Yaxchilán

I didn't do the full trip in one day, as I was tired and not motivated, and the 130 km I had planned was overly ambitious. So I visited a crocodile sanctuary somewhere along the route — I didn't see any, just some lakes and mosquitoes, but I did find company in a dog who showed me around—and went to another old Maya tourist village near Bonampak and treated myself to a cabin for the night. This particular Maya village, Lacanja Chansayab, has adapted a lot to tourism: souvenir shops and campsites everywhere, and lots of activities that are quite expensive. Visiting the local Maya site Bonampak is also only allowed by using their transport, and they wanted too much money for it so I passed. Did have a really nice cabin next to a waterfall there, where I made my own dinner and breakie because vegetarian food is so difficult for Mexicans.

Around this area — most certainly "the jungle" — there are a lot of interesting sounds. At the lodge there were birds making cat-sounds (I thought it was a cat...) And on the road to Frontera Corozal I could already hear the Bronchitis monkeys (aka "howler monkeys") screaming. And now, having lunch, I hear some sound of which I'm not sure if it is a bird or a monkey. (It was a parrot!)

I reached the border town Frontera Corozal at about 10, and saw a few tourist busses passing me, so I thought to be sure I would manage to join a tour for visiting the Maya ruins. I go to the right place, and the difficulty starts: first the guy asks 3000 something pesos. I tell him, in my broken and admittedly horrible Spanish, that no, I want to join a group; he tells me it's quiet today and there might not be a group. So I already know he's bullshitting me, because I saw all the tourist busses, but I ask to wait. Literally 3 minutes later he tells me that there is a bus coming and I can join; next I had to talk a bit off of that price, too, and I'm sure I still paid more than needed, but I was able to join a tourist group with maybe ten minutes of waiting time. Mexicans...

The boat trip is quite long with 25 km to the site by boat (we did see a croc) , but the ruins are beautifully situated in the middle of the jungle. You walk up steep walking paths between lush forest and hearing the monkeys scream, and then the acropolis(seses) suddenly appear. The family of Jaguars (they were all Jaguar head 1,2,3,...) built some pretty impressive buildings there with funky artwork (celebrating their greatness). By the way, all Maya cities used a lot of "stucco" for painting their buildings, for which they took and burned down huge parts of the rainforest for painting their houses. So they certainly weren't that environmentally friendly. Fun fact: using e-DNA scientists found that this also contributed to very bad water pollution (at least in Tikal), which might have contributed to the abandonment of the cities. And another fun fact: in Yaxchilan they found arrow-head remains in one of the acropolises, indicating that it was used as a defence "castle" during the last siege, and that was probably also when the city was abandoned. Lots of fighting, like I mentioned in the last post.

I could not imagine ending my last post in Mexicans without complaining about Mexicans: they guy from the boat told me "doce en punto!", which meant only one hour of walking around, but I was sure he said twelve, and so I hurried to get back at twelve for the boat back. And of course," twelve, sharp" does not mean twelve in mexico; I was the only one there. So I ran back up the (seriously steep) hill to have look at the acropolis (there are three!) that I hadn't found yet, and then also found the rest of the group. In effect, the return time was 12.40, and he told me another time. (There is no way I would not have understood "doce y cuarenta".) Figure your shit out, especially if you feign punctuality, *sshole.

Tomorrow morning I will leave for Guatamala and reach Flores in one or two days, where I will stay for a few days.Read more