Thelma and Louise: Chacchoben, Mexico

This morning as I was obsessing about the bathroom situation for the day, I was sure this blog was going to be called: Monkeys in the Toilets, or something about opposable thumbs and porta-potties. To love me is to deal with the varied bathroom peculiarities I have. Basically, I'm a no on most bathrooms. On the way to Seattle on Friday night, the lobby of the McDonald's in Raymond was closed. Um, WHAT???? Mom was like, no biggie, we'll go to the Shell Station. It has an OUTDOOR public bathroom. And I was wearing open toed shoes. Hard pass. She went in first, and said it wasn't great, but basically fine. If you have to put a lock on the toilet paper, is it basically fine? But yes, I survived. Which brings me to a Trip Advisor review that said the bathroom at Chacchoben was "fine". I'm thinking about tracking down that person, because their standards seem somewhat higher than mine. Kindred spirits.

We are in Costa Maya today, and one of the excursion choices was seeing Mayan ruins in Chacchoben. Louise has seen ruins out and about in her travels, but this was my first rodeo, and was a definitely on the bucket list!

If you read yesterday's blog, you know we are struggling with time and place. This morning we struggled with the alarm. I think we slept through it for like 20 minutes! Eek! So this adventure started with adrenaline instead of coffee. Danger, danger!!

Chacchoben was discovered by a local farmer (whose descendant we met today) in the 1940s, and excavation started in the early 1990s. It would have been inhabited between 200 BC and 700 AD. There's a misconception that the Mayans "disappeared". In reality, there were several factors that led to the decline of their empire. It's all the biggies: war, disease, drought & famine...I'll let you Google that. What's interesting is that where we were today, in the the Mexican state of Quintana Roo, Yucatec Maya is the most common language. Spanish is the official language of Mexico, but this Mayan dialect is the first language many people here speak, being dual lingual with Spanish, and of course many others with English.

Anyway....it was amazing!! This is Temple 24. No, we did not see 24 temples, but I do know that not everything is excavated. This temple would have been one of the last ones built, because archeologists can tell that it was built for a large population because of the four staircases. The two that point north and south were used for ceremonial uses, the best examples of which I cannot summon from memory, while the east and west staircases were used for more astrological ceremonies, the sun lining up perfectly with several markers during different times of the year.

For all my ReadLive friends, guess what was at the base of this? The kapok tree!!!!! I've had this read to me for years now, and am quite well versed on the uses of the fiber that it produces. I can answer #5 without any hesitation. Ha! For the rest of you, the fiber from the kapok tree looks like cotton, and has, in history, been used for flotation devices, and to stuff pillows and mattresses. What I didn't know is that it has these spikes on it to deter the mangrove from growing on it. Or the spikes are ancestors in basic purgatory. You choose. ;)

Temples were built on top of each other, so that they are almost like a nesting doll. On the temples that have been fully excavated, you can see the different layers. There is also so much that is not excavated. I assumed this, the Gran Basemento, was the same. Maybe one of the first layers of a temple, or the second or third.

This is one structure that you are allowed to climb. Our guide was so crafty in not spoiling the surprise. I was just excited to get to climb up. I had zero expectations of what we would see at the top. But this is what was at the top!