A Uaymitun Story: February 2013

Sunday, February 24, 2013

Merida & Progreso

It's been a busy week since my last blog... Don & Michelle had come in, Val & George left and now Dave & Deb have arrived. So I have some catching up to do!

Don and Michelle were given the grand tour of Merida and Progreso.

The first day started with a visit to Gaby in Chicxulub for Michelle to get a haircut.

At Gaby's in Chicxulub!

Tada!

Then we drove into Merida to Sam's Club where we parked and took the city bus into the Plaza Grande.

On the bus downtown

Here are some shots from Merida...

The Governer's Palace...

... with the Cathedral in the background

Merida Cathedral

Dancing in the Plaza Grande on Sunday!

in a downtown park!

We walked up Calle 60 to Calle 55 from the Plaza Grande and visited the chocolate shop... then had lunch in the Chaya Maya! Yum!

Afterwards we walked past our favourite short-stay hotel in Merida, the Luz en Yucatan.

We then had a bit of a rest enjoying a Cappuccino at the Cafe Peon Contreras beside Merida Teatro while Don & Michelle had a walkabout in the Plaza Grande.

After a short walk we entered the south end of the Paseo de Montejo, often referred to as Mérida's “Champs Elysees”. We strolled along the tree lined street past many, many colonial day mansions until we reached the Fiesta Americana hotel.

After a snoop through the ritzy Fiesta Americana... rooms start at $300USD... we took an extremely quick and breathtaking cab ride back to Sam's Club where we had left our car.

Our final leg took us to a Merida landmark... Costco... where we enjoyed walking through a very familiar landscape and picked up a few items we couldn't get at the Bodega Aurrera in Progreso.

The next morning, we took Don & Michelle to explore Progreso. We went to the HSBC bank to get some more pesos out and then visited the Progreso main square, the San Francisco grocery store, the Mercado and enjoyed lunch on the Malecon by the beach... oh, and Michelle shopped for shoes!

Michelle really enjoyed the interesting sights and smells from the Mercado!!!

Anita's spice shop

The carneria... keep an eye out for HelpMe! HelpMe!'s next blog post!

Lunch at Hennequena's on the Malecon

On the Malecon...

... with the Progreso pier in the background

Michelle's best friends looking for handouts on the beach!

That evening, we had a great dinner at Elio al Mare on the beach between Progreso and Chicxulub. Gnocchi with gorgonzola, ravioli in mushroom sauce and carbonara were our mains with tiramisu and chocolate lava cake for dessert! Yumm!!

Elia al Mare in Progreso

That's it for our exploring of Merida and Progreso!

Watch for the next blog posts where we revisit Celestun and Dzibilchaltun with Don & Michelle.

Love to all,

-doug and elaine
-mom and dad
-nana and papa

Saturday, February 16, 2013

Dzibilchaltun

Dzibilchaltún is the "place where there is writing on the stones," referring to the many memorial stones found at the site which is located about 15 Km north of Merida and about 40 Km southwest of Uaymitun.

Wonderful flowering trees at the entrance to Dzibilchaltun

Dzibilchalrun Zona Arqueologica

Entrance path to the site

English version of the multi-lingual signage

Once we had entered the site, we picked up an English speaking guide to show us around the site. On the way to the museum, there are a number of statues outside and many, many artifacts and illustrated tablets inside.

After a brief tour of a reconstructed Mayan village, which would have been what peasant life would have been like outside of the city, we entered the partly restored site.

The most famous structure is the Temple Of The Seven Dolls, so named because of seven small effigies found at the site when the temple was discovered under the ruins of a later temple pyramid by archaeologists in the 1950s. On the Spring equinox, the sun rises so that it shines directly through one window of the temple and out the other.

First glimpse of the Temple of the Seven Dolls

The pillar structure is aligned astronomically with the temple

The temple is connected to the rest of the site by a sacbe, or "white road," so-called because they were originally coated with white limestone, built over stone-and-rubble fill.

The sacbes also link the various cities over many, many kilometres

Interesting flora

The not over-imaginatively named "Yellow Tree"

No known name, so we named them "Purple Plant"

At the southern end of the site were a number of other structures including a large courtyard with incredible acoustics. A Spanish church was also built on top of and from the rubble of the Mayan buildings.

The view back up the sacbe

The other major feature of Dzibilchaltún is its cenote, Cenote Xlakah, located around the center of the city's ruins.

After the long walk along the sacbe in the 92F heat and sun, we were very glad to reach the cenote!