On Friday, January 9th, we left Rio Dulce in the rain and traveled about four hours to Santa Elena, Guatemala. The next morning we drove about another hour to get to the entrance of Tikal.
In the parking lot this cute little girl met us selling her corn husk dolls for such a cheap price (about a dollar each) we couldn't resist taking a picture with her and our purchases.
Just as we started our walking tour we passed a small shop where we stopped to watch a woman using a back strap loom to weave beautiful table runners. Notice her little boy who just plays there quietly all day while she works.
Chrys and I couldn't resist each buying one as they were so colorful and typical of Guatemala. They are all the more special because we bought them from the lady who created them. This beautiful blue one is the one I finally chose with the Quetzal birds and other significant native designs.
Lest you think this was just a shopping trip, I will now go on to tell you about the sights in the temples of Tikal. This Mayan city was one of the most extensive and densely populated and is also one of the oldest, having become populated in the 7th century BC. Below you see the typical design of the temples here with the white apron molding and the crowning crest which like a bell tower on churches, guides the worshipers to the ceremonial center.
This one reminded us of the Grand Staircase Temple in Copan except this one did not have the elaborate story carvings found on that one. It truly was as our guide told us, Copan is like Paris because of the fine carvings and Tikal is like New York because of the height of the temples.
There were some carvings but they were a bit more crude without the fine detail we had seen before in Copan.
One of the amazing things is that we could climb around on these tall temples and be up above the tree line. This would not be possible on ruins in the states.
From up here we could see the top crests of four or five other temples poking up through the canopy.
This is the North Acropolis, the single most complete construction in terms of development and content, which has been excavated up to now in the Mayan region. Those little straw structures covered some carved stells that were weathering badly.
Besides the ancient ruins to see we enjoyed watching the antics of some monkeys high in the treetops.
It was rainy off and on all morning which made the clay-like soil very slick and slippery and there were tree roots always ready to trip us up. We felt blessed that none of us fell down even though we slipped a few times. The whole area was like a beautiful park and we enjoyed our explorations immensely.
As we were leaving the park, we came across this display of much more detailed corn husk dolls that were adorned with mushrooms, feathers, and tiny straw flowers for only Q10 each (about $1.25) so of course we had to end our day buying recuerdos. I only bought one but wish now I had bought a whole bunch of them. Aren't they adorable?
We thoroughly enjoyed our day tramping through the jungle exploring these ancient Mayan temples. Not sure how they might connect with the Lamanites in the Book of Mormon but some of them were built around the same time. We arrived walking about 9:00 and our feet finally gave out about 3:00, glad to head back to our hotel in Santa Elena. We drove around and found a chapel to attend church in the next morning and then plan to head for Belieze.
