Chichen Itza

[Bob3]

Making the run to Chichen & back is a pretty big hike, you may even want to rent a car for that. To hit the Yucateco ruins properly, take at least 2 weeks. A month is better, 'cuz you get to some of the little tiny places where you can just hop right in the cenote.

Holler if you need a Mayan - English dictionary.

 

[Mako Mark]

Mark- Chichen may be the most popular/ best known, but I beleive Coba is size wise the largest Mayan ruin complex.

Heather (the amatuer Mayanist)

I know that Coba is the tallest Pyramid , that Chichen Itza is the most massive Pyramid,

as far as area of the ruins complex,

I dont have a clue

The best ruins I ever went to though was Angkor, which is said to be the largest temple complex in the world, and I was lucky enough to go there when everyone was still too scared to go, so it was deserted.

I think my favorite Mayan ruins would be Palenque because the forest reminds me of NZ, and my first one which was Altun Ha in Belize, mainly because it is really in the boonies.

 

[Pamdiv]

Chichen Itza should not be missed. We were lucky enough to have an archeologist as a tour guide. The ruins are impressive. We rented a car and drove to Tulum on another day early enough to hit all the good snorkeling beaches and a few cenotes on the way back. Both days were fun and well worth the time.

 

[halocline]

I've been to Chichen Itza twice, both times from Merida. I have not been to Tulum, but I can confidently say that Chichen is well worth a trip. This January I"ll be going from Cozumel. I had originally intended to go to Tulum, but since I'll be there with my sister and niece who have never been to Mexico, I thought a return trip to chichen would be better. We'll go to Valladolid the evening before, which adds another element to the trip, and takes care of the distance issue from Cozumel trying to make it a day trip. I think it's only 30 minutes or so from Valladolid to Chichen. You might consider the same strategy. If you've never seen Mayan ruins, be prepared to be pretty awe-struck by Chichen. Although the pyramid is pretty amazing, my favorite parts are the observatory and temple of 1000 columns.

 

[Corigan]

I have never been to Chichen Itza, but my GF has. Both my girlfriend and I have been to Tulum as well. She definately said Chichen Itza was quite a bit better than Tulum. I still like tulum, even if they wouldn't let you climb the ruins. When she went to Chichen Itza ages ago they would let you climb some of the ruins, but I'm not sure if they would still allow you to do that as well. Tulum is a nice site though, and as people pointed out, right on the beach. As also stated, Tulum is a short little day trip.

Matt

 

[ggunn]

I have never been to Chichen Itza, but my GF has. Both my girlfriend and I have been to Tulum as well. She definately said Chichen Itza was quite a bit better than Tulum. I still like tulum, even if they wouldn't let you climb the ruins. When she went to Chichen Itza ages ago they would let you climb some of the ruins, but I'm not sure if they would still allow you to do that as well...

When I went to Chichen Itza in 1995 or so, climbing of the main pyramid was allowed, but they told us that they would be stopping the practice the following year.

 

[halocline]

Last time I climbed it was in November 03. Certain times of the year, especially around the equinoxes, they close the pyramid due to LOTS of people showing up to see the shadow/serpent illusion that ocurrs on the equinox.

 

[CUunderH2O]

They say they're going to stop letting people climb the pyramid every year, but so far, they haven't. It's a spectacular view from top, but so is the view from the top at Coba. Chichen Itza is much more spectacular than Tulum, especially if you have a good guide to explain everything. Either that, or do lots of research before your trip. Too bad people have started mistreating the ruins. First time I was there was 20 years ago, it was in great shape and you could go into/onto everything. Last time I was there (4 years ago) you could only climb the big pyramid, and someone had scratched their initials into one of the smaller ruins (who could do such a thing????), plus there was trash (empty water bottles, etc.) at the top of the pyramid. Some people should never travel.

Sorry for the rant, however, I would say go for the trip to Chichen Itza. It makes for a long day, but if you bring lots of water, a hat/sunscreen and good walking shoes, you'll be fine.

 

[sharky60]

yeah, we fell for the "no more climbing" El Castillo story a couple of years ago, that's when we made the trip to cancun and drove out there.

Just a note to the wise,the best way to get there from Coz is to take the flight tour, you get there in less than an hour, have a full day with a VERY good tour guide and get to see the whole site and lots of info.

yes, Nohoch Mul in Coba is the tallest temple in the Yucatan and Coba is a larger city than Chichen Itza in fact, it's one of the largest mayan cities period, but C.I. is much more developed and really the best jumping off site for the first timer, although you might just be spoiled as all the other sites I have been to have not been as impressive.
although I haven't been to Palenque in Chiapas, Tikal in Balize or Copan in Honduras...yet.

 

[geraldp]

Has anyone taken a trip from cozumel to Chichen Itza for a day? Where is the best place to set up arrangements to do this. I am going to cozumel Dec 17th - 25th and have one day I am not diving. Chichen Itza looks like the best of the ruins to see both on the peninsula and cozumel.

IF you plan on joining a tour bus I wanted to give you a bit of advice. Some of the tour operators have different functions planned, and you need to do a little research on the different tour operators.

I purchased a tour from a street vendor in Playa Del Carmen (I think the tour operator was "The City Tours", or something like that). They told me to be out front of my hotel at 7:15AM, and they would pick me up, and we'd be back at the hotel by 5 or 6PM. A small van picked us up from our hotel (we were staying about 20 minutes north of Playa Del Carmen), then we stopped in PDC for about an hour while we waited for everybody else to show up. Several people from Cozumel joined us off the ferry. Then we headed all the way south to Tulum, where we finally started to head NorthWest up to the Chichen Itza ruins. Our ride to Chichen Itza ended up being 5-1/2 hours long, and we didn't get back to our hotel until 9:30PM. The folks that came over on the Cozumel ferry didn't get back until even later than that.

Our specific tour included a stop at a "village" just shy of Chichen Itza for some shopping, a 3 hour tour of Chichen Itza ruins (half of which was with a tour guide), a full Mayan lunch in a village after the ruins tour, a stop at a cenote for a 30 minute swim, and a stop at a large village (Valladolid) for more shopping. A guide on the bus lectured to us for quite a bit of the bus ride, which was pretty informative. It was a thoroughly enjoyable day, but the 14-1/2 hour day wiped me out.

So shop around for different tours. We ended up paying about $45 bucks each for that (in October of this year), and of course you'll end up paying an additional $18 for the roundtrip ferry ride to Cozumel.

Jerry