Letters from...Palenque

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the ruins of Palenque

  This week was "semana santa" (Holy Thursday and Good Friday is holiday in Mexico), so we took advantage of the 4 day-holiday and went to Palenque. Palenque is located in Chiapas, one of the most southern states in Mexico, just next to the boarder of Guatemala. The weather and the flora, fauna showed us that - it was hot, beautifully shiny weather and the vegetation was like in a jungle (heliconias, orchids and other parasite plants all over the trees), monkeys and amazon parrots to be seen just across the street... I really couldn`t believe it was in the same country that just a day before we had stuck on the highway for 11 hours because 13cms of hail fell... I was really worried not to catch the plane in the morning as at 3am we were still on the highway half way home. But finally we got home by 4am and after a short 2 hours sleep, we headed to the airport to take a 1.5 hour long fly to Palenque airport. This airport is brand new as it was just opened last month. Which is great because it made the access to the Palenque Archeological Zone easy. (Before the shortest way was from Villahermosa, a 3 hour long drive, while now it is 15 minutes from the airport.)

the brand new Palenque Airport

    We arrived around noon, so after a quick lunch we left our bags in the hotel and headed to the ruins. Although there is no rental car in Palenque, but turns out, no need for that. The taxi is cheap, not to mention the collectivos (van "taxis" which in contrast to Mexico City are completely safe). Even to further places like Agua Azul the tours are cheap (we paid 450MXN/person for a 1 day tour to Agua Azul).

heliconia garden awaiting the visitors in the entrance

  The ruins were full of people (many Mexicans take this holiday to travel), but still it was amazing! So far the best ruins I`ve seen in Mexico in 3 years. The taxi took us to the "main entrance" from where you can enter to the main square and see the main buildings first. The jungle background gives the ruins a mystical feeling - it is not only the joy of walking around these 7-8th century old buildings, but one can also enjoy the surrounding huge trees and birds around.

elephant ear

 Also, there are many carvings, hieroglyphs and relieves in the buildings in good shape, so it is worth the effort to climb all the buildings.

Mayan writings - can you read it?

    This day we had only a little time, so we really just saw the main buildings and had to leave. On the 3rd day however we came back to see the museum and buy some souvenirs from within the ruins. First we stopped at the museum - although it was small, you can see many object came from the tombs of Palenque. There are 2 (I can say worldwide known) objects found here: one is the green jade mask (which probably was the base of Jim Carrey`s movie) and the other is the "astronaut Maya". Unfortunately the jade mask can be only seen in the Antropological Museum in Mexico City, but there are 2 other (smaller) jade masks found in the tomb of the "Red Queen".

Jade mask of Pakal in Mexico City

The "astronaut Maya" is only can be seen in a replica here, as the tomb can`t be taken out from the pyramid. However, there is a long, interesting movie about the tomb and its discovery in 1952. The famous "astronaut" relief is often interpreted as Pakal is sitting on a machine that looks like a UFO seat, inhales oxigen and steps on pedals. But this coffin cover is shows the ascension of Pakal, the most important ruler of the mayas. The hieroglyphs around show the sky, the planets and the "machine" is really the Sacred Tree which guides Pakal to reach the heavens. The tomb is not only craved on the top, it`s side and even the side of the cover is full with relieves of gods (the god of avocado, corn, cocoa etc).

here lies the real tomb of Pakal

 After the museum, we headed to the ruins (again). Although by car it takes about 5 minutes to the main entrance, but there is a "back entrance" right from the museum. Actually, I preferred to enter from the "back entrance" as it was more "mystical" going through the jungle until the ruins appear in front of you. (Although it was tough climbing the stairs in 30 C...)

ruins in the jungle - just like Indiana Jones!

    For the second day we reserved a tour to Agua Azul. This was a half day tours, departing at 12pm to Misol-ha waterfalls (just outside of the city) and to Agua Azul (about 60kms from the city). It sounded great and the waterfalls were beautiful, the only problem was that although the tour said we would have 1 hour at Misol-ha and 3 hours at Agua Azul, the road took way more than anticipated and we had no time at all to see the waterfalls normally.

Misol-ha

 We had about 45 minutes at Misol-ha, which was just enough to go around on the back of the waterfall (literally there was a traffic jam as everybody was taking pictures and the trail was too narrow to pass), and only 1 hour at Agua Azul. Not to mention that we got stuck in a small restaurant for the first 30 minutes because there came a squall and we just didn`t want to risk to sit in the van for 2 hours in soaked clothes back to Palenque. So we waited about 1/2 hour the rain to stop and just rushed around the waterfall. Which was a pity, because Agua Azul is huge and seemed to be a great fun.

Agua Azul

 It was also a pity that this was the only day when it rained and we had a bad weather - I only can imagine how turquoise blue the water would be in sunshine! You not only can swim in the water here, but there were little "boats" taking you from one side to the other in order to see the waterfall complex from other angles. As Agua Azul is really popular, it was over crowded and unfortunately, dirty. I saw thrown beer cans, tortilla papers and other garbage, which really just spoiled this beautiful view. I wish the Mexicans would take care of this beautiful place better! After all, I am glad I`ve seen both waterfalls, they were beautiful! I just wish we had had much time to spend there.

  As Palenque and Agua Azul were the main targets of our holiday, on the 3rd day we just picked up a destination to Aluxes Zoo. In Palenque it was all over in fliers, posters, so we thought to try it out.

Aluxes are "fairies" of the nature in the Maya world

    The Zoo is (or at least seems) private reservation of animals that live in the Chiapas region - tapirs, manatees, monkeys, flamingos and of course, parrots. As our big dream was to finally see a manatee, we paid a ticket to feed manatees (100pesos over the ticket price). The manatees were close to the entrance, so we went there first, where a person already was waiting for us. Each of us had a smaller bucket of vegetables and fruits and the manatees came in seconds to the edge of the pool.

feeding the manatees

have you ever seen a manatee`s mouth in close up?

  Well, I can only say, it is worth the 100pesos! We could touch them (there were 2 manatees), feed them, one of them even made turns when you pet her nose, it was really nice to see these huge animals so close! After this rare experience we took the 1.5km trail which went over the jungle: most of the animals (jaguars, ocelots, tapirs, crocodiles, flamingos etc) were in cage, but the parrots and other birds were flying around freely in the park. Even in cage, it was rather a fence around a part of the jungle, so I guess they still have better life than in a zoo in the city. It might sound cruel to have these animals in cage just a few meters from their wild friends, but I`ve heard many of them were rescued and saved by the people in the zoo, so finally I guess it is better for them to live inside the cage than starve to death. Anyway, the zoo was really nice, felt all the passion of the people working there towards the animals.

...and the tapir

  On the way back to the hotel we stopped by an italian restaurant - Monteverde. It is funny, that in Mexico an Italian owner named its restaurant from a Costa Rican city. (Well, monteverde means "green hills", so it makes perfect sense in Chiapas.) As the owner is Italian, we had our best Italian food in Mexico! Great taste, delicious ingredients and nice location next to a pond and surrounded by trees and green. (Just a top on all of it that I found a beautiful turquoise silver ring in the restaurant - they sell pictures, handmade jewelry as well.) Just outside of the restaurant, waiting for our taxi, we spotted an aracari (familiar with toucans) on a tree. 

collared aracari outside Monteverde restaurant

  But we could feel the amazing flora and fauna even in the city - the hotels are in the area of the "Los Canada", which is the hotel zone of Palenque. Here the visitors can enjoy the tropical feeling and the shades of the jungle while the city center is only 5 minutes away even on foot. For example, our "alarm clock" for these 4 days were amazon parrots - they were chirping on the trees of the hotel from early in the morning!

our "alarm clock" at the hotel - an amazon parrot

 Also, on our last day when we were just having some drinks in a nearby cafe, trying to kill time before leaving to the airport, my husband spotted out two howler monkeys just across the street. Where else can you sip coffee while watching wild monkeys jumping on the trees? :)

howler monkey just across the street

 

For more pictures, click here!→Palenque