Palenque: Ruins and a Jungle Hangout

(Map and photos updated! We added a few more San Cristobal photos and all of Rich´s Palenque pictures!)

Why go to the Jungle one might ask? Before going, you might not know. After going, you still might not be sure! It´s hot. Unlike any heat we´ve experienced in a long time, if ever. It´s sticky too, so it´s not a friendly heat. It´s buggy, though surely buggier in the rainy season. The screams of the howler monkeys haunt your dreams.

So for all the discomforts, why go? For the insanely cool ruins at Palenque and the funkiest traveler hangout yet at El Panchan of course, at both of which we ultimately had a great time.

The ruins at Palenque are some of the most famous in Mexico. The Mayans built the city in 100AD and the city was at it´s peak around 650AD. They have only recently been excavated, and the jungle makes a dramatic background to gigantic temples that seem to emerge from nowhere as you walk up the hill and the trees part. The ruins sit at just about the exact place that the hills start to rise out of the jungle. The views from the tops of the temples are amazing. We went in the morning to get good light for photos, and to try and minimize the heat. Minimize, not avoid. It´s always hot. Perpetually and utterly hot.

The ruins are also very different than those we visited at Teotihuacan. Teotihuacan lies in the valley, and the ruins follow a straight road with buildings on either side. Palenque is set in the forest and the jungle. Half of the temples are in a more open field and some of them, less fully excavated, lie along a more tree shaded path through the woods. It was awesome to climb the large temples, then to walk the path through the jungle and see half excavated temples sitting amongst the waterfalls. There were also a lot of opportunities to crawl around through the tunnels in the temples which was not the case at Teotihuacan.

The other thing we dug about Palenque was where we stayed. Palenque town is little more than a transportation hub and a jumping off point for the ruins. So rather than stay in town, we stayed at a famous (the guidebook says ¨legendary¨) travelers hangout called El Panchan.

El Panchan is complex of cabanas and restaurants along the road to the ruins. There´s a bookstore and a piercing shop. It´s in a dense part of the jungle, and the pathways are lined with giant plants, flowers, trees, vines, and streams run throughout the complex. We stayed in a private cabana at a place calle ¨Jungle Palace.¨ We had screened windows and a ceiling fan, a bed, and that´s about it. It was really cool actually.

There are animals too. Ants march up and down the trees carrying big leaves. Howler Monkeys scream in the distance, each day at around 5am. They are the roosters of the jungle. There are lizards too, small ones, and some giant ones. All in all, it was a hot sweaty experience but a lot of fun.

The rest of El Panchan is full of artsy folks and current and ex-hippies. A lot of people sell colorful art and some of the people have lived at El Panchan for years. There are a lot of interesting characters. There are a couple of great restaurants that have live music. So after visiting the ruins yesterday, we spent the day napping, hanging out trying unsuccessfully to ward off the heat (in desperate times, how many cold showers can one take in a day? At least 4, just ask Kendra), eating insanely good pizza and listening to music.

Tonight we take an overnight bus to Merida, a city that´s our jumping off point for exploring the Yucatan Peninsula. ¡Adios!