy slips that go under the dresses. Then we went up the road to a place called Mani, which is famous for being where friar Diego de Landa burned all the mayan paper books and tried to torture a few mayans to death, in the 1500s, before he realized, about 20 years later, some of the value of the culture whose records he had lost and started writing down everything he could recall.
Really liked being in Mani. it´s tranquil, lots of bicycle taxis with old men pumpng, with their dressed up old lady wives in front with their delicate lacy underskirts and their traditionally desigend(but machine embroidered) white dresses. how do they ever keep them so white. The town has large blocks with a little bit of slope, and while we explored, a local kid popped up and said, have you seen the cenote, because I´m one of the guides of the cenote. we had walked past without realizing it. the cenote of course is underground, and there is a wall and an arched entrance where you find some stone steps that take you down into a dark tunnel, into a cave where the roof opens up again and you can draw water. Our guide, Manuel de jesus, had a co-guide, Antonio, and they enjoyed helping us hapless gringos find our way in the dim light and then helpfully pointing out small shrimps. Only we could not see shrimps just little small fry. suddenly antonio punches manuel on the arm and says that´s not a camaron it´s a pescado and manuel tells us in english, is a finch. we marvel at the finches for a while with them while they splash a little and act like boys do around water and with an important job, guide of the cenote, to do. it was great fun. also very cool and fresh down there by the water, lit by the sunlight coming in through the skylight in the limestone overhead. (by the way we think any 9 year old brave enough to work on his english is to be admired and we are not making fun of ´finch´ instead of fish exactly... but it was so cute to think of those little finches in the water...)
From mani, we went up to towns where water tanks painted with coke signs are the main feature... getting drinking water is tough... people in the puuc collect rainwater because no cenotes, and people in the cenote areas still have to have drinking water bussed in because the underground water is no longer so clean I guess.
we really loved lunch in a small dusty town called Tekit, because it was the only place open, a great diner that had basically one dish she would really recommend which was fresh ceviche (marinated fresh fish) and would we like it pure shrimp or mixed. MIxed. it was SOOOOOOOO good. we ate huge plates of ceviche, with fresh crispy lard soaked tortilla chips, chased by Coke Light, while lots of locals popped by in their tricycles to pick up ´ceviche to go´for their families. we were up on floor level which is about 5 feet above the hot cement-stone street level. we sat at our tin tables in our plastic chairs and had a ball. the place is run by a nice lady whose son is a rodeo cowboy and wins prizes and whose daughter, now 17, looked cmpletely gorgeous on the day of her 15th coming-of-age birthday.
for a while, we were waaaay off the fast roads, in the curviest narrow road where every corner was blind due to tall tall grasses and scrub. luckily not much traffic. it goes right by a small cenote that used to be near nothing, now you can peer ovr the edge from the road, it´s deeeeep and has a scuzzy film of organic matter on the top and when you push a small stone in, it´s a long long time before hearing it thunk into the water. it´s got pretty, but very vertical limesone walls. you would not want to fall in.
we saw lots of other interesting things that day... village next to closed decrepit hacienda-sisal factories, one of these villages Chankanan very creatively now uses their small narrow gauge train tracks to pull tourists, using horses, along on the old factory cars to see really nice cenotes you can swim in. wish we had had time.. they were also dismantling a bull ring made of sticks and palm fronds, one of their celebrations in honor of Guadalupe´s festival day next week. Another hacienda village, Ruinas de Ake, also had one of these, and through the bull ring, you could see the mayan pyramids that the hacienda shares with its old henequen factory. ruins of two civilizations, right next to each other... the mayans gone who knows why, and the henequen rope makers, gone because of globalization and the change to plastics. very sobering.
After such a long day, it was nice to come back to Merida for a sophisticated type of evening in semi european comfort, walking the local tourist area streets which at night on saturdays are closed to cars and opened to performing groups and the restos set up tables and dance areas in the street. it was not that crowded so didn´t go on that long, but it was elegant and fun. we listened to about 6 different bands.. guitar duos playing criollo music including peruvian trio stuff. romantic caribbean type songs. besame mucho. cumbia. rocknroll too. In the morning the next day we also got to see our favorite: danzon. elderly couples dancing rhumba, foxtrotty, chachacha, classic dances, to a ten piece dance orchestra, with brass ensemble, piano and guitars, doing cuban-caribbear style favorites like ´quizá, quiza, quizá´.
Sunday morning the 7th... the religion wars: 70% of the yucatan is still catholic, but some portion of the rest is christian evangelical type. This time of year belongs to the virgin Mary, it seems. I wrote about the small kids doing enramadas. We have also seen a lot of pilgrim groups where people travel to holy sites with a lighted torch just like the olympics. it can be by bicycle, in which case the group of cyclists carries police type sirens, so when you hear the siren you get your camera ready to catch the bikers as they flash by in their virgin of guadalupe boxers. but it can also be where a group is in a small bus or two, and they take turns following a runner who carries a lighted torch and runs in front of the bus (which obviously goes slowly). This morning in merida we saw some nice small catholic parades in honor of the virgin of guadelupe, and went to her church where people were singing to her. and today we are at a VERY catholic place, the convent of izamal, in honor of the Virgin of Izamaal. This entire town is Mary-focused for the next two days. Yet, last night in merida we saw the opposing team get in to the action: at about 4 pm, there was a very long parade of evangelical christians with small rock type bands on the backs of trucks, pretty girls and women dressed in pink and white costumes, lots of fervent evangelicals all dressed in white if possible stretching out their hands in praise, some wearing pure white huipils over white lace skirts others in modern clothes, and then a sort of praise fest in the main square which lasted a while, as the dark fell, the neon christmas lights went on, and all the catholics sort of gawked and muttered, like who are these people stealing our show and our emphasis on penitence and hardship by singing, clapping and praisin´ God.
at our last writing, the night of December 4th, our second day on this holiday, craig and I finished blogging and set off in a bicycle pedicab around the lively but soothing streets of Ticul. Ticul is a medium sized town on the border between the absolute flatness of most of the yucatan peninsula and the low hills where the terrain starts to start up towards the mountains of Chiapas. In the front seat for two of the tricycle cart, while our driver pedaled systematically behind us, traveling through town in the darkening evening, we saw small groups of elementary age kids, carrying palm fronds and branches, an activity called 'enramada' singing songs in honor of the virgin of Guadalupe to their neighbors. we are told they do this to raise money to pool together, to buy themselves a pinata for a later party perhaps at chrismastime during the posadas (the parades people do pretendnig to be jesus and mary looking for lodging, and getting rebuffed by their neighbors who don´t have lodging, and finally finding a party instead). Often they had a mom or two along, carrying small candles. We hopped the pedicab partly because we were looking for a restaurant, the Mirador, that our bike-driver said was a long way, so we saw a lot of town before we realized it was definitely closed. Shoulda realized it would be far, because Mirador implies a view and the town is totally flat. Also it was totally dark so what mirador would be open then? dumb gringos. But it was a great journey, by quiet bike in dark one lane streets whizzing past open doorways where people chatted or lounged in their hammocks. lots of christmas lights and christmas trees. many people buy artificial trees, which are for sale in every corner mom and pop store, but, another common way to do a christmas tree, here is to build an enormous cone of palm fronds and drape lights around it. very pretty and can be huge. Every town has lots of fancy neon-like decorations, and now and then there are snowmen and elves, despite this being an area where a temperature of 40 d F is a cold snap.
The next day, Friday, December 5, we had an absolutely fabulous happy time exploring the ruins up and down the Puuc route. some people do this in a single day from merida, and we were really happy to have 3 total days - one day to come down from merida and see the haciendas and caves and small ruins near the highway to chetumal, one day to see Uxmal which by itself took us 4 or 5 hours with lots of exploring of paths leading to ruins in the jungle, and also to see 4 other smaller city-ruins, which we loved, and one day to come back.
On the Puuc route day, visiting the smaller ruins, each one had a really kindly caretaker or two, often a husband wife team, and they were really pleasant. The ruins themselves were each quite unique and extensive and though small compared to Chichen Itza or Uxmaal sized, they were absolutely fabulous. great sized plazas, lots of rooms on courtyards, fabulous old mayan arches the size of the arc de triomphe framing their highways where they take off into the jungle and are now lost. there were many forests to walk through, coming out suddenly onto a pyramid or two or a plaza. we had a great time in uxmal in particular finding unreconstructed sites and wandering in to old-feeling rooms by hopping across heaps of old tumble down city.
Another nice part of being in the Puuc area overnight was the very gracious experience of staying in Sacbe bungalows in santa elena, with scattered cozy cabins on a huge grounds with lots of ornamental and fruit trees of the regions. We got to experience each of the two different tasty comfy restaurants in santa elena. Santa Elena is definitely a rural town. Although on its outskirts there are about three small european run places to stay, and one mexican run hotel that kinda imitates the others, it really has not much as it´s a very traditional village and probably most folks just don´t eat out, but on the main road outside of it, it does have two nice places to eat up til dark, one is mexican called the Chac mool and one is canadian run but has excquisit yucatecan food, called the Pickled onion, run by a nice welcoming lady Valerie Pickles. The Sacbe and the Pickled onion are very close to each other, across the rural part of the highway just south of the main town.
On Saturday, the 6th, we took another long travel day. we started with walking in the fresh morning around the grounds of the sacbe, and having breakfast in their arbor, with tasty coffee finally, thank god... then, we drove through about five or six different small towns, back to merida. we were mostly off of the good highways, which are straight, fast, and wide and bypass the small towns. we caught parts of Ticul again, then a great market-sized town called Oxcutscab in an area full of orange groves, where we negotiated for some pretty dresses and blouses, and the lacy slips that go under the dresses. Then we went up the road to a place called Mani, which is famous for being where friar Diego de Landa burned all the mayan paper books and tried to torture a few mayans to death, in the 1500s, before he realized, about 20 years later, some of the value of the culture whose records he had lost and started writing down everything he could recall.
Really liked being in Mani. it´s tranquil, lots of bicycle taxis with old men pumpng, with their dressed up old lady wives in front with their delicate lacy underskirts and their traditionally desigend(but machine embroidered) white dresses. how do they ever keep them so white. The town has large blocks with a little bit of slope, and while we explored, a local kid popped up and said, have you seen the cenote, because I´m one of the guides of the cenote. we had walked past without realizing it. the cenote of course is underground, and there is a wall and an arched entrance where you find some stone steps that take you down into a dark tunnel, into a cave where the roof opens up again and you can draw water. Our guide, Manuel de jesus, had a co-guide, Antonio, and they enjoyed helping us hapless gringos find our way in the dim light and then helpfully pointing out small shrimps. Only we could not see shrimps just little small fry. suddenly antonio punches manuel on the arm and says that´s not a camaron it´s a pescado and manuel tells us in english, is a finch. we marvel at the finches for a while with them while they splash a little and act like boys do around water and with an important job, guide of the cenote, to do. it was great fun. also very cool and fresh down there by the water, lit by the sunlight coming in through the skylight in the limestone overhead. (by the way we think any 9 year old brave enough to work on his english is to be admired and we are not making fun of ´finch´ instead of fish exactly... but it was so cute to think of those little finches in the water...)
From mani, we went up to towns where water tanks painted with coke signs are the main feature... getting drinking water is tough... people in the puuc collect rainwater because no cenotes, and people in the cenote areas still have to have drinking water bussed in because the underground water is no longer so clean I guess.
we really loved lunch in a small dusty town called Tekit, because it was the only place open, a great diner that had basically one dish she would really recommend which was fresh ceviche (marinated fresh fish) and would we like it pure shrimp or mixed. MIxed. it was SOOOOOOOO good. we ate huge plates of ceviche, with fresh crispy lard soaked tortilla chips, chased by Coke Light, while lots of locals popped by in their tricycles to pick up ´ceviche to go´for their families. we were up on floor level which is about 5 feet above the hot cement-stone street level. we sat at our tin tables in our plastic chairs and had a ball. the place is run by a nice lady whose son is a rodeo cowboy and wins prizes and whose daughter, now 17, looked cmpletely gorgeous on the day of her 15th coming-of-age birthday.
for a while, we were waaaay off the fast roads, in the curviest narrow road where every corner was blind due to tall tall grasses and scrub. luckily not much traffic. it goes right by a small cenote that used to be near nothing, now you can peer ovr the edge from the road, it´s deeeeep and has a scuzzy film of organic matter on the top and when you push a small stone in, it´s a long long time before hearing it thunk into the water. it´s got pretty, but very vertical limesone walls. you would not want to fall in.
we saw lots of other interesting things that day... village next to closed decrepit hacienda-sisal factories, one of these villages Chankanan very creatively now uses their small narrow gauge train tracks to pull tourists, using horses, along on the old factory cars to see really nice cenotes you can swim in. wish we had had time.. they were also dismantling a bull ring made of sticks and palm fronds, one of their celebrations in honor of Guadalupe´s festival day next week. Another hacienda village, Ruinas de Ake, also had one of these, and through the bull ring, you could see the mayan pyramids that the hacienda shares with its old henequen factory. ruins of two civilizations, right next to each other... the mayans gone who knows why, and the henequen rope makers, gone because of globalization and the change to plastics. very sobering.
After such a long day, it was nice to come back to Merida for a sophisticated type of evening in semi european comfort, walking the local tourist area streets which at night on saturdays are closed to cars and opened to performing groups and the restos set up tables and dance areas in the street. it was not that crowded so didn´t go on that long, but it was elegant and fun. we listened to about 6 different bands.. guitar duos playing criollo music including peruvian trio stuff. romantic caribbean type songs. besame mucho. cumbia. rocknroll too. In the morning the next day we also got to see our favorite: danzon. elderly couples dancing rhumba, foxtrotty, chachacha, classic dances, to a ten piece dance orchestra, with brass ensemble, piano and guitars, doing cuban-caribbear style favorites like ´quizá, quiza, quizá´.
Sunday morning the 7th... the religion wars: 70% of the yucatan is still catholic, but some portion of the rest is christian evangelical type. This time of year belongs to the virgin Mary, it seems. I wrote about the small kids doing enramadas. We have also seen a lot of pilgrim groups where people travel to holy sites with a lighted torch just like the olympics. it can be by bicycle, in which case the group of cyclists carries police type sirens, so when you hear the siren you get your camera ready to catch the bikers as they flash by in their virgin of guadalupe boxers. but it can also be where a group is in a small bus or two, and they take turns following a runner who carries a lighted torch and runs in front of the bus (which obviously goes slowly). This morning in merida we saw some nice small catholic parades in honor of the virgin of guadelupe, and went to her church where people were singing to her. and today we are at a VERY catholic place, the convent of izamal, in honor of the Virgin of Izamaal. This entire town is Mary-focused for the next two days. Yet, last night in merida we saw the opposing team get in to the action: at about 4 pm, there was a very long parade of evangelical christians with small rock type bands on the backs of trucks, pretty girls and women dressed in pink and white costumes, lots of fervent evangelicals all dressed in white if possible stretching out their hands in praise, some wearing pure white huipils over white lace skirts others in modern clothes, and then a sort of praise fest in the main square which lasted a while, as the dark fell, the neon christmas lights went on, and all the catholics sort of gawked and muttered, like who are these people stealing our show and our emphasis on penitence and hardship by singing, clapping and praisin´ God.
Thursday, December 4, 2008
Of Guayaberas and Panama Hats (Craig)
Amy and I arrived in the Yucatan a couple of days ago. Yesterday was spent wandering the streets of Merida, a wonderful city, full of life, traffic, noise, great food, shopping, music and art. Things happen here everyday, music, fiestas, you name it. And they are getting ready for one of Mexico´s biggest days, the day for the Virgin of Guadalupe. So there are lots of decorations all over, both for the Virgin and for Christmas.
We did a lot of wandering....eating and shopping. The food here is marvelous. We came into town by public bus from the airport (only 10 pesos!) and were dropped off about 10 blocks from the hotel. Luckily, we are travelling very light, so no problem walking around with our bags. We went into one market and had a breakfast of tacos filled with turkey meat and this sauce they call relleno negro, which is come kind of black sauce made from chillies. Yum! For lunch we ate at a great restaurant called Marlin Azul. 5 plastic tables are all they have, but the food is to die for. We had a mixed ceviche...very fresh! That was followed by conch cooked with a green garlic sauce. Ohmygawd! Never had conch before and it won´t be the last time. For dinner we went to a rather pricey restaurant, called something or other de Pelegrino. We had a sopa de lima (typical Yucatan soup) and another ceviche. Amy had a baked eggplant dish with chicken and cheese. I had pollo pibil, a typical Yucatan dish cooked in banana leaves with a delicious brown-red sauce. We drank a glass of a very good repasado tiquila, I wish I could remember the name. Also, an Argentinian malbec. For dessert it was coconut ice cream with kalua on top. WOW!
In between all this eating, we went shopping, or rather kind of just window shopping as it turned out. I was interested in looking at the Panama hats, which are made in Campeche state next door, and the famous Yucatn shirt, the Guayabera. I wanted a really good Panama, with a weaver that was close to those of a fino Equadorian Panama. I found one that I thought was pretty close, very fine weaving on it. But the lady quoted me $240!!! OUCH!!!! I hemmed and hawed quite a bit and she finally got down to $119 (quite a drop), but I decided that the Equadorian versions were much better anyway, so didn´t get it.
Most of the guayaberas I´ve seen aren´t all that great. Most come in white or baby blue (I had a leisure suit that color in 1973) and were ugly and made with a cotton-polyester blend. Gimme a break. Polyester? In this heat? But in the same place with the fine Panama, they had some really high quality linen guayaberas. But the price was over $100!!! I might go back though and see how far they can reduce the price.
Other than that, we just wandered through the interesting markets here. Really good local markets with very few tourists. In fact, not that many tourists here it seems. Maybe the calm before the storm, who knows? Amy was able to find a lovely dress, the kind the local indian ladies wear, with flowers actually PAINTED on the dress! How cool is that?
So today, Thursday, we´ve rented a car and headed south to the Puuc Route, where there are all sorts of Mayan ruins, including Uxmal, which we will go to tomorrow. We´re in the town of Ticul and are about the only touristas here. It´s a very typical Yucatan town with no tourists stores, just stuff for the locals. The weirdest thing we saw today was a plastic Virgin of Guadalupe that was surrounded by green and red flashing Christmas lights. Just the thing to put on your mantle and impress your friends. Wandering around Ticul is a lot of fun, mostly because you really see what true life here is like. I don´t know what it is, but for some reason, as soon as it gets dark, people get the idea to put their stereo speakers on the street, put on some incredibly obnoxious music, and turn the volume up to 11 (Spinal Tap 11). But it´s all part of the ambiance, unless it´s next door to your hotel. But that is why we travel with earplugs.
Today we also took a one hour tour of a cave. It´s a huge sinkhole in middle of nowhere that you climb down into and then walk several hundred meters back into. A guide goes with you, the great-great-great grandson of the guy who discovered it in 1840. There are all sorts of stalagtites and weird forms on the walls. And it was interesting that they all had a recognizeable shapes, like a standing bear, a running horse, a penis complete with testicles, a llama and even Osama bin Laden with the devil whispering in his ear. They even had vampire bats in this cave, which move and do their little noises when you shine a light of them. Kinda makes you shudder and think of Bela Lagosi. The cave was quite intersting, but I learned that I probably won´t add caving to my list of hobbies.
We did a lot of wandering....eating and shopping. The food here is marvelous. We came into town by public bus from the airport (only 10 pesos!) and were dropped off about 10 blocks from the hotel. Luckily, we are travelling very light, so no problem walking around with our bags. We went into one market and had a breakfast of tacos filled with turkey meat and this sauce they call relleno negro, which is come kind of black sauce made from chillies. Yum! For lunch we ate at a great restaurant called Marlin Azul. 5 plastic tables are all they have, but the food is to die for. We had a mixed ceviche...very fresh! That was followed by conch cooked with a green garlic sauce. Ohmygawd! Never had conch before and it won´t be the last time. For dinner we went to a rather pricey restaurant, called something or other de Pelegrino. We had a sopa de lima (typical Yucatan soup) and another ceviche. Amy had a baked eggplant dish with chicken and cheese. I had pollo pibil, a typical Yucatan dish cooked in banana leaves with a delicious brown-red sauce. We drank a glass of a very good repasado tiquila, I wish I could remember the name. Also, an Argentinian malbec. For dessert it was coconut ice cream with kalua on top. WOW!
In between all this eating, we went shopping, or rather kind of just window shopping as it turned out. I was interested in looking at the Panama hats, which are made in Campeche state next door, and the famous Yucatn shirt, the Guayabera. I wanted a really good Panama, with a weaver that was close to those of a fino Equadorian Panama. I found one that I thought was pretty close, very fine weaving on it. But the lady quoted me $240!!! OUCH!!!! I hemmed and hawed quite a bit and she finally got down to $119 (quite a drop), but I decided that the Equadorian versions were much better anyway, so didn´t get it.
Most of the guayaberas I´ve seen aren´t all that great. Most come in white or baby blue (I had a leisure suit that color in 1973) and were ugly and made with a cotton-polyester blend. Gimme a break. Polyester? In this heat? But in the same place with the fine Panama, they had some really high quality linen guayaberas. But the price was over $100!!! I might go back though and see how far they can reduce the price.
Other than that, we just wandered through the interesting markets here. Really good local markets with very few tourists. In fact, not that many tourists here it seems. Maybe the calm before the storm, who knows? Amy was able to find a lovely dress, the kind the local indian ladies wear, with flowers actually PAINTED on the dress! How cool is that?
So today, Thursday, we´ve rented a car and headed south to the Puuc Route, where there are all sorts of Mayan ruins, including Uxmal, which we will go to tomorrow. We´re in the town of Ticul and are about the only touristas here. It´s a very typical Yucatan town with no tourists stores, just stuff for the locals. The weirdest thing we saw today was a plastic Virgin of Guadalupe that was surrounded by green and red flashing Christmas lights. Just the thing to put on your mantle and impress your friends. Wandering around Ticul is a lot of fun, mostly because you really see what true life here is like. I don´t know what it is, but for some reason, as soon as it gets dark, people get the idea to put their stereo speakers on the street, put on some incredibly obnoxious music, and turn the volume up to 11 (Spinal Tap 11). But it´s all part of the ambiance, unless it´s next door to your hotel. But that is why we travel with earplugs.
Today we also took a one hour tour of a cave. It´s a huge sinkhole in middle of nowhere that you climb down into and then walk several hundred meters back into. A guide goes with you, the great-great-great grandson of the guy who discovered it in 1840. There are all sorts of stalagtites and weird forms on the walls. And it was interesting that they all had a recognizeable shapes, like a standing bear, a running horse, a penis complete with testicles, a llama and even Osama bin Laden with the devil whispering in his ear. They even had vampire bats in this cave, which move and do their little noises when you shine a light of them. Kinda makes you shudder and think of Bela Lagosi. The cave was quite intersting, but I learned that I probably won´t add caving to my list of hobbies.
Waiting for the Virgen of Guadalupe in Ticul, Yucatan, Mexico - by amy
tonight, we are in Ticul, Mexico, a busy small town in the Yucatan near the Puuc Hills where soft breezes fan palms in the main square, loud twostroke bikes go by and from a nearby streetside restaurant´s open cement front, carols in honor of the virgen of Guadalupe, whose feast is in 8 days, are blaring out. It is great here, they are having a ´cold wave´, the locals are exclaiming about how freezing it is and soft breezes blow at a whoppingly cold 65 deg F. We are only at the end of day 2 and there is a lot to tell. Tonight the funnest part, is being practically the only gringos in town, while people get ready for this feast. since the town is a mix of catholics, antagonized by 7th day adventists and other born agains, those who worship the virgin are showing it with amazing displays of christmas tree lights, virgin of guadalupe portraits surrounded by whirling red-green-white gold-silver-blue radiating small lights, and other pictures of her covered by nets of white lights. People are also getting ready for christmas in general, selling lots of pinatas and candy and confetti to stuff them, lots of tinny carol playing displays, lots of articifial trees. but the virgin is big stuff. today we saw a group of 6 young adult men, biking along a country road forming a little pilgrimage group, the first biker hoising a flag with the virgin and the last having a mexican flag. we learned from talking to our restauranteur that the many accoutrements we could not explain, e.g. boxer shorts with the virgin painted on the leg, that sounded a bit sacreligious, are for those on pilgramage, who need to carry her portrait with them. I am dying to get craig some virgin of guadalupe boxers, but he doesn´t usually wear boxers so what am I to do.
our evening in town contrasts a lot with four hours ago, when we were deep in a limestone cave system with our mayan indian guide Salvador, walking over slippery clay floors looking at stalagtites and mites by flashlight and looking at the shards of mayan pottery that are here and there in the cave, listening to the tweety shrill calls of bats - two kinds - the normal kind that stay asleep when you shine your light on them, and the other ones who move immediately, and those are the VAMPIRE bats. they just suck on animals... so they say. the cave is like other cenotes around here, a sinkhole in the limestone, and it´s got an impressive large opening with a large open floor full of lovely tropical plants and as you drop from the scrubland above into the cave, it gets very fresh and cool as you go through the vegetation... but once you get deep into the ground, it´s hot, baby! always hot... even in the ´cold wave´ like the one they have now, that keeps us from ever having to use air con.
so what is mayan yucatan like, far from the coast resorts. it is lovely. the towns we have been in so far, are all colonial type towns, built originally during the spanish conquest of the descendants of the maya, and then, in the 1860s, the haciendas took off by selling rope called ´sisal´or henequen made from a mescal type cactus, by brute slavery it appears. they spent their millions at the turn of the century on very ornate french style mansions, both in Merida, and in the countryside. we have visited three deserted and some restored haciendas today and it was really interesting... the limestone blocks, mostly stolen from mayan buildings, create very ornate palaces, out in the middle of nowwhere, with narrow guage railways from the fields, to the factories, which were themselves built with neocolonical facades and statues. very interesting... everything lush. nowadays since the revolution and the rise of plastics and competition, they are all desolate, and very enticing in their own way. Merida is a nice city, lots of music, and although it´s modern, still, one in 4 women still wear white huipils with colorful embroidery at the neck, arm openings and bottom hem, over a lacy underskirt that reaches almost to the ankles, and with a handsome shawl over the shoulders. they look very nice in them. the modern-ness is fun - last night we went to one of the free concerts, expecting to hear some Trova music which is a cuban-latinamerican romantic sound that the city is famous for, often performed with trios, and instead we heard a great group in a cool modern concert hall called ´Los Golden Years´, a rockin´out band of 60 year olds playing very good 60s pop-rock classics. hilarious to see some white haired guys in dark suits, pale pink shirts and red ties playing the spanish versions of songs by creedence, los bee gees, ricky vallee, and others, in spanish and having the whole audience often be singing along. made me realize back in ´68, the whole of yucatan was rockin´out not listening to ranchero music, and now it´s just as sentimental for them, as it was for us. we had a lot of fun dancing in our chairs. the drummer was particularly great as was a sax they had and the electric guitarists were also superb. lots of fun. then we wandered home along the flagstone streets from one little classic colonial plaza to another, home to our great little hotel, the ´Luz en yucatan´.
oh wow, now though, we are getting some great ranchero music coming on, here in our email cafe - great to type to! a different style. well it´s time to stop as my hands are a bit sore... tomorrow we will continue down in the Puuc route, exploring caverns, mayan ruins and small mexican towns where guys on bikes pedal little carts in front of them bringing ladies in huipils home from market, and the cafes are full of extremely tasty yucatan food often with fresh conch and the best fish ceviches we can recall.
a few other things to share... last night in Merida, wandering down an aisle in one of the markets and there were a few stores with video games and on the sidewalk, slot machines of the latest styles, red and seductive... and each one had a middle aged mayan woman with traditional huipils on, giving it a spin! guess the wish for good luck spans all traidions. also, twice, once in a fancy store and once in a car rental, we have met young folks who clearly speak californian... both were raised in the states from elementary school on, then came home to merida and fell in love with home again, or decided the opportunities were strong... they have chosen a good part of mexico to re-settle in, as the tourism here is still pretty strong catering to europeans, and the warmth and easy living is more like california than some of the more traditional parts of mexico, the level of cultural familiarity with the rest of the world seems higher and I think it´s easier to fit in, as an american raised mexican. really nice folks who seem very happy. it has to be hard in mexico, as recently the peso has fallen from a stable 10 or 11 pesos to the dollar, to somewhere between 13 and 15 pesos to the dollar, and those who work in the states also have less money to send home. we see signs of strain in the economy, yet, as usual, the easy hanging out outdoors, the quite evident enjoyment of family and community ties here, the respect for elders, the enjoyment of just hanging out talking, love of music and jokes, are great... some things about mexican life are just a lot, lot more pleasant than the basics of american suburban life. especially here in warm yucatan! (brrrr.. only got up to 75 degrees today...)
one last comment - our two nice hotels so far - both smallish hotels with little suites not just rooms and both with pools and quiet... the luz en yucatan, which is a city hotel but lots of relaxed feeling, $60 to $65 US, run by some nice americans who took over from an older women who went on to south america... and here in Ticul, the posadajardin which is a hotel on large grounds, taking up much of a city block, not extravagant, made with a little of this and a little of that, but basically small clean cement cabins in a great outdoor setting with lots of tropical ungroomed yard and a small pool also. not swank but perfect for our needs especially at 300 pesos a night.
our evening in town contrasts a lot with four hours ago, when we were deep in a limestone cave system with our mayan indian guide Salvador, walking over slippery clay floors looking at stalagtites and mites by flashlight and looking at the shards of mayan pottery that are here and there in the cave, listening to the tweety shrill calls of bats - two kinds - the normal kind that stay asleep when you shine your light on them, and the other ones who move immediately, and those are the VAMPIRE bats. they just suck on animals... so they say. the cave is like other cenotes around here, a sinkhole in the limestone, and it´s got an impressive large opening with a large open floor full of lovely tropical plants and as you drop from the scrubland above into the cave, it gets very fresh and cool as you go through the vegetation... but once you get deep into the ground, it´s hot, baby! always hot... even in the ´cold wave´ like the one they have now, that keeps us from ever having to use air con.
so what is mayan yucatan like, far from the coast resorts. it is lovely. the towns we have been in so far, are all colonial type towns, built originally during the spanish conquest of the descendants of the maya, and then, in the 1860s, the haciendas took off by selling rope called ´sisal´or henequen made from a mescal type cactus, by brute slavery it appears. they spent their millions at the turn of the century on very ornate french style mansions, both in Merida, and in the countryside. we have visited three deserted and some restored haciendas today and it was really interesting... the limestone blocks, mostly stolen from mayan buildings, create very ornate palaces, out in the middle of nowwhere, with narrow guage railways from the fields, to the factories, which were themselves built with neocolonical facades and statues. very interesting... everything lush. nowadays since the revolution and the rise of plastics and competition, they are all desolate, and very enticing in their own way. Merida is a nice city, lots of music, and although it´s modern, still, one in 4 women still wear white huipils with colorful embroidery at the neck, arm openings and bottom hem, over a lacy underskirt that reaches almost to the ankles, and with a handsome shawl over the shoulders. they look very nice in them. the modern-ness is fun - last night we went to one of the free concerts, expecting to hear some Trova music which is a cuban-latinamerican romantic sound that the city is famous for, often performed with trios, and instead we heard a great group in a cool modern concert hall called ´Los Golden Years´, a rockin´out band of 60 year olds playing very good 60s pop-rock classics. hilarious to see some white haired guys in dark suits, pale pink shirts and red ties playing the spanish versions of songs by creedence, los bee gees, ricky vallee, and others, in spanish and having the whole audience often be singing along. made me realize back in ´68, the whole of yucatan was rockin´out not listening to ranchero music, and now it´s just as sentimental for them, as it was for us. we had a lot of fun dancing in our chairs. the drummer was particularly great as was a sax they had and the electric guitarists were also superb. lots of fun. then we wandered home along the flagstone streets from one little classic colonial plaza to another, home to our great little hotel, the ´Luz en yucatan´.
oh wow, now though, we are getting some great ranchero music coming on, here in our email cafe - great to type to! a different style. well it´s time to stop as my hands are a bit sore... tomorrow we will continue down in the Puuc route, exploring caverns, mayan ruins and small mexican towns where guys on bikes pedal little carts in front of them bringing ladies in huipils home from market, and the cafes are full of extremely tasty yucatan food often with fresh conch and the best fish ceviches we can recall.
a few other things to share... last night in Merida, wandering down an aisle in one of the markets and there were a few stores with video games and on the sidewalk, slot machines of the latest styles, red and seductive... and each one had a middle aged mayan woman with traditional huipils on, giving it a spin! guess the wish for good luck spans all traidions. also, twice, once in a fancy store and once in a car rental, we have met young folks who clearly speak californian... both were raised in the states from elementary school on, then came home to merida and fell in love with home again, or decided the opportunities were strong... they have chosen a good part of mexico to re-settle in, as the tourism here is still pretty strong catering to europeans, and the warmth and easy living is more like california than some of the more traditional parts of mexico, the level of cultural familiarity with the rest of the world seems higher and I think it´s easier to fit in, as an american raised mexican. really nice folks who seem very happy. it has to be hard in mexico, as recently the peso has fallen from a stable 10 or 11 pesos to the dollar, to somewhere between 13 and 15 pesos to the dollar, and those who work in the states also have less money to send home. we see signs of strain in the economy, yet, as usual, the easy hanging out outdoors, the quite evident enjoyment of family and community ties here, the respect for elders, the enjoyment of just hanging out talking, love of music and jokes, are great... some things about mexican life are just a lot, lot more pleasant than the basics of american suburban life. especially here in warm yucatan! (brrrr.. only got up to 75 degrees today...)
one last comment - our two nice hotels so far - both smallish hotels with little suites not just rooms and both with pools and quiet... the luz en yucatan, which is a city hotel but lots of relaxed feeling, $60 to $65 US, run by some nice americans who took over from an older women who went on to south america... and here in Ticul, the posadajardin which is a hotel on large grounds, taking up much of a city block, not extravagant, made with a little of this and a little of that, but basically small clean cement cabins in a great outdoor setting with lots of tropical ungroomed yard and a small pool also. not swank but perfect for our needs especially at 300 pesos a night.
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