Day 20: Uxmal to Sacalum-2024!

January 1, 2024

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Dodie "hatched" the idea that in addition to the list (and set of photos) we are keeping of all the birds we have spotted in Yucatan this time around, we could begin the New Year with a list for 2024, from any and all places we may visit. This opens the need to re-photo those Grackles, Kingbirds, Doves, etc. that we had long ago cataloged. Oh well, it gives us an activity on the road.

Dodie picked up the camera at dawn and shot the photo below. Quite side from which birds may be in the photo, I find it has a "2001" quality, suitable for beginning the year.

We walked out onto the lush grounds of the hotel, having noticed a direction sign for ruins. Very naively we thought "Oh wow, our expensive hotel even has some custom on-site ruins for us", so we followed the sign, expecting to bag some ruins and maybe some birds before breakfast.

It took a while, too long really, for it to dawn on me that we were not heading for a private hotel ruin, but rather to the main Uxmal Ruins site. As can be seen from the track above, we waslked about half way before smartening up. The sign and the trail were simply for guests to find their way on foot to the major attraction!

We turned around and slunk back to the hotel, for our included breakfast. As with supper, it was good - tasty, but lacking in quantity. This would be ok, because our day today was to be quite short.

We set off on the highway in the direction of Muna. I was a little surprised to see a sign for the town, featuring a red cross that signifies medical services. As we learned, while they do have a medical transfer van, they lack other services, including even a stretcher.

By the roadside we noticed our first field in Yucatan that contained actual green and growing corn. Because of the season when we are always here, all corn to date has been brown and finished. The corn in this field was of three heights/ages, and obviously had never heard of our adage from home "Knee high by July".

We are still a little obsessed with this highway, and with trying to spot where on it Dodie crashed (to help understand why). Of course, we will no longer find blood on the road, but the photo below seems to be about the spot. The road has been coming down at 3-5% for about a km at this point, and that was enough for Dodie's speed to climb into the unstable range. You can easily see the hill we are talking about in the track above. The height of land is just before Muna, a point at which there is a restaurant with a lookout. They have a lot of sort of popularized Maya statuary, where you can take your picture, looking like a local.

The road descends from the restaurant into Muna, steeply enough that we need to remember not to be climbing up to go to Uxmal, next time.

At Muna we of course ran through the centre, and encountered the standard hulking church, which here is called the Temple of the Virgin of the Assumption. There was a service going on, with a good crowd, and we found the priest was a pretty good singer.

High above the priest was a painting, which is generally easy to analyse. It has the father and son and a dove plus alpha and omega above them, signifying no doubt the holy spirit. Some questions or observations do arise. Clearly the father is the classical old man with grey beard. He is carrying a turned dowel, maybe just to have something to hold. But Jesus has a cross. We assume this is a souvenir he brought home from earth.

From Muna we set off toward Sacalum. I was casting a lot of doubt on the Google track, since it went through places in which our map showed no road. Sure enough, it was a Grampie trap, and we had to turn back and get onto a real route.

At first the way looked ok - with a trap, it always does.

But here it revealed its true nature. We bailed!

There were a couple of things of interest along the way. Here is an abandoned hennequen (sisal) hocienda, with its telltale chimney, used for cooking the plants.

These banana plant have fruit, that is being protected by bags.

Sacalum turned out to be really a very poor town, with only the smallest of hole in the wall "grocery stores", and those carrying only bottled drinks and packaged processed foods.

This shot makes Sacalum look far better than it was.

We did find our place, which is called Saak Luum Ruta Puuc. It has a long wall facing the street, with at least five gates in it. All of course were locked. The true entrance is way around the side. It is more of an apartment, with a kitchen and sitting room in addition to the bedroom. Its price of about 1000 pesos per night is on the high side, but the space is huge.

Thisis the main building and pool. Our spot was not in this, but just to the side.

You can not really see it in this photo, but although our rooms are nominally ground floor, there are at least ten level changes (steps) to negotiate before reaching our door.

Dodie has been having some more intestinal upset, so I got sent out on foot to find some kind (any kind) of food, while we settled her in for a nap. I walked the street a bit, to where we had seen some hole in the wall stores, but now all were closed. So I grabbed my bike and sailed downtown to what seemed to be the biggest place going. This was apparently Super Willys. Except for some low quality yogurt, all I found at Willys was processed junk. I brought some back, and I am not sure if I will get praise or criticism for my efforts from the still sleeping Dodie. It is becoming apparent that despite the availability of great fruit here (though definitely not in Sacalum), the highly processed food and low quality carbs are reducing our fitness, despite the hours of cycling.

We have an extra night booked here, so tomorrow we will likely head over at least to Ticul, which has that great, crowded market. We will surely find some real food in that direction.

Today's ride: 39 km (24 miles)
Total: 802 km (498 miles)

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