The BEST DAY EVER - Úxmal Ruins

I momentarily pondered not posting tonight because I am absolutely exhausted, but I decided that I didn't want to get behind on my blogging so, without further ado, I shall tell you all about my trip to Úxmal (whilst listening to Fresh Prince in the background).

Well, this morning was a slow start (you would have thought that after 10 hours of sleep that it'd be easy to get up in the morning, but I still had to roll myself out of bed).  I arose at 6 AM, technically, but was on and off asleep until 8:30 AM (I was trying to do homework...that obviously did not work out well).  I got ready by about 9 AM, then had breakfast (eggs with ham and bread.  YUM).  Afterwards, I finally finished my reading assignment and finished getting ready for our trip to Úxmal.

The van came about 11:20 AMish.  We then had a few more people to pick up before making our way to Úxmal!  I wasn't quite sure how I would like these ruins - as Chichen Itza had been interesting, but long and slightly boring.  But man alive, Úxmal is offically my favorite ruin I've seen thus far.  Mainly because we got to climb on, touch, and go through the different ruins.  SO fun.  And we took some fun pictures too.  As seen here:

The House of the Magician East Facade Puuc style.   Do note that this is the only Mayn building that has rounded corners. 

Here's the other side of that same building. 

Here's a little alcove we stood in (mostly for shade while the tour guide talked)

Here's one of the stones (don't know what building it belonged to, but it was fun to touch the carvings on it and get an up close look).

Here's the backside of that same building with me looking ponderous.

Here's the courtyard at the back of that same building.  (right side)

Another picture of the courtyard (left side)

This is the stone/place where they sacrificed people and removed their organs (really, REALLY gross)

This is the backside of the courtyard.

This too (this is the alcove at the back of the courtyard.  This is where people would come and sit and watch the ceremonies).

Us girls looking cute at the back courtyard alcove thing.

And again.

And here's the boys.  My profe said, "be sure to show some skin!"  Lol, it was hilarious.

This is from when we were walking round the ruins, heading to our next destination.

This is the view from that spot.

The grand courtyard.

A rare sight indeed.  One of the scripture stones they used in ceremonies and stuff.  It's rare to see one of these intact.  Cool, huh.

This is the pelota court :)

This is where they would store rainwater (it's a very deep hole in the ground).

This is the great pyramid (as they call it).  And we got to climb it!  The following pictures are view from up on the temple.

Another ruin.  We didn't visit this one because it's still being rebuilt by the archaeologists.  

The tongue of the rain god.

This is back on lower ground (higher up still, as we didn't descend the temple completely.  We were still probably 20 feet off the ground when we journeyed on a 'side path' thing to reach these ruins).

Here we are back on the ground again.  This is the same building as the one picture above.  (The other picture is an areal view).

This is where they would ground corn and all that good stuff.

After Úxmal (SO awesome.  LOVED it), we went to the Chocolate History museum.  Here are some pictures from that:

Apparently monkeys played a big part in spreading the cocoa bean, so I guess that's why they had monkeys there.

This little baby deer was SO cute.  It was hard to get a good picture, though.

This is where they showed us how the chocolate was made.  AND we even got to try some original Mayan chocolate!  It was...very bitter.  Luckily, they had sugar and other spices to add to it.  I tried it first without anything added, then proceeded to add a large quantity of sugar and some cinnamon.

Here's the cocoa beans we got to smell.  And we also got to try some roast cocoa beans.  That tasted interesting as well.

After the museum (at which I bought a fabulous shirt!), we finally got to go eat!  (It was about 5 PM by this time).  It was a resteraunt pretty close to Úxmal and the Chocolate Museum (by pretty close, I mean it was literally a two minute drive).  It was authentic Mayan food:

Some delicious drink that had pineapple in it.

Sopa de Lima, though the waiter tried to convince us that it was Iguana soup, lol.

Pork!  Very yummy pork that was cooked slowly underground.  With it there was rice onion, and beans, and tortillas.  It was YUMMY.

Flan and some other delicious desert (Raquel and I split each half and half).

 After eating (and a thirty-ish minute break in which some people swam), we went back to Úxmal for the light show.  It was...hilarious.  Mainly because the sound effects were just, well, funny, and I just could not take it seriously.  But it was very interesting.  I learned that many archaeologists believe that Úxmal was abandoned out of lack of rain (a super bad drought occurred and they all left).   And apparently there is a legend that the princess of Úxmal was kidnapped by the people of Chichen Itza on her wedding night.  And it caused a war (like Helen of Troy).

As I sat here, I kind of felt like a queen looking over her kingdom, so I expressed these sentiments to my companions, then said, "Bring me the head of a pig!" (Brian Regan anyone??)   My professor noted, "I'm adding that to the 'list of things I never thought I'd hear Rebecca say"  Lol

The snake is actually carved into that part of the building.

I wish I could have gotten better pictures, but that's all I had.  Anyway, today was a fabulous day, I'll have to post some more pictures later (mainly the picture where we are all making a Y on the side of the great pyramid.  #legit).  Not much occurred after the light show, except for the hour and a half drive home.

I think the coolest thing about Uxmal is that it felt like an actually city.  Being there, I felt like I was a Mayan (a really tall, white Mayan, but a Mayan).  And it was so cool to walk where they walked and to take a tour of the grand city.  Can't wait for the next excursion!

And now I am headed to bed.

'Til Tomorrow.

R J Carr