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Published: September 22nd 2007
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hope your all well and that the autumn is not too cold.
spent the mexico day of independence in Tulum.
This consists of the whole nation sinking gallons of tiqula (which I have never liked and wont go near) but its a carnival in every street with the most awful out of tune brass bands on the planet.
An ex public school brigaderes son from Chelsea 'Tom (whom i call master Henshaw) and i where looking for a bar in a jungly part of the coast where we stumbled across a massive film crew filming Bulgarian Temptation Island - we nearly got in stating we where the mystery gay couple and that an email from our agent had been sent. We knew our fib would not work when 5 security guards with guns came for us. Was very very funny. Tom is in trouble with daddy for not taking up his slot in Sandhurst so has gone travelling to escape daddies wrath. saying all that he is actually a decent guy and knows he is "one of those".
Met a mexican at the bus stop to Merida and we got chatting (he spoke american), i showed him
my pic of the outdoor 'no smoking area' at gatwick and this bloke was pissing himself "thats some crazy ass fucked up shit", was very funny. he was cool as he got over border to america and realised it was a load of consumeristic shit and got back to mexico rapido.
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merida is north west yucatan and 30 miles from the north coast. beatiful colonial town and lots n lots to do in the area. The town is sooo hot and humid as 30km from the sea. Its as mexican as it gets, and the buses look like ex-american prison buses and the streets and buildings are crumbling. I got my hair cut (as too hot) for 70p and the guy used cardboard scissors :-
Took a day to Cenzulum at the coast to take a trip on a fast boat around this natural lagoon / river where there are flamingos. Before boarding had to argue about the price for half an hour "hey gringo, no puedo". But the trip was awesome - the driver was loco (crazy) and kept nearly crashing the boat deliberately and laughing.
The hostel is nicer than a 4 star
hotel with cleaners, free salsa lessons, guitar singing entertainers, ac, posh courtyard all for £7 a night!
Chichen Itza
Chicken Pizza is the new 7th wonder of the world. 200km from Merida. Its awesome. its covers 4 miles squared and the main temple is a massive calendar, not like the gregorian, this baby can measure billions of years, galactic cycles and also our normal days, it also has a serpent coming down the stairs (in the way of a shaped shadow moving slowly downwards) only on the equinox (and a day either side). The photos dont do it justice as this shadow of a serpent really does slowly slither down the stairs in about 15 minutes. The myth goes that the king of the Maya Kukulkhan was a feathered reptilian and swore to return!. This calendar building also measures prescesional equinox, moon and venus cycles more accurately than anything we have now.
The mayan calendar states (and now backed up by modern astronomy) that we are coming to the end of a galactic 26,000 year cycle and the sun / solar system will pass through the centre of the galaxy (milky way). The mayan calendar also stops
dead on 21st December 2012!!!!!! cool, wont have to fork out for xmas prezzies then. How the Mayans knew all this but did not even know about the wheel is a mystery. The spanish catholics burned everything Mayan in the name of christ and named them pagan devils, and forced averyone to use the pretty crappy gregorian calendar.
The picture of the hoop on the wall is a part of a massive ball court, two teams had to get a ball thro this hoop without using their hands, the winners got to be sacrifised (an honour). some games lasted a week or so.
Also check out the pic of the cenote (natural water in limestone) where the scarificed bodies where thrown. Also if you clapped near the stairs of the main temple you would hear a bird coo a second afterwards - this was an accoustic thing designed in the build. Also check out me in the same clothes as yesterday -nice.
About 7,000 people where there to see the serpent decend the stairs - was pretty cool.
Dzibilchlitun
Another mayan site near Merida, this baby has the sun fit right into the temple
of the seven dolls only on the equinox at sunrise for 5 minutes - i thought i would check that out :-) see pics.
Mexico is very very corrupt, and its a place where you can literally get away with murder, its dirty, humid, nothing works, nothing is on time and the mozzies are a bit hungry...but ilove it :-)
Had a bit of a err tummy issue for a day or so, so from now on its mineral water to wash food and teeth!
Next stop is a 9 hour bus ride to Palenque, would of got the morning bus but the police at Dzibilchlitun would not take my bribe for a lift though they nearly did. Im going to stay right in the jungle which is out of Yucatan and into deep middle Chiapas - I will pass through tabasco (sauce anyone?) on the way, and hopefully not get stopped by any gun or machette wielding nutters.
Heard some great things about Guatamala from many different people and may head there soon. Trying to find some health and safety on my trip but not come across any yet.
the photos
here are just a few of that taken and the originals are 10x more in resolution.
love to all,
mark
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wanda
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LOVE the flamingos!
The flamingos are fabu! what beautiful creatures! and you've captured them perfectly.