Feeding the Well of the Mouth of the Itzaes
Or, "How I learned to stop worrying and love the thrill."

By Dane H. Strom
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January 1, 2000 | Page 1, 2

"It's clear. Once you get up there, just keep low so no one can see you," my teacher Ted whispered.

"But how do I get up there?" As I put down my backpack and camera, Ted lifted me up into a square hole blacker than a coal miner's face. I was at Chichén Itzá, the famous ruins of the Yucatán peninsula, Mexico. The hole led to the top level of a Mayan astronomy observation temple, called Caracol (literally "snail").

Needless to say, we were breaking the rules.

Perhaps it's better to note that we were breaking unposted rules. The security guards probably never imagined that someone would be stupid enough to climb all the way up. But we didn't need to rationalize our rule-breaking--they spoke Spanish, we spoke English. We decided to take advantage of the unwritten dictum of traveling in a foreign-speaking country: plead ignorance, win innocence.

Climbing through the hole, I imagined what nasty surprises could be lying in the damp recesses and alcoves of the entrance. I hoped nothing alive, or in the very least nothing that would cause me to slide back out and fall. As I carefully walked up a curving set of stairs causing my back to hunch 90 degrees, I thought, "The Mayans were short. I mean really short."

The deep blue sky was framed and as I reached the last of the dozen stairs, I felt transformed, as if I'd gone back a hundred years with each upward step. If I had actually been there in, say, 1001, I would be standing in the center of a dark, round room, the only light coming from shafts of sun rays let in by sight holes used for viewing stars. Short Mayans would be standing around me, writing a codex that predicted lunar occultations well beyond the next millenium. These Mayans would then take me, the tall white-faced intruder to the top of El Castillo, the 500-ft tall pyramid, and toss me off in a ritual sacrifice-research shows that virgins weren't the only victims meeting death in this manner. (Earlier in the day, a man, drunk on the thrill of climbing and margaritas, shouted from the top of El Castillo, "Somebody throw me a virgin!")

Today, Caracol has no Mayans or Codice or round room. The ravages of time and Spanish invasions have taken their toll on the rock building, the eastern half of the top level having collapsed and worn away. Still, I was utterly transfixed. For all I know, I was the first person to tread there since the place was abandoned nearly eight hundred years ago (not a very likely possibility, but at the time I felt as if I were taking the first steps on the moon). I explored as much of the ruin as I could without being seen, noting the three sightings that pointed south and west, used to determine calendar dates depending on a star's position in the sky. I also observed a hallway of sorts that only a Mayan (or Gary Coleman) could walk through.

The possibility of getting caught quite real, I made every effort to keep from getting busted. Ted (giver of boosts into the hole in the wall) soon joined me, bringing his years of world travel experience to our rule-bending side trip. "A basic rule of world traveling is: if they don't say you can't and you feel you can do it safely, go for it," he advised more or less, "Otherwise, what's the point of traveling? You're just another bumbling tourist." Five minutes after we started our private adventure, a sharp whistle rang through the air, a guard below us yelling in Spanish for us to come down (or so we assumed).

"Okay, okay," yelled Ted to assure that guard that we meant no harm and started to look for an alternate way down the collapsed side of the building so that the guard wouldn't know how we got up and end up sealing off the hole in the wall.

"We should just go back the way we came," I suggested, "Otherwise, they'll know that we meant to break the rules. It's obvious that the side of the building is way off limits." Talking in hushed voices, we pretended to retrace our path down the side of the building, trying to ignore the shrill sound of the security guard's whistle.

Deciding to return through the hole, Ted raised his hands in the air and said, "When you get down there, just act like a stupid tourist." As I grabbed my backpack and hurriedly evacuated the premises, all I heard was Ted's voice, crying "No español, no español!"

We woke up in our tents to the coldest Mexican morning in many years. The Pacific Northwest weather from which we traveled made a point of following us to Piste, the small town within walking distance of Chichén Itzá. We were prepared for Portugese man-o-war attacks, wild boar chases, and highway robberies, but not cold weather. Carole, the owner of the Piramide Inn, gave us blankets for the next night and turned up the hot (warm) water in the hotel room we used as a bathroom/storage area.

After a breakfast of fruit platter (found in every Mexican eatery) the local children thrust themselves upon us, selling their hand-carved god sculptures. This was how they spent their school days.

"No escuela, hoy?" a dreadlocked traveler asked.

"No, no escuela!" they gleefully chanted.

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