Wednesday: Dzibilchaltun

Yesterday was a day where the pictures can pretty much do all the talking. A mostly cloudy day, so we left Mérida and visited the ruins of Dzibilchaltun, about 10 miles to the north.

Discovered in the 1950's, Dzibilchaltun was once a great Mayan city, home to as many as 40,000 people. Artifacts have been discovered that date back to around 500 B.C.

Even with an occasional drizzle of rain, the kids had a great time climbing some smaller pyramids and exploring caves all over the ruin site. The cloud cover actually worked in our favor today, allowing us to explore longer and take lots of pictures without sweltering in the hot sun.

Here are a few more good shots exploring the ruins...

Trapped...

in a Mayan catacomb

With the kids at the top

Kids surveying their kingdom

Emma on the sacbé to the final temple

The centerpiece of the ruin site is the Temple of the Seven Dolls, which is named for the seven figures found inside of the temple. It's thought to have been an astronomical observatory, since the sun lines up precisely through its windows during the spring and fall equinoxes.

As our explorations at Dzibilchaltun were winding down in the afternoon, a pretty steady rain began to fall. Since we were already getting wet, we decided to cool off with a swim in Cenote Zlacah which is on the grounds. A cenote is like a well; it's a sinkhole that connects to subterranean fresh water.

As we rounded the jungle growth near the cenote, it became very plain that two gay caballeros were getting a bit too friendly for a family-style establishment. And since they had chosen to display their affection for each other in the shallow end of the cenote, that meant we had to trek all the way around to the deep end with the kids. Of course, that's the side that is over 140 feet deep. Nevertheless, our kids had a great time splashing around in the cool water with hundreds of tiny fish swimming all around them. And thankfully, they never took any notice of the show at the other end of the water, which continued without any regard for the children or families present. Neither of us are ready to field those types of questions yet!

Once we were done swimming, the jungle mosquitos chased us out of the area pretty quickly. By the time we headed home, we were extremely hungry, having only fed our kids cookies and juice for lunch earlier (another great parenting moment). We'd had a full day, so we decided to order pizza once again.

My confidence with the Spanish language was growing daily, so the telephone ordering process had only a few minor hiccups this time. However, it became apparent that "salchichas" does NOT mean sausage, because I managed to order us a hot dog pizza for dinner. Another gourmet meal for the Cornine family. Oh well, when you're hungry, hot dog pizza really isn't half bad.