Scaling A Pyramid

Finally.

After scoping out pyramid after pyramid, where the local jefes sensibly kept the mobs off of their ancient relics in the interest of preservation, as well as preventing some klutz from falling and bashing their brain pans in, I finally got to climb one of them.

Click on any picture for a bigger view.

I’d begun to wonder if it was in the cards. Although I’d seen pictures of folks atop this pyramid or that, including a few in places we’d already been, for us they were all roped off like a crime scene. And who knows, maybe some idiot with a spray can did commit a crime at some popular spot, ruining it for the rest of us.

In any case, once we got to a little town called Izamal a bit off of the beaten path between Merida and Chichen Itza, fate dealt us a full house. No crime scene rope.

Admittedly, at first view, the pyramid didn’t seem like much.

Pirámide Kinich Kakmó

This was in part because I didn’t realize that the slope I’d climbed to get to this point was actually part of the beast. What you see above is merely the bridge on the battleship. Given the view from 50,000 feet (Google Maps satellite view), you get a better notion of the big picture.

The big red square is the perimeter of the full pyramid base, and the red X in the middle of the plateau is where the last picture was taken, looking toward the top of this shot. The blue circle is the pyramid in the first shot, and the blue X at the bottom is an entrance to be seen later.

The pyramid looks bigger now, doesn’t it? But even climbing the “bridge” turned out more challenging than one might think.

If you look at that first shot, it looks like a typical stepped pyramid with stairs up the side. But while the initial set of stairs was in good shape, most of them were nonexistent. This made the ascent more like a steep mountain scramble, where the three points of contact and/or butt-surfing methods were sometimes called for. The fact I had a somewhat pricey camera swinging from its strap when I bent over, doing its best the crash into the nearest rock didn’t simplify the process.

But ultimately I got to the top and enjoyed the view from the heights.

From the top, the view is a sea of green, a Yucatan jungle that seems flat as a billard table with a horizon that goes on forever. Nowhere to be seen are other overgrown pyramids, nor lakes and rivers, leading one to wonder how all that flora gets a drink.

The trees would have to be hardy, with roots that could reach deep into the water table. For some even that would be a luxury – consider the trees that covered and still cover most Mayan pyramids and other structures. No water table there, only the hope for a rainy season and the certainty of months of no rain. Still, they were strong enough to grow on top of and into the pyramids, reducing stairs and walls to rubble.

In the distance, town center is dominated by the Convent and Church of San Antonio de Padua. The raised platform it sits on also used to be a pyramid. As was their habit, the conquistadors shaved the top off it and used the materials to build the church and convent. It was finished in 1561.

View from the top of Kinich Kakmó, with a telephoto lens.

View from the town square

Shops along the square

Next to the town square, a line of buggies play the Izamal version of cabbies, no doubt aimed at the tourists. But the horses seem cool with it.

The courtyard at the convent is massive. It is, in fact, second only to the Vatican’s. Pope John Paul II visited the city as part of a Mexican tour in 1993 – maybe he was checking out the competition.

You may have noticed the yellow motif. It is common to the entire town of Izamal, to the point where the burg is known as The Yellow City. While some visitors come to see a town wearing a yellow and white uniform, upon review I had a tendency to see it in black and white.

An entry and lower levels of Pirámide Kinich Kakmó

As for the Mayan history, it’s a long one. We’ll skip the gruesome details, beyond the impression that Izamal was one of the bigger players during its heyday (200 B.C.-600 A.D.). That’s a lot of hey and quite a few days.

So was climbing a pyramid a life changing experience? No. Maybe if I could have pulled it off, Ply on the wall style, circa AD 200 to see it in its glory, in the midst of full ceremony it would have been something to write home about.

Um, wait a sec…

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