Mexico, Vacation... Jungle, part 7

To read previous part click here - Mexico, vacation... Valladolid and Chemax, part 6

Next morning we woke up early and decided we wanted to go to the jungle. Just to see how it feels being inside, because we have never seen jungles before.

 

We crossed a narrow bridge and followed the trail running between the trees. And first we found a small cenote, hidden in the deep shadow under the tree crown. We really liked this one, it looked like a small pool, filled with crystal clear water and there were two big fishes slowly circling around. As I said it already, all 5 cenotes on site are connected and fishes can freely move from one to another as they wish. Usually we saw two or three in this small cenote, but there were eight of them. Somehow we weren't lucky enough to see them in others. I don't remember what kind of fish they are, but this fish moved to the fresh water from the ocean and adapted to live in either salt or freshwater. Kinda unique one :) They grow up to about three feet long in a freshwater and about three times bigger in an open ocean. The fishes in "our" cenote were smaller, I guess maybe about one and a half foot long. Or, probably, they are just young...

We said hello and as the fishes were impolite and ignored us, we left them alone and continued walking along the trail. Just turned the corner we met a group of workers who were doing some gardening work to make the place look even better.

 

In a couple of minutes we left the thick jungle and stopped at the big (relatively big) open space. Later we always referred to this square as "Iguana plaza", because every morning one can find many iguanas here. They are lying down and catching the sun's heat. You know, the iguanas have a cold blood and don't have enough energy in the morning, so they spend time in the sun and warm themselves up, accumulate the energy and become more active in the afternoon. We were told, if you want to catch iguanas, the morning is the best time for this hunt. One has a better chance than late afternoon when they recharge the battery and become really fast. The iguanas definitely weren't happy to see the photographer who tried to get into their personal space and interrupted them during such an important time of warming the muscles :)  

But no iguana was hurt this morning and we left them alone and crossed the open space to dive into the jungle again and walk to the Mayan ruins. There are a few walls and foundations on the site, and we have no idea how they were used five hundred (or more) years ago. But we felt how old they were and some old ghosts were walking around and trying to tell their stories. Mystic time...

Next stop we made to see the sacred Mayan tree. This tree can always be found at any Mayan village. This is interesting, the young tree has a green bark and a lot of sharp thorns, protecting the trunk. And... the trunk is hollow, like a bamboo tree. Growing older the tree changes. It lost the thorns, became solid and the bark swapped the color to dark grey. The tree became a real giant, and I can understand why Maya thought about it as a sacred one.

Looking at the photos you can imagine how the Yucatan jungle looks like. As I said, we never really have seen this kind of forest before and were surprised how thick and tangled it is. I am not sure if one can easily walk through, I guess the machete or ax is a must have tool to move through the jungle. And this is dark under the roof of palm trees, unknown trees, liana and flowers covering the jungle as a big umbrella. And we were thinking the forests we used to know, even the thickest spots are much easier to come through. There can be bigger trees, more bushes and grass is taller, but it is usually not as thick and tangled as a jungle. That was a very interesting experience I would say.

PS for those who are attentive and curious. You can find strange barrel shaped rocks on the edge of the trail in some pictures. They are lamps and bring some light to the trail  during the dark hours. They are hollow so the bulbs are placed inside and have multiple slots to let the light out. They don't really light up an environment, but give enough light to see the trail and don't get lost. They help you to remember you are in the wild forest and not walking along Broadway. Most of the trails and roads around the resort are equipped with similar lamps. Just the central part is well illuminated and gives you a feeling you are not lost somewhere in the middle of nowhere :)

To read the next part click here - Mexico, vacation... Coba pyramid, part 8

Pictures were taken in March 2018.