I've been to a few dozen sites there over the 3 trips I've taken to the Yucatan area.
I climbed a pyramid in Guatemala a few years ago on a trip there and chatted with the park rangers there. At first they were kinda of standoffish, which is common, but I learned that when I took out my little "Spanish for Dummies" handbook and cracked a joke about me needing it they'd laughed and warm up to me. Being humble made an amazing difference.
It can get pretty hot there during our winter months here in the US when I went there and I finally realized just a few days before at a different site on that trip that on all of my trips the one thing in common when you climb those is a wonderfully refreshing and cooling breeze, whereas in the forest below them it was hot and muggy, and I mentioned that to those Mayan Park rangers.
They instantly became excited to talk to me about that. They told me that is exactly why they were built and what they were used for, and emphatically pointed out they were not built for "chopping off their enemies heads" like the archeologists that come from the US and Europe like to opine and imagine they were used for.
I was kind of shocked by that, and their disdain for those foreign archeologists that keep saying they were, which they made very clear to me.
I got fairly well torched the last time I mentioned this here but I think it's important to share because it's so easy to overlook. I overlooked it for quite a long time myself.
Just a few years ago my wife and visited the Chokia site near St. Louis, MO on a vicious hot and humid summer day and it's there too. So you don't have to go to the Yucatan to experience that wonderful cooling breeze on a pyramid because climbing that big mound offers the same cool breezy relief, and it's undeniably there while just below it is not.
Now... to put this into proper prospective you have to spend some time below those pyramids working a bit. Working up a sweat for a few hours in the sun like real labor does for you. Then go climb that mound. It's the equivalent to modern A/C.
The Mayans will tell you that's why they were built. It's fair to say some were modified over the years to be more ceremonial, like Uxmal for example, but all around even that one are many lesser structures with perfect places to sit and refresh in the cool breeze to be found on them.
If you go to Tulum you'll notice that in the parking lot it's hot and humid and the air is dead still and there are no tall structures anywhere. But if you walk to the edge of the cliff overlooking the ocean you'll find the cooling breeze. They didn't need a tall structure there. That was where they took their work breaks.
We need to update our take on those because that is too common and too easy to prove and it's what the Mayans themselves say is the reason those structures were built.
I climbed a pyramid in Guatemala a few years ago on a trip there and chatted with the park rangers there. At first they were kinda of standoffish, which is common, but I learned that when I took out my little "Spanish for Dummies" handbook and cracked a joke about me needing it they'd laughed and warm up to me. Being humble made an amazing difference.
It can get pretty hot there during our winter months here in the US when I went there and I finally realized just a few days before at a different site on that trip that on all of my trips the one thing in common when you climb those is a wonderfully refreshing and cooling breeze, whereas in the forest below them it was hot and muggy, and I mentioned that to those Mayan Park rangers.
They instantly became excited to talk to me about that. They told me that is exactly why they were built and what they were used for, and emphatically pointed out they were not built for "chopping off their enemies heads" like the archeologists that come from the US and Europe like to opine and imagine they were used for.
I was kind of shocked by that, and their disdain for those foreign archeologists that keep saying they were, which they made very clear to me.
I got fairly well torched the last time I mentioned this here but I think it's important to share because it's so easy to overlook. I overlooked it for quite a long time myself.
Just a few years ago my wife and visited the Chokia site near St. Louis, MO on a vicious hot and humid summer day and it's there too. So you don't have to go to the Yucatan to experience that wonderful cooling breeze on a pyramid because climbing that big mound offers the same cool breezy relief, and it's undeniably there while just below it is not.
Now... to put this into proper prospective you have to spend some time below those pyramids working a bit. Working up a sweat for a few hours in the sun like real labor does for you. Then go climb that mound. It's the equivalent to modern A/C.
The Mayans will tell you that's why they were built. It's fair to say some were modified over the years to be more ceremonial, like Uxmal for example, but all around even that one are many lesser structures with perfect places to sit and refresh in the cool breeze to be found on them.
If you go to Tulum you'll notice that in the parking lot it's hot and humid and the air is dead still and there are no tall structures anywhere. But if you walk to the edge of the cliff overlooking the ocean you'll find the cooling breeze. They didn't need a tall structure there. That was where they took their work breaks.
We need to update our take on those because that is too common and too easy to prove and it's what the Mayans themselves say is the reason those structures were built.