Merida ….. Mundo Mayan Museum & a day trip to the Mayan ruins at Uxmal

November  29th, 2023

Looked like ok morning so we decided it would be a good day for a visit to the Mundo Mayan Museum. The museum is about 10 kilometers away so walking was not an option.

In any event, we had noticed some brand new Mercedes Benz buses rolling up and down the roads with Van Y Ven emblazoned on them.

These were in stark contrast to the old foggies lurching & belching diesel smoke on some of these same routes. We finally found a very helpful blog that explained the system…you cannot pay on board, as you pay with a card that is scanned on entering. The trick is to find where to buy the said card (the official bus site says OXXO) but no such luck. As it turned out the Super Aki (yes my favorite not-so-super supermarket) sold these. It was a no-brainer you buy the card then load it with a bunch of rides (7 MXN each) and you can go anywhere on the system (but no transfers).

So off we went, scanned our cards sat down, and tracked the ride on our phone…20 minutes later arrived at our destination:

The museum is quite well done, and there is a two-tier pricing system to encourage locals to learn about their history > for us it was 300MXN (24CAD). Not many folks visiting at this time so we could take our time and read about the rather difficult history endured by the Mayans in the course of the Spanish conquest of the Yucatan.  Lots of interactive displays including one where you can input your birthday etc. and it is translated into the Mayan Calendar …it was supposed to be e-mailed to us but just as we finished one of the guards advised the system wasn’t functioning…so we took a pic instead…

Below are some of the artifacts on display…

We then reversed course with the bus and got home just in time to witness a huge downpour, maybe not an atmospheric river, but we were sure glad we were back at the Casa.

November 30, 2023

It was a beautiful morning as we walked to the ADO bus station where we would get a 2nd  class SUR bus to Uxmal. We left at 08:00 and it was a slow ride but eventually, it arrived at 09:30 and dropped us off on the highway. It is a short walk to the entrance and we quickly buy tickets, 1062 MXN (84 CAD) for us both …there was no line-up and very few people at the site.

In 1996 Uxmal was made a UNESCO World Heritage site, making it the 35th (27 being cultural sites) such site in Mexico, …in contrast, Italy has 59 (the most in the world), so Mexico’s historical heritage is pretty impressive.

The link below provides a map detailing archeological sites in the Yucatan and by clicking on each site e.g. Uxmal, it drills down deeper into the details of each site >>> for those wanting more detail or thinking of visiting archeological sites in Mexico offers a good starting point…

https://mayaruins.com/yucmap.html

The Pyramid of the Magician is the very first building we see upon entering the site. The pyramid stands 117 feet (38 m) high and was built on an elliptical base, an unusual style found in few Mayan pyramids….an impressive opening act:

Then onwards towards the  Nunnery Quadrangle which is a collection of four buildings beside the Pyramid of the Magician. It was named Casa de las Monjas (The Nunnery) by the Spanish, not the Maya, as the 74 small rooms that face the inner courtyard reminded them of a Spanish convent…

Many of the buildings still have intricate carvings which must have been outstanding especially when the buildings were painted and adorned…

Walking around the Nunnery Quadrangle there are great views of the Pyramid of the Magician…and onwards to the Governor’s Palace… 

The Uxmal site is undulating and nicely treed providing perspective and lots of shade, a huge asset as it does not take long for the sun to make its presence felt. Unfortunately, you are no longer permitted to climb any of the pyramids … a bummer as I was beginning to like those climbs. After about an hour there were still few people around so we can take our time and savour the site with a fair bit of solitude…

There is a short climb to the Palace of the Governor which is situated on an enormous raised platform. It is regarded as one of the best examples of Puuc architecture in existence and is thought to be one of the last buildings constructed on the site (around 987 AD).

From this vantage point, there are excellent views across the Ballcourt and towards the Nunnery and the Pyramid of the Magician…

Southwest of the House of the Governor is the Great Pyramid, a massive mound with an ornamented temple at its summit and fronting a sunken courtyard.

 

We then slowly returned to the entrance, had a refresco, and were told by one of the guides there was a 13:00 bus back to Merida…walked to the highway waiting under a rather nice tree for some time but no bus (the guide lied?) ended up meeting a Mexican tourist, and then shared a taxi (called for us by a friendly food truck lady) to Muno a nearby town. 

The “bus station” in Muno is a fellow with a portable ticket machine, paid him and jumped on an Oriente bus which had just materialized ….perfect, an hour later we were back at the ADO station in Merida.

Uxmal was well worth the effort and we figured we enjoyed it the most of the sites we have seen in the Yucatan to date…great weather, everything clicked and the pizza at Pizza e Core was tasty. Happy but tired …