Brother Peter

My brother visited us last month for two weeks. He's been here before but not for a couple of years, his acting duties having kept him otherwise occupied. So, in the wake of the release a film (Parker) in which in which he had a small part alongside Jeremy Stratham, Jennifer Lopez and Michael Chiklis and wrapping the U.S. premier of a new British adaptation of Hamlet, he needed some R&R.  

We rambled about the Yucatan Peninsula visiting places familiar and new:

In ancient times, the city of Izamal was a center for the worship of the supreme Maya god, Itzamna, and the sun god, Kinich-Kakmo. A dozen pyramid temples were devoted to these and other gods. It's no wonder then why the Spanish built a huge Franciscan monastery there and why the Izamal is known as La Cuidad Amarilla (The Yellow City). Many of the city buildings are painted yellow..


Convento de San Antonio de Padua was started
in 1533 using stones from a major Maya temple.
It was finished in 1561. The huge atrium is said
to be second in size only to the Vatican's.

 

 

Coba, Maya for "stirred by the wind," was a city that once covered 43 square miles. It was occupied from 100 AD until the Spanish conquest. Set deep in the jungle near five lakes, Coba has an estimated 6,500 structures, only a few of which have been excavated and restored. The restored buildings are spread so far apart that it's wise to use a bicycle to see them all. You walk/ride on ancient sabeob (white, stone-paved roads) that interlace the site and run up to 62 miles long, the longest in thr Mayan world.

Coba has stelea, stone tablets,
that depict female rulers from Tikal in
Guatemala, giving rise to belief of
an ancient alliance between the two
powerful Mayan cities.

Dee, on the left, decides not to climb 138-foot high Nohoch Mul, the
second highest Mayan structure on the Yucatan Peninsula.

One of two ball courts at Coba.

 

Then it was on to Tullum on the coast. Oh my, what a spectacular site to build a Mayan city.  We took the advice of our hotel manager and used the back entrance along the beach rather than the main entry which makes you walk through a Disneyland-style place and past rows of hawkers selling everything. 

Peter and I wanted to swim on the magnificient Tullum beach so, on the advice of the hotel manager, we headed directly there when the site opened at 8 a.m. We had the beach to ourselves for about 10 minutes.

This beach belongs to the turtles and is off-limits to humans.

Peter decending to the human's beach.
 

Our beach.
 

Well, not ours alone.
 

Dee up there wathing us swim.
 

Pete and Dee finally taking a look at  the ruins.
 

Not too shabby of a location to build your city.
 

A Mayan summer cottage by the beach?

The manager's info was spot-on: Use the back entrance. Arrive when the site opens. Go directly to the beach to get your swim in. Leave the beach as people arrive. Tour the ruins and get out by 9:30 a.m. As we were leaving we had to step off the pathways to let the hundreds of bus tourists flow into the site.