YUCATAN BY BICYCLE

Time to get out on the bikes!

2009-11-15T18:13:00.004-06:00

Yucatán is cooling down and it is time to get out on the bikes. It is a beautiful time of year to visit Mayapan and the surrounding area.
For ideas as to where to go, check out some of our trips on our website:
http://www.bicycleyucatan.com/BicycleYucatan.html

Ecologically Friendly

2009-09-11T17:56:00.002-05:00

We will soon be back making bike excursions.
In the meantime, we have added new pages to our website: Eco Living Yucatan
Check out this video and then click the link below if you wish to see more.

For more on our Eco Concept House, click here.

How to Bike and Bus from Mérida, Yucatán

2009-06-21T21:04:00.003-05:00

BUSES AND BUS TERMINALS OF MÉRIDA, YUCATÁN, “AUTOBUSES”
The intention of this listing is to assist those bicyclers who wish to incorporate bus/ taxi transport into their travel adventures in and out of Mérida plus national destinations.

First class and luxury buses will definitely get you there fast and efficiently, but for fun excitement and adventure second class will take you to the places that tourists miss most. See the out of the way villages and meet the people that actually live there. Second class buses stop on demand and take longer and are perfect for eccentric penny pinchers.

The following information does not at the present give a complete list of all the destinations that the numerous Mérida bus companies service. However that current information can be found by visiting the listed web-sites and phone numbers below.

Not all buses will take full-sized bicycles. (We find that turning the handlebars and removing the pedals will make loading better and help save spoke breakage.)
Folding bicycles that are folded are best because they will go on or in all buses and colectivo taxies, (vans) and even if there is no storage space below or luggage rack on top many will accommodate your bicycle inside. (You might have to buy an extra seat for the displaced space.)
As a rule, if you are asked to pay for your bicycle it should be loaded and unloaded for you and a receipt and claim tag will be included…not always.
Full-sized bikes usually can be stowed below on; “UNO”, “ADO GL”, “OCC”, ‘MAYAB”, “FTS” and “ORIENYÉ”. ADO GL buses are first class but might charge extra for your bike. We have yet to be charged extra for our folding bikes on UNO
TERMINAL NAME /LOCATION
CAME, (Centro autobuses de Mérida) The first class bus depot. Located on Calle 70, between Calles 69 and 71, This is where you will find buslines UNO, ADO GL and ADO. ADO is first class and UNO is luxury. First class ADO, ADO GL and UNO have toilets.. DESTINATIONS; For UNO and ADO GL; north to US border, west to Mexico City, south to Oaxaca, Chiapas and east to the Caribbean coastal towns such as Cancun, Playa del Carmen and Tulum. …see their user-friendly web-site. Their other buses cover Yucatan State.
INTERNET/PHONE;
Info at: www.ado.com.mx
Phone (01999) 924 8391
You can now purchase tickets online and at the following terminals: CAME, TAME, NORESTE (see below for addresses) and in their office at the Hotel Fiesta Americana on Ave. Cupules just off of Paseo de Montejo. Some of the UNO and ADO GL buses to Cancun and Villahermosa depart from in front of the Hotel Fiesta Americana office .
NOTE;
This company, ADO has the best quality and sets the standard for all Mexican buses. You will always see these buses professionally driven and never smoking.
Their UNO buses are fabulous; they have extra wide fully reclining luxury seats, his and hers rest rooms, hot/cold wet-bar with coffee, tea, bottled water and soft drinks included. A kit containing ear plugs, ear phones, eye covers, candies, a pillow and blanket are standard equipment. (Many ride these buses thought the night and save the price of a hotel room.)
TERMINAL NAME /LOCATION;
TAME, (Terminal de autobuses Mérida) and, located adjacently in Mérida’s center, on Calle 69 between Calles 68 and 70. This is where you will find what is called the economical buses plus the first class bus to Chetumal, CLASE EUROPA leaves from this terminal at 1000, 1600, 2230 and 2400 hours. The trip takes 5 ½ hours.
Inside the TAME bus terminal on Calle 69
This is also where you will find; “OCC”, ‘MAYAB”, “FTS” and “ORIENTÉ”, TRT bus lines, Also, you can buy tickets here for all the UNO and ADO buses although they leave from the CAME terminal which is around the corner on Calle 70. Buses from here run to the Caribbean coast, all over Yucatan, Campeche and Tabasco. Here you find the buses to Uxmal.
TERMINAL NAME AND LOCATION;
AUTO PROGRESO: located in Mérida’s center on calle 62 between 65 and 67, east side
DESTINATIONS;
Mérida and Progreso direct.
PHONE; 999 924 8991
NOTE;
These buses have no toilet facilities, leave every ten minutes and occasionally charge ten pesos per bicycle. You most likely will not be assisted in loading and unloading your bike.
Auto Progreso and Milenio lines go to; Chablekal, Conkal, Dzitya, Xcanatún, Komchen, Sierra Papacal, Chuburná Puerto, Progreso and Chicxulub Puerto.

TERMINAL NAME AND LOCATION;
AUTOBUSES DEL NORESTE IN YUCATAN, In Mérida’s center on calle 67 near the corner with calle 50.
DESTINATIONS; (two bus lines are stationed here, Noreste and LUZ;
From Mérida on the Noreste line; Motul, Izamal, Espita, Dzidzantún, Dzilam Gonzales, Dzilam de Bravo, Buctzotz, Tizimin, Rio Lagartos, San Felipe, Kantunikin, Cancun, Acanceh, Tecoh, Teabo, Chumayel, Mani, Oxkutzcab, Peto, Cuzamá, Homún and Huhí. (There are even more stops not listed.)
From Mérida on the LUZ line; Acanceh, Tecoh, Peto, Ticul, Oxkutzcab, Homún, Huhí, Teabo, Tzacala, Sotuta and Tekit.

PHONE; 999 924 6355 and 923 0548, and luz23@prodigy.net.mx
NOTE; these buses are all second class meaning that they have no on-board toilet facilities and stop anywhere on demand.

We frequent this terminal and enjoy the local routes that bounce you along off the main roads to quaint villages, past ancient haciendas and will put you off where you please…like the ruins of Mayapan.

Folding bicycles are no charge, but, they have a tight fit under these buses. Full sized bikes can be brought inside for a fee.
A recent development; the AUTOBUSES DEL NORESTE IN YUCATAN terminal now sells and books “UNO” and ADO GL” tickets.
TERMINAL NAME AND LOCATION;
TERMINAL DEL CENTRO; Centro Autobuses, Auto Progreso, and Milenio lines are all located, on calle 65 between 46 and 48 next to “Casa del Pueblo” in downtown Mérida.
DESTINATIONS; From Mérida on Centro Autobuses; going east with numerous stops in-between to Tixkokob, Izamal, Motul, Valladolid and Cancun.

PHONE; 923 9962, 923 9941 extension 15 and ventasacey@prodigy.net.mx
NOTE; these second class buses have no on-board toilet facilities and make frequent stops. The equipment is well maintained and their departures are frequent.
COLECTIVO TAXIS; These fast moving multi-passenger vans park on the street at numerous designated spots in downtown Mérida near and around the main municipal market and also in the San Juan Park, (On calle 71 between 62 and 64).
Most colectivo taxies take departure when they have sufficient passengers.
Above on the left are numerous colectivo taxis parked near the main market on calle 65. The first one, (red) is from Mérida to Kimbila. Behind it (white) is Mérida to Izamal. The possibility of end destinations with these colectivo taxis is extensive.
They will stop anywhere, but full sized bicycles could be a problem unless you find a taxi with a roof-top rack and in that case the sky is the limit. Expect to pay an extra fare for your bike if it is loaded top-side.
Almost all of these taxis have room for a couple of folding bicycles inside and they rarely charge extra.
The nice thing about these colectivo taxis is that you can flag them down anywhere and they are numerous throughout Yucatan. So, returning to Mérida is quick and easy. We often times bus out to our biking area and then return by colectivo taxi which will get you back to Mérida fast.
(Note) In the above photo you can see the amount of public transportation with colectivo taxis and numerous buses on the streets around the market area.
You haven’t seen the real Yucatan until you bike and bus it.
After more than a quarter century of doing these excursions we still have a long list of end-destinations to explore.
What are you waiting for? Come on and have the adventure of a life-time.

Check out bicycleyucatan for many bus/bike destinations in Yucatán, Campeche, Tabasco and Quintana Roo.

Fontebecci Pizza

2009-06-13T17:49:00.003-05:00

100% HOMEMADE MEDITERRANEAN FINE FOOD AT ECONOMICAL PRICES AND SUPERB SERVICE WITH ELEGANT PRESENTATION IN MÉRIDA; Fontebecci Pizza, that’s where, located on the corner of Calle 58 and 45 in Santa Ana.
Open from 1 PM till 11 Monday thru Saturday, with indoor or patio seating, the Fontebecci salad selection and presentation are first class.
The main courses with daily specials that feature Italian home style cuisine will make you want to become regulars.
In the above photo are; Jan and Junaita and Jane Grimsrud. They were accompanied by Jane’s husband John, photographer and author of this story.

¿ART IN MÉRIDA?

2009-06-13T17:22:00.001-05:00

In a town with more art galleries than Oxxo stores displaying merchandise of questionable worth and dubious appeal, it is at least refreshing to come upon a gem.

The SoHo gallery located on Calle 60 between 41 and 43 features several artists simultaneously. And at this moment you may see the works of one of Merida’s finest artists; David Reed.
David has his impressive collection of remarkable Indigenous faces, here are samples;

Here is the artist himself, the very talented David Reed pictured with Juanita Stein the editor of Yucatan Today Magazine.

Also showing at SoHo are works by Viviana Hinajosa, Manuel Taure Garcia,
Nicholas Lavroff, and sculptures and ceramics by American artist Joseph Kurhajek,

Plus a collection of Cuban art recently purchased in Havana done by young Cuban artists.
All of the works are for sale.

Join this unique bike club

2009-06-10T11:03:00.004-05:00

To all Friends;

Don't you think it's time we all became more physically active?

Beginning this June 25th I, (and a few friends) will be riding 5 miles every day. If any of you would like to join our Bike Club, please let me know and we can make arrangements. We are starting up bike clubs all over, even in your area.

I think it would be appropriate to ride somewhere between 4:00 and 7:00pm.
We can call it happy hour, if it will make you say yes.

I have enclosed a photo of my bike.

XCUNYÁ, AN ECO-TRIP, “OFF THE GRID”, IN YUCATAN 2009

2009-05-19T19:36:00.008-05:00

en español
Half way between the city of Mérida and the coastal port town of Progreso in the little unassuming village of Xcunyá is located a relatively new experimental ecological park A'ak.
In just three years of existence the experimental station has done wondrous things. This non-governmental operation is proving a point that life can indeed go on without being plugged into the electrical grid and get along quite well living without polluting the environment.
This group excursion was sponsored by “Mérida Verde” or green Mérida and coordinated by George Ann Huck, at left in this photo.
We had the opportunity to partake of an informative three hour guided tour and discussion.
The object of this experimental station is to incorporate the ancient Mayan agriculture, herbal medicinal plants, and the propagation of native flora and fauna with modern space-age technology in an eco-friendly environment.
Our guide Carlos Ancona Valdez, in the blue shirt, shares his vast knowledge with us.
This was a learning experience for all, filled with innovative and ingenious uses for alternative energy.
From wind powered watering to positively faultless sewage disposal, this place has covered the bases with eco-friendly solutions.
The experimental station has as one of its objectives to get the entire community involved with clean environmentally friendly use of the planet and they are focusing on the young.
Electricity from wind and solar power converge here in the control room to be stored, transmitted and converted from direct current into alternating current so that all household needs can be met.
Like a breath of fresh air this experimental station is demonstrating clean energy use.
In just three years indigenous fruit abounds and that gives a ray of hope for the future.
The old and the new way of Mayan agriculture are combined with re-cycling thrown in. The ancient Maya used a system of kitchen garden called ka’anché that employed a raised biodegradable platform made of poles and filled with dirt.
Here is what has evolved at the experimental station; discarded items that would otherwise go to the land-fill are used in a modern-day innovation of the Mayan ka’anché.
This is basic physics pressed into utilizable action.
Here you have a contraption that resembles some kind of a goofy pin-ball machine.
Well, using the suns penetrating tropical heat this thing thermo-siphons hot air from the left hand side over to the right where the “chimney effect” sends the hot air up past the trays of fruit and herbs. It is a solar dehydrator and is very functional. The dried grapes were a sensation! Oregano and other leafy things nearly dry before your eyes.
The group all enjoyed this ingenious look at alternatives to fossil fuel consumption.
Just like magic this solar oven uses mirrors and no smoke.
These people were not selling anything, but just promoting a cleaner way to live on this planet…”off the grid!”

Saturday is open-house from 9 AM until 1 PM.

For more information on alternative energy: contact Yaaxtec, www.yaaxtec.com
tel. Mérida 999 195650 Carlos Buenfil Mañé

For more information on A'ak:
Ciencia Social Alternativa, A.C.; office phone is; (999)195 6513
caranva@kookay.org or www.kookay.org

Entertainment in the Mérida, Lucas de Gálvez Market

2009-04-22T09:34:00.003-05:00

MÉRIDA’S MUSIC MUSEUM, “MUSEO de la CANCIÓN YUCATECA

2009-04-22T09:00:00.000-05:00

Located in Mérida’s city center on the corner of Calle 57 and 48 near the Mejorada Park; this is a very worth while diversion that will take you from the ancient Mayan times up to the present in Yucatecan musical evolution.

There is plenty of off-street bicycle parking and the variety of presentations here will keep you occupied for several hours.
Yucatan’s famous musical artists are cast in larger than life bronze.
A depiction of centuries of area evolutionary musical history is reflected upon by this famous musician as he contemplates the stone carved Mayan serpent he rests foot upon.
Take a close look at the extraordinarily intricate detail of this cast bronze artistry.
Drums, Indian drums! Here is one of the oldest authentic Mayan musical instruments made from the iron hard wood of the zapote tree that provided the ancients with fruit, rubber, shade and enduring wood. Made from a solid tree trunk and hollowed out by hand using no power tools or even steel this ingenious musical instrument emits a number of different resonating tones. The museum even provides rubber tipped drum sticks so that you may try your hand at making music in the earliest Mayan way.
The “Museo de la Canción Yucateca” features numerous video presentations coupled with photos, paintings and artifacts that help tell a unique and very fascinating story you will not want to miss.

TIKAL RESTAURANT, THE BREAKFAST PLACE

2009-04-21T20:15:00.000-05:00

The Tikal Restaurant is definitely bicycle friendly and they let us park our bikes inside the lobby while we dine.
Located in Mérida’s city center on Calle 57 between 56 and 58 on the north side of the street it is positively well located.
This is not the Ritz, but it is clean, efficient, friendly and wholesome featuring wonderful local egg dishes, honest food at honest prices and they keep your coffee cup full, something rare in Mérida.
Jane and I are undeniably regular customers here and you will be too, treated like a part of the family upon your second visit.
Huevos a la Mexicana, is one of their many breakfast package deals that includes juice, your main dish, tortillas or bread and coffee. The hot-sauce in the black bowl is habenero and packs a punch like on other, so use discretion and try just one drop to start.
Mario our very friendly and efficient waiter with impeccable attention to detail, the hands-on owner, Teresa and rest of the smiling jovial kitchen crew

New: Environmental Editorials

2009-04-10T19:41:00.003-05:00

A poem written by Kurt Vonnegut Jr. called “Requiem,” which has these closing lines:

When the last living thing
has died on account of us,
how poetical it would be
if Earth could say,
in a voice floating up
perhaps
from the floor
of the Grand Canyon ,
“It is done.”
People did not like it here.

We are starting a new feature on our website: www.bicycleyucatan.com. We are adding guest editorials on topics that relate to the environmental degradation and renewal in Yucatan. A healthy environment is very important to our life and good bicycling in Yucatan.

Our first guest editorial is by Natural Jim Conrad who knows the Yucatan well. Please click the following link to read his informative article: ON SETTLING ON THE YUCATAN'S NORTHWESTERN COAST

We invite comments.

TEKAX, KANKAB, CHACMULTÚN, TIXCUYTÚN, TIXMÉHAUC, CANTAMAYEC AND SOTUTA BY BIKE AND BUS MARCH 2009

2009-03-08T19:49:00.010-06:00

The smiling faces of Tekax: Griselda and Juana

Jane and I made the pleasant two hour Mayab bus ride from the Mérida TAME terminal at calle 69 and 70 to Tekax with our folding bicycles snugly stowed aboard.
We have been visiting one of our favorite colonial Yucatan towns, Tekax, since the days of the old narrow gauge railway train nearly a quarter century ago and have been eating at the same marvelous restaurant all these years. El Huinic de la Ermita restaurant, owned by our very good longtime friend Carlos Carrillo Góngora, is located at the foot of the 16th century Ermita chapel that is prominently and conspicuously perched above the city.
A very pleasant and especially romantic thing to do is to climb the native stone stairs meandering up to the Ermita chapel in early evening to watch the city lights pop on as the stars above begin to fill the tropical twilight sky.
In the hotel lobby is hung this interesting oil painting depicting the restaurant El Huinic de la Ermita with the adjacent Hotel Posada del Carmen and the 16th century Ermita chapel perched above on the overlooking hill.
Here is an actual photo of the Ermita chapel above and Carlos’s restaurant below.
What is El Huinic? Well, in this oil painting that hangs in Carlos’s restaurant is this depiction of “El Huinic”. He is a typical Mayan field worker who has tended the farmlands of Yucatan for countless centuries attired as you see above. A day’s ration of water is carried in the gourd at his waist and the bag contains the “pozol”, cooked corn meal, he will mix with water and some chili peppers for his sustenance.

It is worth the trip to Tekax just for this traditional Poc-Chuc eating extravaganza. Thinly sliced and delicately spiced pork is done over charcoal and served with a variety of savory sauces ranging from mild tomato to bean and comatose level hot Habanero…you apply your own quantity…as they jokingly say; “kill yourself”. The meal is garnished with sour orange and pickled onion, tomato, cucumber and cabbage salad on the side. To make the meal most memorable hand made tortillas are furnished in unlimited quantities.
I get hungry just looking at this scrumptious mouth watering Poc Chuc dinner.
This is breakfast at Carlos’s restaurant beginning at 7AM of huevos a la Mexicana, enough to sustain an active bicycler until noon.
You may think that we only came to Tekax to eat; well it is definitely one of the main attractions.
We butter the hand made tortillas with the bean sauce and then fill them with the huevos a la Mexicana and topping it with a measured amount of habanero sauce, fold them into a taco and savor a breakfast meant for a Mayan king.

This Tekax church was dedicated in 1609 and recently painted to coordinate it with the new city color scheme.
It is an amazing 200 feet from the entry door to the alter retablo of the Tekax church.
The birds make the church into a fly-way with the many meter tall doors open all day.
In this side altar you can still see the centuries old wooden vigas ceiling supports.
In Tekax city center across from the church is the neatly painted and meticulously kept municipal building. Little would you know that just a few years ago an intense hurricane brought down a large portion of this structure.
This is the downtown bustling with bicycle traffic and so few traffic lights you can count them on one hand. The tallest structure in Tekax is three stories tall and is nearly two hundred years old. The city abounds in quaint authentic colonial buildings…bring your camera.
Afternoon coffee and snacks in the city center park bring the friendly conversation of two young girls in Tekax attending the technical university and studying business economics.
Day two of our Tekax excursion finds us after breakfast boarding the colectivo taxi at the city center park, Zocolo, with our bicycles stowed on top. We are headed up into the Puuc hills to the tiny town of Kankab. This is where we will begin our bicycle excursion to one of our all-time favorite Mayan ruins, Chacmultún. We plan to bike back down the hill to Tekax. (See numerous photos and a story of Chacmultún on our web-site at the end of the Kiuic narrative.) http://www.bicycleyucatan.com/kiuic2006.html
Jane and I have watched in astonishment the degradation of nature and man in the past twenty-five years since we first began visiting the Mayan ruins of Chacmultún.
Considering that nearly five hundred years had passed since the Spanish conquistadors plundered the Mayan people since we first visited here in the 1980’s, the pace of dilapidation has exponentially accelerated. Two recent major hurricanes toppled many temples that were invaded by gigantic trees roots and squatters building cooking fires inside the temples have destroyed some of the most ornate Mayan wall paintings. At least this place did not meet the fate of numerous other Mayan temples in Yucatan of just being used as a source of building materials for churches and land fill.
Gliding down the hill from the Mayan ruins of Chacmultún we enter the small town of rural Kankab. The only two things that Jane and I had ever appreciated about little Kankab were the clean fresh air of the Puuc hills and its quiet tranquility. This time as we entered our ears were accosted by the blaring ear-piercing cacophony of noise that was potent enough to dissolve kidney stones. The source of this obnoxious head-ache producing racket was a roof-top megaphone blaring our local commercials in Maya interspersed with a few Spanish words and laced with tinny grotesque mind maddening music that could only be classed as loathsome insufferable noise. Just to make this scenario complete, the air was insufferably filled with acrid smudge-pot smoldering fires distinctively emitting the putrid breath robbing stench of burning plastic. Civilization has arrived!
Day three we say our good by to our friend Carlos in Tekax as we leave his hotel before the sun has peeped over the horizon to take advantage of the early morning coolness
Our first stop this lovely Friday morning before 7 AM is at the poor isolated little town of Tixcuytún. From the photo you are unaware of the blaring megaphone rattling the countryside with public service announcements advising first in Maya and next in Spanish of unpaid water and electric bills of individuals who can expect that their service will be cut this day unless full payment is made. As I rode my bicycle around the corner behind the church to partially escape the blaring megaphone and snap some photos I was amazed to be accosted by a van with screaming ear-splitting megaphones atop blocking me off. (A Spanish “dicho” or saying goes like this; “pueblo chico, infierno grande” or small town, big hell.)
As a biking route the narrow and quiet seldom traveled road to Tixcuytún is wonderful.
On our fact finding tour across the back-country of Yucatan staying on small roads like the one you see here we find that the reason why there is little traffic and hardly any public bus transport is because the people here have no money to spend.
This is poor little Tixcuytún’s central park where we make our first stop of the day for oranges, bananas and a drink of water.
This typical Mayan palapa home is of the same style as those built here for thousands of years. Thirty years ago over half of the private homes in Yucatan were of this type. The only significant difference today is that now these palapa homes have electric service.

Our next stop is at poor but quiet little Tixméhuac. Jane is feeling ill and the decision is made to find motorized transport. The one bus a day to Mérida left at 9 AM and the next bus in the opposite direction, southeast is to Peto and leaves at 11:30.
The enterprising locals see an opportunity and negotiate a deal to carry us and our bicycles to the supposedly larger town of Cantamayec, 30 kilometers away where we are assured that there are hotel accommodations and frequent bus and taxi service. Looking over at our map to confirm the destination and distances the driver, Poncho agrees to take immediate departure.
By the time we arrive at Cantamayec the sun has climbed sufficiently in the sky to make a place in the shade a treasured commodity. Surprise! No hotels or any public transport of any kind is available. It is only 16 more kilometers to the next town of Sotuta where we know for a fact that there is a restaurant and bus service to Mérida. Our options are nearly none, so we bike on. Jane is feeling peaked but is doing what has to be done.
For an story on an earlier trip to Sotuta, check out: http://bicycleyucatan.blogspot.com/2008/03/sotuta-by-bike-and-bus.html
Here is a map with the place-names in bold that we visited this trip.

Jane felt too bad to eat lunch so she reposed in the shade of a kind old tree as we waited for the next bus out to Mérida as 2:30 PM, arriving in Mérida at 4:30. On the bike ride home Jane felt sufficiently recovered after a snooze on the bus to stop at a bakery where we drank our afternoon coffee and partook of some sweet rolls…just what Jane wanted next to the cool shower that awaited us at home.

For food and accommodations in Tekax:
John M. Grimsrud ©2009

Carnival 2009, Merida, Yucatan

2009-02-23T19:41:00.002-06:00

It's carnival time again in Mérida, Yucatán! Watch the video and listen to the music!

An entertainer on the bus to Calkini

2009-02-12T21:50:00.003-06:00

Entertainment on the bus from Merida, Yucatan to Calkini, Campeche. The entertainer is Julio Cauich from Maxcanu, Yucatan.

CALKINI, BECAL, HALACHÓ, CHUC HOLOCH AND NUNKINI BY BIKE AND BUS

2009-02-12T17:47:00.021-06:00

CALKINI, BECAL, HALACHÓ, CHUC HOLOCH AND NUNKINI BY BIKE AND BUS

Calkini is located seventy-five kilometers southwest of Mérida on the old Spanish highway known as the Camino Real half way to the capital city of Campeche. Calkini’s only claim to fame is that it has been a half-way point for nearly five hundred years.
Prior to the Spanish conquistadors arrival here in 1549 little Calkini was a major hub of the Canul Maya with an enormous temple at its center. The Canul Maya emigrated from nearby Mayapan to the north in 1441 after that city was abandoned because of a civil war.
These Canul Maya were believed to have originated in the Peten jungle of Guatemala and were mercenaries for one of the ruling families of Mayapan, the Cocom’s who were one of the last hold-outs against the Spanish conquistadors.
Though the Spanish overran and plundered Calkini and seven adjacent Mayan towns making it their second largest Yucatan city by 1588 they were never successful in overpowering neighboring Uxmal.(1)
To this day Uxmal, just thirty kilometers to the east of Calkini submerged in a dense jungle interspersed with Mayan milpa farms has no signs of the conquistadors ever having successfully intruding there.
This is a very interesting and unique bicycling area that is definitely out of the tourist loop.
In order to best enjoy and get a good prospective of this matchless area I recommend that you travel to Calkini by second class bus that will take you on a two and a half hour scenic tour through the small off the main road Mayan villages along the way.
Catch this bus to Calkini at Mérida’s TAME terminal located on Calle 69 between 68 and 70. We nearly always return home on the rapid direct bus that makes it back to Mérida in about one hour. (Note; one consideration is the fact that the second class buses have no toilet facilities onboard.)
In the central plaza of Calkini across from the bus terminal Mayan ladies sell their home gown fruit.
Calkini is a clean quiet town with nearly no motor vehicles and only two traffic lights. In the above photo you can see the neatly kept central plaza and the city municipal building perched upon the base of an ancient Mayan temple that also is the base for the adjacent huge church complex.
Immaculate Calkini’s lack of street trash is amazing especially after leaving Mérida.
This new horse cart, the same as those used for centuries has just returned from the jungle with a load of firewood, leña delivered to a bakery, panaderia in downtown Calkini
The lady manager of the government sponsored “ISSSTE” store of Calkini makes a fashion statement. These stores are usually located in areas where privately owned stores don’t adequately meet the local needs. This store happens to be built into the side of a Mayan pyramid directly in the city center.
Here on a typical side street of Calkini you can see in the background the public school artfully painted with cartoon characters and the patio that Jane is standing on is composed of facing stones harvested from an ancient Mayan temple. Note the lack of motor vehicles and the amount of street traffic.
In our quest for a bicycle route the 24 kilometers from Calkini through the jungle to the Mayan ruins of Uxmal (2) we encountered this lovely lady. Doña Ana who has lived on Calle 23, the route to Uxmal all her life and is the caretaker of a small chapel on that same street a half kilometer from her home.
The conversation gets animated with Doña Ana as she expounds about the wild jungle.
Doña Ana explains to Jane that a guide will be required for transiting the jungle/milpa trail to Uxmal and her brother might be available. Another word of caution was not to travel in the out-back with only two unarmed persons because it is too dangerous. A machete for snakes and a mountain bike with fat puncture resistant tires and extra tubes are recommended also because of all of the thorny vegetation that most certainly will cause flat tires.
Bread and sweet rolls make the rounds of the city streets in the afternoon at coffee time.

This is the Calkini government building that is built upon the city center Mayan pyramid that it shares with the Church complex and the ISSSTE store. The building is constructed from materials taken from the pyramid and like the rest of the city is neatly kept.
The reason you don’t see any tourists is because there are none.
Our hotel Milo, one of four in Calkini is clean airy and bicycle friendly
Calkini abounds with photo opportunities unchanged since colonial times.

The Calkini church was begun in the 16th century and added onto in the 17th and 18th centuries. Read about the fascinating history in the recommended book Mayan Missions.
Jane and I can ride our bikes off the street and directly into our room and Hotel Milo.
Our first stop on our 40 kilometer Calkini area bike trip is in the little town of Becal that is distinguished for Panama hats make from a tender young palm leaf known as Jipi. Other interesting novelties like the miniature trinkets that include minute Panama hats of Jipi used as earrings are sold here. Twenty-five years ago Jane purchased a set of those little Panama hat earrings that she has loved all these years and now came back to renew them. Only young eyes can perform the intricate work of weaving these miniature items.
The ladies that weave these Jipi items do their work down in damp caves beneath the city where their materials will not dry out while they are being worked on and they invite visitors, so come and take a look.
This is one of several shops selling Panama hats and other Jipi trinkets in Becal.
Little Becal is tourist free and has no stop lights which has a great appeal to Jane and I as we do our five town bicycle loop tour.
Bicycle traffic out numbers all other here and this biker had to stop me to tell of his twenty years living in New York City where he left because he claimed it was no longer safe.
Jane and I found the hidden Becal municipal market a couple of blocks off the main street and had our taco breakfast there. It was just ho-hum but we got fed and for a town that doesn’t cater to tourists it was nice to find a selection of eateries.
Gold leaf and ornate painting adorn the Becal church also built from material reclaimed from a Mayan temple.
The central plaza, zocolo of Becal proudly displays their claim to fame, Panama hats.
Crossing the border back into Yucatan on our five city loop trip the departing sign says; “Campeche the hidden treasure of Mexico, we await your return.”
The border guards between Campeche and Yucatan have real fire-power but turn out to be jovial and friendly, to us bikers anyway.
Our next stop is quiet little Halachó with no stop lights where they are having a street-fair that takes over the downtown. There are few motor vehicles in town
Little Halachó has an exquisitely appointed and meticulously kept church called “Santiago Matamoros” which means literally; St. James the Moor slayer. I have to give it to the Spanish for being up-front when it comes to their xenophobic hate-mongering. They carried on a nearly 700 year war ultimately driving the Moors out of the Iberian Peninsula and still keep the battle fervor hot.
Here you can see Santiago Matamoros, St. James the Moor slayer triumphantly in action as he treads beneath his gallant white steed a dead or dying Moor.
Polished to perfection the Santiago Matamoros church does not put on an ostentatious show to attract tourists.
Read the fascinating history of these ancient churches in the book; Mayan Missions.
The central plaza and government building of Halachó viewed from the old church.
This old man boasted that his father had come to Yucatan to put down the revolution back in the 1910’s from the state of Gurerrero on the Pacific and stayed here in Halachó.
From Halachó our bike tour took us still further off the beaten path to an even smaller Chuc Holoch, a strictly Mayan town of very friendly and inquisitive people who seldom see foreigners.
This gathering featured homemade local foods for sale in this small zocolo park. You will notice the two distinctively different dresses of the ladies. The traditional huipil, a white smock type dress richly adorned with hand embroidery covering a protruding lace trimmed slip is warn by the mestizas, Mayan ladies. The other ladies, known as Katrina’s ware traditional western style clothing and are considered citified.
Jane and I quickly became the main attraction here with our big screen digital cameras that instantly captured these lovely ladies in their innocent seldom visited village. It is hard to find these isolated little gems of naive child-like people uncorrupted by big city.
This stop at a molino or tortilla shop know as a tortillaria in Chuc Holoch was almost worth the value of the whole trip because of the exquisite fresh hot tortillas toasted to perfection that were as good as they ever get.
Jane and I have our ears tuned to the distinctive sound of the burner that fires these automated tortilla bakers and instinctively purchase a quarter kilo to immediately eat lightly sprinkled with salt and rolled. Out in the countryside like this it is common to get corn tortillas that are made from locally produced corn from a real Mayan milpa.
This is a genuine treasure of Yucatan.
In the cities you more than likely will get maseca tortillas made from pre-ground corn flour of unknown origins and age. I call them, tortilla de cartón or cardboard tortillas.
Still out of the tourist loop we stop at quaint, quiet and clean little town of Nunkini.
Prominently displayed in the center of the Zocolo Park of Nunkini is this exceptional work of art depicting a strikingly beautiful Mayan woman proudly holding their staff-of-life, corn.
The busiest intersection of Nunkini has a sleeping dog in the street and tri-cycle taxis waiting for customers under the shade of a giant cieba tree.
Nunkini like most towns in this part of the world have their street venders selling home grown fruit and often home cooked local items such as pork or chicken tacos or tamales wrapped in banana leaves known as vaporcitos.
If you have a peso or two you will always find something interesting and delicious to eat here.
Gliding back onto Calkini we complete our 40 kilometer five town outing and before the bikes are put away for the evening we had covered 50 lovely and quiet kilometers. Check out the amount of traffic on the city streets.
It is well worth the effort to find these isolated out-of-the-way places that make bicycle touring truly a joyous event.
Our hotel Milo was so quiet that we can hardly believe that we are still in Mexico, let alone the Yucatan.
In the morning we boarded the direct ATS bus back to Mérida and were there in about one hour.
After two nights and three action packed days it seemed like we had been gone for three weeks.
This end of the world has more interesting adventuresome places to explore than you will be able to see in an active lifetime…so what are you waiting for?

1 MAYAN MISSIONS by Richard and Rosalind Perry
2 Check Google Earth to view the paved road from Calkini to Xnolan and the dense jungle from there to Uxmal. Only a trail covers the last 12 kilometers and is unmarked.

John M. Grimsrud Feb. 2009

IZAMAL AND KIMBILÁ PASSING HOCTÚN AND CITILCUM BY BUS AND BIKE

2009-01-16T17:28:00.007-06:00

On a cool gray January morning that Jane and I had anxiously been awaiting, we leisurely biked to the city center and boarded the nine AM Oriente bus to Kimbilá.
(Check out our web-site for bus terminal information and details about the “Noreste” and the other buses of Yucatan.)
Kimbilá has the distinction of being the manufacturing center of Yucatan for fancy embroidered ladies blouses and dresses.
Izamal is known for its gigantic Mayan pyramids and classic colonial Spanish structures.
The return bus ride is best for its scenic towns but the countryside in this part of Yucatan is nondescript at best with low thorny scrub over a flat unremarkable plain.
The following story is told with captioned photos;
Jane is biking the quiet Mérida side streets to the city center in January 2009.
Out of the tourist loop in silent Kimbilá I manage to get my head into the church photo.
Fresh cut meat sold in the city center of Kimbilá directly in front of the church.
Street dogs, “callejeros” are busy sniffing and frolicking around the street meat-market.
Parking and traffic are not problems in Kimbilá where the scarcity of motor vehicles and absence of stop lights create a welcome relief from Mérida’s pushy-shovey horn-honking madness.
Ten AM finds us having our morning iced coffee and fresh locally made hot tortillas on the main street of Kimbilá where it is so quiet we become anxious in anticipation of some unforeseen event that is surely not going to happen here anytime soon!
The trip proves to be well worth the effort for we have found a priceless commodity…quiet.
Across the street is the unassuming Taller de Bordado, a retail store and sewing factory and this is why all the bicycles are parked here. Inside are countless sewing machines busily humming along turning out fancy embroidered clothing mostly for exportation.
Inside of the sewing factory this is one of the many rooms filled with workers who all came to work on their bicycles.
Jane shops at one of the many Kimbilá stores featuring the locally made handy-work of the talented sewing artisans. These clever people produce unique adorning patterns that reflect the embroidered work of the ancient Maya.
We were impressed by the quality of workmanship and the excellent materials used.
Taxi service in Kimbilá goes at a sensible rate and the kids are delivered home from school for lunch by this smiling lady operator.
The town of Citilcúm on our way to Izamal is little more than a wide place in the road, but it is home to some people. Check out this main zocolo park directly across the street from the church that is skinny pickings for this horse sniffing out a meager meal of dry parched nearly invisible grass.
This is becoming a rare sight in Yucatan these days. Henequen cut and neatly stacked atop this antique truck rolls through town to be processed into sisal rope fiber. The process is so labour intensive that even Mexico is losing out to the cheaper producers in Brazil.
Citilcúm still keeps this industry alive and thriving. Throughout Yucatan even these small towns manage to keep their churches functional, though numerous evangelizers are encroaching.
Our first rest stop in Izamal is at this little park dedicated to the caste war that raged across Yucatan for nearly sixty years, ending about the time the revolutionary war began in 1910. (Peaceful places have no history.)
These cement “love seats” designed for face-to-face intimacy have been standard city park fixtures for many years in Yucatan.

Behind me and our little folding bicycles you will see the color that makes Izamal distinctive. For whatever reason I am not sure but throughout town you will only find this yellowish color paint on the city’s buildings. It is very nice and very distinctive.
Izamal is a major photo-op stop and tourist destination in Yucatan and I will not attempt to do justice to the many impressive Mayan pyramids or spectacular colonial structures in this story but refer you to the book Maya Missions by Richard and Rosalind Perry. I also encourage you to search the web where abundant information is available. Above is a statue of the notorious Bishop Diego de Landa who had a hand in the development of the Izamal monastery in the 1500’s and is noted for torture and the burning of Mayan books.
A pawn shop in downtown Izamal is not a positive sign of good times in Mexico.
The colossal amount of stone harvested from the ancient Mayan temples that stood here to build this city is simply mind boggling considering that several enormous pyramids still remain standing to this day. We recommend Izamal as a must-see place. Bring your camera, read-up ahead of time and by all means take a guided carriage ride.
On the streets of Izamal and near the municipal market venders turn local fruit to money.
A couple of blocks east of the main square Jane and I found this lovely little cocina economica that produced a hardy local dish known as “potaje” which is a stew heavily laden with vegetables, pork, lentils and spiced just right. The option of adding lethally hot habanero sauce is at your own risk. We make tacos with the fresh tortillas that are included with the meal. The portion is very sustaining and is the required quantity for active bicyclers.
This a Mérida street in January in our neighborhood on the way home from the Centro bus terminal in the city center. Jane is wearing one of the Kimbilá embroidered blouses.

TABASCO, THE CACAO ROUTE REVISITED, VILLAHERMOSA, CANDUACÁN AND COMALCALCO BY BIKE AND BUS

2008-12-29T20:23:00.010-06:00

December, 2008

Our nine hour snooze aboard the “UNO” state-of-the-art sleeper-bus that sizzled non-stop through the night took Jane and I along with our folding bikes from a quiet moonlight Sunday evening in Mérida to the hustle and bustle of a Villahermosa on Monday morning.
The “UNO” bus is ADO’s luxury step above first class featuring huge fully reclining cushy seats, his and hers toilet facilities, always open wet-bar with unlimited hot and cold drinks and a “care-package” containing, ear plugs, ear phones, eye covers, blanket, pillows and even mint candies.

Jane and I are no strangers to Villahermosa, a unique tropical city bounded by the Grijalva, Mezcalapa and Carrizal rivers plus numerous lagoons.
Over the years we have enjoyed the one-of-a-kind city-center jungle park-museum La Venta with its wild monkeys and hoards of colorful parrots that features the mysterious mega-ton carved stone Olmec heads thousands of years old.
The world class riverfront Carlos Pellicer Cámara anthropology museum (Museo Regional de Antropología Carlos Pellicer Cámara) that links the Olmec and Chantal Mayan cultures which formed the cradle of American civilization is easily worth the trip to Villahermosa by it self.
The other attraction unique to this capital city is its enormous municipal market where Tabasco’s extensive variety of deep tropical bounty is sold fresh daily. Cacao, coconut, cinnamon, vanilla, corn, and many strange species of bananas are but a few of the items they sell and are also prepared along with tantalizing seafood delights done in their traditional Tabasqueño cuisine commingling ancient Indian and Spanish customary culinary cookery.
The following story is told with captioned photos:
Upon our arrival in Villahermosa across from the ADO bus terminal several open-air breakfast places compete and the service may vary from one to the other. If you can hold out for the big municipal market your meal will be much better and immensely cheaper.
Our old stand-by Hotel Bilboa, a block from the big market with roll in bicycle parking ultimately got our business and we next took to the busy streets headed for the marketplace on foot. Curious diversions abound.
Going hungry here is not possible if you have a few pesos and are willing to partake of the street food like this coconut vender has to offer.
Where is the beef? Behind Jane is bullfight poster announcing an upcoming slaughter of six bulls and in the shop hangs the fresh unrefrigerated slabs of flesh and sausage, so you don’t have to wait. I have always maintained if you have been in Mexico so long that the beef starts to taste good, you have been in Mexico too long.
Tabasco is chocolate country and has been for several thousand years dating back to the first cultivation by the Olmec Indians and here are the cacao beans in bulk and sold by the kilo. The bag in the middle is called lavabo and the others are fermented, two different processes.
Pozol: Made fresh and a local favorite is this drink concocted of ground corn meal and whole sun-dried and roasted cacao.. It is all natural and when you smack your lips after the drink the cacao butter leaves a lovely lubricating sensation.
The market diversity is utterly amazing and you can’t see it all in just one day.
Fish; fresh, smoked or fried are available by the kilo.
This is not a penitentiary guard tower; however it sure does resemble one. Villahermosa has several of these observation towers around town, including one in the La Venta Park and this one towers over the bank of the Grijalva River which has flooded its banks the last two years in a row. Two years ago the big rivers flowing into Tabasco from Guatemala managed to submerge 80% of the state.
This is one of the numerous city parks that always manage to have venders hawking something to drink or eat and occasionally some trinket you might impulsively buy.
Breakfast? Six eggs and a stack of tortillas will definitely carry you until noon.
Mexico is definitely about food and we just had to try these Yucatecan salbutes that lost a lot by virtue of geographical relocation. They were good but a far cry from the real thing. The cream covered brown things were fried sweet ripe cooking bananas (plátano relleno). This is one delicious thing that Tabasco excels at and shouldn’t be missed.

I must comment about bicycling around Villahermosa; the drivers were wonderful, patient and courteous and we didn’t notice any of the standard neurotic pushy-shovey horn-honking run-you-off-the-road beaverboard we see back in Yucatan. The street conditions however could be life threatening with man-hole covers inset three or more inches, deep slotted holes that could tear a wheel off a bike and diagonal metal storm grates that could dislocate everything associated with your bicycle including you.
After we had thoroughly enjoyed our lovely return visit to Villahermosa Jane and I boarded a colectivo taxi for a small out-of-the-way town that looked in a tourist brochure like the type of place we must visit.

Cunduacán; with a nice intriguing sounding name like Cunduacán, the place just had to be worthy of our holiday stopover.
This was unquestionably a back road out of the tourist loop kind of spot that we often times find charming and very fascinating. After all, we were the only tourists in town and the competition for services was nearly non-existent.
Without dragging this story on too long I will tell you the only accommodation in town was more than just sleazy…it was deplorable.
The market at my initial glance appeared clean, spacious and neat. I went in and at my first turn into the main market area discovered that it was a children’s gaming parlor like a mini Las Vegas with a noise level that was designed to blast out ear-drums. Before noon we made our escape and boarded a bus to Comalcalco, a few minutes away.
In the pleasant and clean food court at Comalcalco’s main market our favorite is still Doña Alma’s cocina económica with its super attention to customer satisfaction and elegant culinary presentation. As we entered the food court the friendly and attentive waitress parked our bicycles and smiling took our order. (Note our bikes nearby.)
This is a good reason just to come to Comalcalco and Doña Alma’s liter sized pozol heavily frothing over with cacao cream is the best we have sampled in Mexico.
This is the lovely lady that makes the best food in town with a lovely little tote-bag presented to us as a reminder of her cocina económica that makes the claim; “we are not the only ones but just the best!!!” As far as we can tell Doña Alma is correct.
Honey and jalea real, or royal jelly an expensive delicacy extracted from bee hives all come from this enthusiastic mans own garden…from the private producer directly to you in the market. The Comalcalco market still sells products predating the Spanish invasion.
From the numerous waterways of Tabasco live crabs are bundled and oysters shelled and bagged. This is as fresh as it gets without any refrigeration.
Speaking of fresh, white corn on the cob and live turkeys and chickens await customers.
The corn, maiz and turkeys,( guajolote or pavo, are indigenous to America but the Spanish brought chickens, pollo to the New World.
Neatly presented in corn husk wrappers is a local product called; panela, brown sugar, which here in Tabasco is nearly unrefined and made into cakes like disks. These disks are packed four to a wrapper. The flavor is mild but has sweetness similar to caked maple syrup. The market holds many mysterious products sold in intriguing ways and used here differently than other places in Mexico. Your adventure will be on-going.
Authentic pre-conquest food is here. These fresh milled corn bread cakes were literally steaming hot when I arrived. The dark ones contain beans, and one is what a field worker would normally take as a days ration. I absolutely love these energy packed cakes that you can sink your teeth into and don’t require any topping. They do however go quite well with the fresh fried fish sold at the adjacent stall.

This is cacao fruit, this is not just any cacao, but the original strain developed by the ancient Olmec Indians thousands of years ago called, almendra blanca and kept in limited production at a small hacienda named La Joya. Jane and I were first made aware of unique this place by our bicycle tour friends Basil and Alix, www.bikemexico.com
There are no road signs and we had to find this obscure out-of-the-way place using latitude and longitude coordinates and a print off from Google-earth. These people do not have to advertise their product because they have probably the most exclusive chocolate product in the world and it commands the very highest price everywhere it is sold.
This is where it grows and these cacao trees are overshadowed by a huge canopy jungle.
This is how it grows, directly attached to the main trunk.
This is Doña Clara Maria Echeverria, the proud owner and operator of the La Joya cacao hacienda that has been in her family and producing almendra blanca cacao for nearly three centuries. Heaped to overflowing the wagon load of recently picked cacao will next be opened and the precious seeds extracted, fermented and sun-dried before being processed.
Working in conjunction with the areas best processor and marketer, CACEP cacao http://www.cacep.com/ , (which we write extensively about in our TABASCO; THE CHOCOLATE ROUTE BY BIKE AND BUS) a one kilo bar is now being produced.
This is as good as it ever gets!
Our time in Comalcalco was again not enough but we had an enjoyable stay at the bicycle-friendly Pat-Mal Hotel, visited the CACEP cacao reserve and ate as much of the lovely local foods as we could possibly hold.
Because we were so close to the end of the year holiday season we had a hard time getting seats on the bus back to Mérida and had to lay over an extra night and then shuttle back to Villahermosa to catch a direct bus home.
We returned heavy laden with cacao in various forms, beans, bars, cakes, powder and sticks. What a lovely addictive substance cacao is!

Recommended hotel in Comalcalco:
Hotel Pat-Mal
Morelos No. 606
Centro C>P. 86300
Comalcalco, Tab.
Tel. 933-334-0982 and 933-334-1792

For bus information:
www.ado.com.mx

Tour Cacep, http://www.cacep.com

Comalcalco Bus Ride

2008-12-29T20:20:00.001-06:00

A short video from a bus ride we took from Tulipan, Tabasco to Comalcalco, Tabasco. The ride took about an hour but seemed like hours. Play and see why!

HAMMOCKS OF YUCATAN: MÉRIDA, THE LAND OF TAKE IT EASY.

2008-11-28T18:05:00.003-06:00

HAMMOCKS OF YUCATAN; MÉRIDA, THE LAND OF TAKE IT EASY.
REST, RELAXATION AND COMFORT IS WHAT IT IS ALL ABOUT!

The Yucatecan hammock is the most versatile, most easily stowed and comfortably sensible furniture item that is
perfectly suited to tropical living and you can easily take them anywhere.
Yucatecan hammocks lend themselves well to an easy going laidback atmosphere that goes hand in glove with the
natural ambiance of ecologically friendly tall shade trees or cool high ceiling open-air tropical dwellings. For all the information about hammocks that we think you need to know, check out our website: www.bicycleyucatan.com

Hammock Weaving in Tixkokob, Yucatan 2008

2008-11-26T21:49:00.000-06:00

Ticul to Abalá, Yucatan

2008-11-18T18:38:00.006-06:00

This blog continues our journey from Ichmul, through Peto and on to Ticul, Sacalum, Mucuyche and ending in Abalá.
At Peto we made a miraculous connection and in less than five minutes of our arrival there we were on another bus headed north to Ticul.
We arrived in Ticul before dark and went directly to the Posada El Jardin Cabañas our favorite lodging. The cabañas are located conveniently just three blocks from the bus terminal on Calle 27 between 28 and 30. As their business card claims; “For Nature Lovers”, Large Rooms, tranquil atmosphere, patios, terraces and gardens. Well, we can roll our bicycles directly into our large and commodious quarters. What we like the most besides the jungle atmosphere in the city is its location so convenient to marvelous bicycle roads both in the Puuc hills with the many Mayan ruins and also north toward Mérida. www.posadajardin.com
Another plus to the Cabañas El Jardin is its close proximity to this lovely little unpretentious cocina economica restaurant Zazil, also on calle 27, where we enjoy lavish dining at the best bargain price in town. We are repeat customers.
Here I am with the owner of Zazil, José Gonzalez Rosado and his lovely wife who also happens to be the one to put together these extravagantly presented feasts we keep returning to enjoy.
Six A.M. and Jane and I are taking our departure in the cool early morning air from the El Jardin Cabañas headed north in the direction of Mérida. This is our fourth day out on the road and we have been enjoying a complete news-fast of no TV, radio, newspapers or even conversation pertaining to world events. This is just part of the reason that we have big smiles this early in the morning.

Jane and I make our first stop of the morning at this little out-of-the-way town of Sacalum and have our over-the-road breakfast of whole-wheat tortillas buttered with peanut butter and filled with Jane’s own muesli. Three of these give me enough staying power to make it until lunchtime.
This is downtown Sacalum, in Maya known as Land of the White Earth, which is also written up in Richard Perry’s book Mayan Missions where he describes the huge stone outcropping where the strange church is perched..
Little Mucuyché is one of the haciendas that John L. Stephens visited and wrote about on his 1842 visit to Yucatan.
Page 83 volume 1; Incidents of Travel in Yucatan by John. L. Stephens;

Hacienda Mucuyché
This is one of the most unchanged wild places in the Yucatan peninsula and it is very close to Mérida. Here is an excerpt from their book “Incidents of Travel in Yucatan” page 83;
After breakfast the cura left us to return to his village, and we set out to continue our journey to Uxmal. Our luggage was sent off by Indians of the hacienda, and the major domo accompanied us on horseback. Our road was by a bridle path over the same stony country, through thick woods. The whole way it lay through the lands of the provisor, all wild, waste, and desolate, and showing the fatal effects of accumulation in the hands of large landed proprietors. In two hours we saw rising before us the gate of the hacienda of Mucuyché (Figure 4). To the astonishment of the gaping Indians, the doctor, as he wheeled his horse, shot a hawk that was hovering over the pinnacle of the gateway, and we rode up to the house.
This pen and ink drawing by Frederic Catherwood depicts the Hacienda Mucuyché that greeted Stephens and Catherwood after their two hour horseback journey across the overgrown Mayan sacbe road from Xcanchakan.
I had been looking for the sacbe road route from Mucuyché to Xcanchakan that was traveled by the explorer and historical author John L. Stephens on his 1842 trip to Yucatan and I was told that this lady, Doña Canita with her ornate earrings was the one who knew all about local travel. I asked Doña Canita if it was possible to traverse this old sacbe road that has become severely overgrown since Stephen’s 1842 passage. She said; “you can make the trip by horse, but not with your little ‘caballito’”. The little caballito that Doña Canita was referring to was my little bicycle. I had tried this route from the other side and found her to be correct and upon inspection of the Mucuyché side my respect for her advice was confirmed…Doña Canita was indeed road wise.
The day turned hot by 11 AM and we made the decision to bike the ten kilometers to the tiny town of Abalá and catch whatever transportation to Mérida presented itself first.
Again the pleasure of our Peto trip was in the adventuresome journey. (Above is the tiny church of Abalá taken from our speeding colectivo taxi headed for Mérida.)

Ichmul, Yucatan

2008-11-18T18:14:00.009-06:00

ICHMUL, YUCATAN - A SHORT SIDE TRIP FROM PETO
The following are jewels of the jungle we encountered on a short side trip from Peto to the town of Ichmul where you are even less likely to find tourists. The only things we found in Ichmul to buy were fresh corn tortillas and soft drinks.
Ichmul was and still is a garrisoned military outpost that dates back in time to the beginning of the 60 year Caste War that began in the 1840s.

This never finished church is a product of that war that doesn’t ever seem to go away. The above carved in stone message dates from the Mayan occupation here.
The church was never completed and what you see here is as far as construction ever went.
Read about Ichmul; Place of the Pyramids in Richard Perry’s book Mayan Missions pages 146 and 147. You will find the story of Ichmul fascinating and therefore there is no need for me to tell you more than to get the book and read it. It makes an excellent field guide.
This sleepy tiny town has little to show but the old and older because nothing of significance has happened here since the beginning of the Caste War that began in the 1840s when the town was abandoned completely. Only recently have people began to repopulate Ichmul.
This unfinished church with its ornate embellishments dates from the1800s when the famous Mayan sculptor Pascual Estrella created this now weather-worn artistry.
Surrounding Ichmul are literally thousands of undisturbed Mayan ruins in the jungle that are in the ever so slow process of being pulled down by the vegetation whose roots pry apart the stone work and bring it down. This unfinished church undoubtedly has had some care in the last two centuries or it too would be taking its first steps of returning to the earth.
Ghosts of this abandoned jungle town are silent now with more than two centuries of forsaken desertion.
Find out more about this relic called El Santuario in Richard Perry’s, Mayan Missions.
If you superstitiously believe in symbolism then take a look at this church tower with a vulture perched atop that was recently struck by lightning that sent large pieces of the dome exploding away. Is there a message here for us?
At Ichmul at least you don’t have to be bothered with hordes of tourists or anybody else. as we found out public transportation is limited but still very convenient.
Relics or monuments to the past Ichmul was stifled and abandoned for two-hundred years. Now a new highway is being blazed past town that is sure alter this tranquility.
These two cast iron cannons memorialize the 60 year Caste War that dispersed the town.
What is happening in Ichmul hasn’t changed much since the Caste War when the red military garrison building in the background was first occupied. As you can see the military is still here. These three soldiers are not as sinister as they appear. They were in fact quite friendly and jovial considering the fact that they were on a high alert because of drug gangs operating in the area. Everyone is a suspect in this type of environment and so we guarded our actions because we didn’t want our heads blown off.
The building on the left is the city municipal building where you as a stranded traveler can apply for lodging and the mayor will find you a roof to sleep under.
The afternoon became hot and eating options in Ichmul were nil, except for hot tortillas and thankfully we already had our fill of them.
Jane and I decided on a strategy of taking the first transportation out of town no matter which way it was headed as it had become too hot to bike and the road to dusty from construction work.
In a few minutes we were seated in air conditioned comfort and headed back to Peto.
At Peto we made a miraculous connection and in less than five minutes of our arrival there we were on another bus headed north to Ticul. For more, see our post Ticul to Abala, Yucatan

PETO AS AN END DESTINATION?

2008-11-18T17:32:00.012-06:00

PETO AS AN END DESTINATION?
Peto is not the average tourist’s intended objective.
Jane boards the packed to capacity narrow gauge train to Peto with its 1890s vintage wooden coaches that were still rolling in 1985. The toilet was a hole in the floor.

The adventure trip to Peto makes Peto worth while.

Twenty-five years ago Jane and I disembarked Mérida on the narrow gauge train for one of our most memorable Yucatan adventures…we still have the original time-tables and tickets.
We set off from Mérida aboard one of the last narrow gauge trains still operating in the world headed into an unknown realm departing for the end of the line.
Back then Peto enjoyed a thriving export economy based on chicle, used in chewing gum which was extracted from the sap of the towering zapote tree forest surrounding this jungle area and also wild bee’s honey.
Riding aboard that long forgotten relic of the past that made 6 scheduled stops where there was only a foot path from the jungle, the conductor told Jane and I that he had been working onboard this train 26 years and that we were the first foreigners to ride it all the way to the end of the line at Peto.
(Read more about the history of transportation in Yucatan on our web site page Yucatan Roadways.)
At Peto the entire train just pulled to a stop for the night in the serene city center blocking intersections.
We were in another world so quiet it made you want to whisper. This sleepy colonial hamlet was dimly lit by sparse incandescent street lamps while the faint aroma of spicy wood smoke from neighborhood cooking fires trailed through the pristine jungle scented evening air.
Occasionally a dog would bark or a distant car started that could be heard putt-putt-putting slowly along and then silenced. Tranquility was at its optimum here.
We dispersed on foot with the rest of our fellow passengers into the eerie dimness of Peto’s silent night unhindered by traffic save the occasional bicycle.
The first of the two hotels in town was fully booked and the second had but one room remaining…we took it. The night clerk proudly signed me in as Mr. John and went out to get us a bar of soap, something normally not included in the accommodations inventory.
My first impression of our startlingly stark room was that it must have been of pre-Mayan origins. The stacked stone structure known as mamposteria was in the evolutionary process of returning to the earth from which it had undoubtedly originated untold centuries beforehand. It appeared to be leaning in six directions at the time if that is at all possible.
In the corner of our primeval room stood a small battered gray baked enamel wash basin on an ornate antique metal stand undoubtedly forged by a blacksmith eons before. A single pipe dangled down from the ceiling with a garden spigot valve to fill the washbasin…there was no drain. We deduced that in order to discharge the wash water you merely pitched it out the barn door sized window that had no glass or screen, where the birds were free to flutter in and out. Some discretion was in order because of a make-shift movie theater set up next door where a bed sheet was stretched in the trees for the screen and several rows of wooden benches were placed directly beneath our window.
A single bare light bulb equipped with a pull string hung starkly at face level and our bed was a metal four-poster with a lumpy-bumpy mattress of questionable origins.
One toilet with no seat and a huge gate valve to flush it satisfied the needs of the entire hotel.
On a large spike in that bathroom, driven into the cement wall were neatly impaled quarter sections of the Diario de Yucatan newspaper; that was to be our toilet tissue.
This experience was not for the fainthearted luxury lover, but then this is what true adventures are made of. At least there was this one remaining lodging in Peto for us.
The years have passed and it was time to re-visit Peto again. As before, just the trip getting there would make Peto worth while.
Here is what the explorer and author John L. Stephens had to say about Peto in his 1842 classic book; Incidents of Travel in Yucatan;
Page 180 from volume 2
PETO;

Peto is the head of a department, of which Don Pio Periz was jefe politico. It was a well built town, with streets indicated, as at Mérida, by figures on the tops of houses. The church and convent were large and imposing edifices, and the living of the cura one of the most valuable in the church, being worth six of seven thousand dollars per annum.

(Also from Stephens 1842 book, volume 2, page 173 the reproduction of a Spanish map dating 1557 makes no mention of the existence of Peto.)

Look over our bike and bus route using the LUS second class bus that departs from the Noreste Bus Station located on Calle 67 between Calles 50 and 52 in Mérida). It took us on a scenic out of the tourist loop back country adventure route to Peto. Here is the map;
The following travel log story is told with captioned photos;
Consider this; all of the towns depicted on this map have daily public transit and most have several per day that will transport you and your bicycle to Mérida or many other destinations.
This is downtown Peto in 2008 where most street traffic is still un-motorized. Though the pace of life here is still unhurried, the noise level has skyrocketed and their export economy has changed from chicle and bee’s honey to migrant laborers who journey to the U.S. to bring back hard fought for green-back dollars.
Peto’s municipal market is still a family type enterprise as you can see here even a toddler gets into the act.
The streets of Peto speak volumes of the old and new where here a centuries old colonial dwelling houses a store hawking numerous plastic Chinese imports.
Little Peto has been a military outpost since the days of the 60 year Caste War that began back in the 1840s but the military is still here and now it is to control the drug gangs or “narcos” as they are now known in Mexico.
Our first night in town we find a superbly located hotel in the city center. The bare-bones basic San José is definitely not scrubbed to death but boasts cable T.V., hammock hooks and indoor first floor bicycle parking. We off-load our packs and venture out in search of the best meal in town.
This cocina económica in the city center did not cater to tourism but provided us with a huge ration of frijol charros or pork and beans. In a cocina económica usually only one dish is prepared each day and when it is depleted, they close. You have the choice of eating in or carry out. Most of the trade is carry-out and nearly every Yucatecan home relies on a neighborhood cocina económica.
This is our frijol charros or pork and beans that come with all the tortillas you want.
From Peto this lovely little paved bicycle path leads out of town to a very quiet back road that will take you to Xoy, Chaksinkin, Tixmehuac and finally Tekax. This is a lovely jungle route past ancient haciendas, tranquil Mayan villages and intriguing missions, which Jane and I plan to do soon. Richard Perry’s book Mayan Missions is a good field guide on this route.
Perry gives a lengthy description about the, Virgen de la Estrella, “Peto” church but was not as impressed as we were. Jane and I found this to be one of the most formidable and massive ornate examples of dedicated attention to detail that we have encountered in Yucatan. You must come and pass your own judgment.
From the choir loft some perspective can be gained of the mammoth size of this structure that is nearly four meters thick. The Mayan temple that the materials were salvaged from had to be colossal. Recent restoration work has been carefully done but is still lacking.
The following photos were taken from the dizzying height of the roof top and I get dizzy with thick socks on!
Looking east from the church roof top you will see near the center of the photo behind the ball court a structure that was part of this church complex and it by itself consumed a monumental amount of building materials. Below is a close-up of that structure that gives the appearance of being built just to consume tons of stone.
Nearly four meters thick walls still stand but the roof has long ago returned to the earth.
Looking south west from the church roof you can easily discern the Puuc hills near to the town of Tekax far off in the distance. The above jungle previously consisted of zapote trees from which the chicle for chewing gum was extracted. The fruit of this tree is wonderfully savory and also known as custard apple. Those lovely trees whose wood is among the hardest and most enduring of all woods of the world became too irresistible for the greedy timber barons who have harvested then almost to extinction.
Looking down the roof you get a perspective scale of size with Jane at the other end.
Peering down from the base of the bell tower on the front façade, the altitude is apparent.
Looking west across the zocolo park the view of tree tops is far below.
This is downtown Peto’s business district where motor vehicles are in the minority.
As you can see Jane and I go to great lengths to get these interesting photos especially when you consider that I get dizzy with thick socks on.
This building represents a huge amount of rock and when you consider that all of the building materials previously went to build a Mayan temple and were taken down and then reconstructed into this colossal church; the back breaking man hours of toil becomes unfathomable.
The church is named; “Virgen de la Estrella” or virgin of the star and for this reason the façade is adorned with numerous stars like this one that perforates the wall.
This is where some of the lumber from Peto’s zapote forest wound up. These ancient hand hewn steps form a spiral staircase leading from here at the roof top all the way down to ground level.
After a few turns going down this spiral staircase it is as dark as being in a closet with the door closed and we had to feel our way along in the pitch darkness trusting that the steps were all there and well. This photo was taken with a flash and so we got a look at what we couldn’t see in the dark.
I found this Christ with his crown of thorns most curiously wearing a silk lace trimmed mini slip. There just has to be some convoluted story behind this.
Seated with me is Isabel Tec Canto the helpful and friendly church warden and the man who opened the doors to Jane and I so that we could take all those lovely roof top photos.
A recently restored side chapel complete with ancient wooden vigas; roof beams.
This must be a modern innovation, smokeless electric candles that you light by inserting a coin directly into the coin-slot…how very clever conserving all that wax.
Peto’s population turns out in mass for community functions like this cheer-leader competition that lasted several hours with loud speakers blasting everyone senseless.
The following are jewels of the jungle we encountered on a short side trip from Peto to the town of Ichmul where you are even less likely to find tourists. Ichmul is covered in the next post.

Bike Friday's in Mérida

2008-11-05T17:32:00.005-06:00

It has been our pleasure to meet and share a day with a couple of avid adventuresome bicyclers who are visiting Mérida. Elaine and Pat Rourke joined us with their Bike Friday folding bikes on a short tour of the sights and tastes of Mérida.
Pat and Elaine
First stop for refreshments was Caffe Latte in Itzimna. A smoothie for Pat and Martin's special iced coffees for Elaine, Jane and John.
Any tour of Mérida back streets isn't complete with out a stop to refill at our favorite cantina in Mexico Oriente, La Carreta Cubana II. La Carreta Cubana II always entices us to return time and time again for their delicious botanas that just keep coming and coming!

Elaine and Pat, we wish you a wonderful stay in Mérida.
PS: Pat and Elaine just recently completed a 1000 mile bike tour in Europe.

2008 USA

2008-10-20T18:56:00.006-05:00

USA TRIP 2008
Our thirty day trip to behind the wall began by bicycle and bus to Cancun where this photo of Jane was taken amidst a dazzling array of Mexican patriotic nationalistic memorabilia for the upcoming Mexican Independence Day celebration in September. This is a typical spectacle to be found across all of Mexico this time of year.
Our inspiration and motivation for this special trip was primarily to collect, transcribe, scan and digitize historical information pertaining to the life and times of Jane’s father the late Edwin Pearson and also to visit with family and friends.
From Cancun we would fly on a charter airline called Sun Country to Dallas and then on to Minneapolis, Minnesota. Jane and I were pleasantly surprised at the friendly, courteous and attentive service we received by all of this airlines employees.
By contrast we were amazed at the excessive level of paranoia that has gripped America when we passed through immigration at Dallas. It had been seven years since we spent time in America and we were not quite prepared for the state of fear that gripped the country…it could be that there is now substantial reason.
We made this trip with the two folding bicycles you see in the above photo and two small carry on backpacks. I should have packed warmer bicycle pants, otherwise we were adequately prepared.
This is a typical tranquil northern Wisconsin back road that we enjoyed so very much especially with the lack of traffic. The fabulous view you see is of the decent from the top of the hill that leads down to the “big lake”, Superior far off in the distance.
Here is the western extremity of the “big sea waters” of Lake Superior with the hills of Minnesota twenty miles across on the north shore. It is rare to find the lake this calm.
In 1972 Jane and I took departure from this place aboard our homebuilt 46 foot sailboat Dursmirg and sailed away on a fifteen year live-a-board adventure and voyage. We have a 4 volume story entitled The Travels of Dursmirg on our web-site; www.bicycleyucatan.com Volume 4, The Rogues of St. Augustine and Other Social Misfits has recently been posted.
Still remaining from the pioneering days when this area was first settled in the 1880s as the timber barons clear-cut the virgin tall pine forests are these relics of that past time.
Quiet solitude and the first autumn colored leaves give a hint of the cool nights when we stoke the wood fired sauna at the home of Jane’s little brother Joel, before snoozing where the stars sparkle brightly without human competition.
This is Lindstrom, Minnesota where the historical Swedish novelist Moberg wrote his classic books about the immigrants.
Next to Lindstrom is Chisago, Minnesota where much of Moberg’s writing about the Swedish immigrants took place and he is depicted here with his bicycle bigger than life.
This is one of many Twin City bicycle paths laid upon abandoned railroad right-of-ways, now well used and enjoyed. My brother and sister in law, Dennis and Joan Davis, above photo, rolled out the hospitality to Jane and I and made our visit more than magnificent.
The Pearson family cabin is located at the end of a two mile forest hiking trail and is situated on forty acres of wild land abounding with deer, bear, timber wolvess and countless other north woods wildlife It is on the shore of Lake Superior.
Above Jane P, Dick, Judy P, Katie, Jim P, Joel P, Amy, Brandon, Alex, Brent, Shelly and Andy. All of the names followed with a “P” are the Pearson brothers and sisters…this is all family.

Winging our way home to Yucatan, Mexico, below is Cabo Catoche extending out into the green Gulf of Mexico. Off in the distance under the wing is Isla del Cantoy that demarks the beginning of the inky blue waters of the Caribbean Sea at the furthest northeastern point of the Yucatan peninsula. This is the tropics.
Our thirty day stay in the USA began with the news that our trip insurance company went belly-up, next our bank did the same and finally the morning we took departure the front page newspaper story was that Sun Country airlines was in financial trouble and would only issue one-half pay to the employees…later that day they filed for bankruptcy. I told Jane on the way to the airport that morning not to be too surprised if our airplane didn’t get fueled. Well, it did and we got home, all the while thinking we might be on “the last plane to paradise”.
Jane and I were amazed in America to find the “blame-game” for the nation’s financial crisis placed upon Bill Clinton, the Chinese and the Mexicans. We wondered if the importation of 21,000,000 barrels of oil a day, unprecedented military spending or corporate financial thieving might have been contributing factors.
Our trip was an unequivocal success. We secured even more historical information than we had hoped for and our visits with family and friends were just great. We only wish that we could have had even more time to enjoy the fabulous hospitality lavished upon us.
So, thanks to you all who made our lovely trip wonderful beyond description.
John M. Grimsrud