Welcome to the jungle

My sojourn in the southernmost region of Mexico half over, it was time to leave the mountains behind and head back from whence I had come. Palenque is a small unremarkable town with a quite remarkable set of Mayan ruins just outside. It was my (and presumably most other people’s) primary reason for visiting. But more on that later. 

One pleasantly uneventful bus journey later, I arrived in town to discover I had well and truly swapped the chill mountain air for the humidity of the jungle. More than this, though, it was the noise of the night, the incessant background hum and chatter, that truly made it feel like I was somewhere quite different. 

Enjoying the luxury of a room of one’s own (which could admittedly have slept four), I was up before the crack of dawn for the first of two consecutive day trips. Yaxchilan is a Mayan ruin some distance away on the Guatemalan border. A long minibus ride was followed by a 45-minute boat trip down the river dividing the two countries. Rather like Petra, the entrance to the heart of the site is quite spectacular because you don’t see it coming. You go through a maze-like underground tomb to emerge at one end of the grand plaza. I had a relaxing wander round the whole site (technical term: Yaxchillin’) and got got hugely hot and sweaty into the bargain.

Next up was Bonampak, a smaller ruin consisting mostly of a large set up steps populated by buildings. The most impressive thing about this site was the surprisingly well-preserved paintings inside some of the chambers, the colours and detail still bright and clear. 

The next day was to Palenque itself and the ruins were incredible. One of the most famous Mayan sites, and deservedly so, this was on a different scale to yesterday, with numerous temples, tombs and buildings across a sizeable area. I took a guided tour here, which was good in that I learned a lot about the site but the flip side was that it did move far more slowly than I would have done under my own volition.

I also discovered first hand why they call it the rainforest because it absolutely hammered it down at times and kept up for most of the day. Having not needed my waterproof the day before, I considered jettisoning the extra weight but I’m very glad that I tend to err on the side of caution.

The trip also involved jaunts to two nearby waterfalls. Misol-Ha is one classic outpouring of water from on high down into a pool. You can walk behind it, which was cool, and just because I wasn’t wet enough already I had a poke around a connecting cave network. 

Agua Azul was a different kettle of fish. The water is as blue as the name suggests but I was rather underwhelmed to start with as it seemed like some fairly tame river rapids. I was wrong, however, and following the path upwards for several hundred metres was greeted by a serious of colossal cascades. The main lesson to draw from this is clearly that you should go chasing waterfalls.

A very enjoyable chat with Marty, a retired teacher from Wisconsin, over beer and empanadas brought the second trip to a close. Back in town I had just about dried out and was ready for another night bus back to the coast.