Tuesday morning we woke up at 5 am to take the 3 hour drive to Chichen Itza. Our plan was to rent a car and leave super early, both to avoid any heavy traffic and crowds at the ruins.
We rented a car from America Car Rental, and the irony is not lost on us. We drove our car home and parked it outside over night for the early morning.
Turns out that McDonald’s is not open at 530. 🙁
The Mexican highways are well built, but the speed limits are fucked. You’ll get sent down to 40 km/hr for no reason, a limited changed from 60 to 80 and back to 60 within the same sight line and…40 on the highway…So…fucked. And we’ve been warned to follow the limits exactly, lest we get pulled over by a cop for speeding.
Once we got past Tulum and onto the highway north speed limit sorted itself out and stayed a decent 90.
Valladolid is a city in the middle of the state it’s filled with narrow roads one way streets. There is a toll road that avoids it, but we decided to go through. Awkward, but we made it.
We arrived at Chichen Itza around 930, and walked around until about 1115. Photos to come. Lunch in the restaurant there was alright. My pibil tacos were a little dry, but tasty enough. Miranda had a pizza that was good.
We left and drove the short distance to Ik Kil, a nearby cenote. It was 70 pesos to enter and you could really spend all afternoon here if you were inclined. The cenote was largely cemented up, with a tunnel and stone stairs leading to the bottom. A little more manicured than Dos Ojos, a lot less than the “eco parks” here (which I’ll write about at some point). We stayed for a half hour and left – we just wanted see place take some photos.
Next we drove to Ek Balam, the site of another ruin. This place doesn’t get much advertising, and is much cheaper. EB was about 120 pesos versus 288 each at CI earlier. There are fewer ruins here, but you can climb on them, which is worth a lot in my books. The largest one is smaller than at CI, but still tall enough to see all of the nearby jungle.
We left there unfortunately early as we wanted to get back to Playa before dark sets in. We took the toll road back through Cancun and down to Playa and man was that a different experience! Two lanes, well marked and a consistent 110 km/hr the whole way to Cancun. Downside is a 258 peso toll, which is around $23…That’s an expensive road!
When we finally got back into Playa drop the car off, one of the monkeys at the car rental place almost tried to claim that we’d stolen or lost one of the car mats. Thankfully, the boss appeared out of nowhere from across the street and made the problem go away!
Leftover pasta for dinner and relaxing after a long day! Again, no photos until i get home, I think. Later!
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