Semana Santa Part 2

Righty then, part 2. After visiting Palenque and the various points of aquatic interest around it we headed over to San Cristobal de las Casas, which turned out to be one of my favorite towns in Mexico. It was a really vibrant town, with many musical acts, things to look at and do, and places to eat. We planned on staying for two nights. Here's a picturesque church near our hotel from the first night:

The day after this we went to see the canion del Sumidero, which is a quasi-famous canyon near the town. We took a boat tour through it and were treated to shear rock walls and lovely views. Here's the most famous view, it's on the crest of the province:

and this is a crocodile we saw along the way, he was just kinda hanging out there.
The trip took most of the day and we were fairly suntoasted by the end of it. We had a little extra time that afternoon and went walking around town. We climbed this hill up that church (it was a pretty long climb).
At the top was an enormous Mexican flag. The area served as an overlook for the city and afforded very nice views:
The next day we went on a small tour through several modern-day Mayan village, which was a very interesting cultural experience. Not very many of them speak Spanish and most lived in either adobe or government-santioned concrete abodes. It really was a world apart from Monterrey and the US way of living, but perhaps not so far:
The town itself was actually fairly large, here's a shot of the main sqaure where one could purchase many things I would never want to eat. It was pretty interesting as well, especially with the language problems.
Finally, here's the town's "Catholic" church. It's supposed to be an official church and everything and looks pretty normal. Inside, however, it was quite different from your average church as people practiced traditional Mayan religion. It was pretty interesting. As a fun fact, if someone sees you take a photo inside they will break your camera. Then take you to jail. Don't do that.
We personally saw two people get "arrested" by the policemen who had large sticks. After that funtime adventure we were shown the magic of weaving and treated to a typical Mayan taco (really spicy sauce and some interesting cheese on a tortilla). After this we arrived back at town just in time for Danny to get really sick. I had to use my emergency Spanish to get an extra night of hotel and change our bus to the next day, but it all worked out. The next day we bussed into Villa Hermosa and went straight to the airport to fly back to Monterrey. oddly enough we met another of my friends who was traveling with her friend at the airport, and got to share a taxi back to campus with them. It was a very long car ride spent wondering about the whys and hows of my removal from Mexico. Within the week I was on (oddly enough) a smaller airplane for my flight back to Detroit. Mexico really was a great deal of fun while it lasted, but I was really disapointed to have been called back so soon. Like I said before I finished my classes at Purdue without too much drama (although they still haven't payed me the travel expenses yet). To me the experience was really positive, as the school stuff I did in Mexico was up to par and the social things were much different than they were at Purdue (which made the early homecoming all the more annoying). I'd do it again a million times.

You may think my adventure ends here BUT WAIT, there's more! Right now I'm on a plane to Costa Rica to take part in an internship at Kimberly-Clark's Cartago plant. The GEARE office was really great in helping me find this position, they've been very nice in helping me make the best of the situation. I'm excited about the opportunity but anxious again about starting from nothing all over again. I'll be regularly updating this about my new adventures there, hopefully there will be cool things to show you all. Until next time!

Semana Santa Part 1

Well, it's been quite a little bit here, sorry. I'd been really busy sorting out the semester at Purdue and then doing as much of nothing as possible at home. I finished my semester at Purdue by taking similar courses and I had to make up a month and a half of material in one class. I had to stay on campus for a week extra, but I think it all worked out (still don't have grades yet). This update will probably be two pages (got a lot of photos) and will cover my jaunt with a French-Canadian by the name of Danny through various Mayan ruins and stomach illnesses.

We started by flying into Cancun, which has the highest theme restaurant coverage per captia in the world. It was pretty scary really. We really only used Cancun for the hotel, which was very nice. Day two began with a short bus trip out to Tulum, which were a set of very pretty ruins on the side of the ocean. Unfortunately it was there that I got the call from the GEARE office at Purdue saying I'd have to come home, but other than that we had a great day. The beachfront was open for swimming and what-have-you and we stayed to enjoy the sun and sand for an hour or so. Here is a picture of the ocean (there may also be an iguana):

And here is a photo of the ocean and some ruins:
The next day we bussed out with all of our belongings to Chichen Itza, home of the tallest surviving Mayan pyramid (I think). The site was really large, and had a lot of buildings of various size and purpose. Here's some cool carvings on a random building.

We saw Chichen Itza with a guide, which was kinda expensive but probably worth it in the end. Here's an observatory, they used rooms with little tiny windows to see stars and stuff with surprising accuracy.
And here's the main attraction, the pyramid itself. It's kinda hard to miss as it's right in the middle of the site and is really quite big. Apparently there's another little pyramid inside, but you can't see it anymore.
It really was very impressive. We had a good day there. After Chichen Itza we took a whole lot of busses down to Palenque, home of some more ruins. Here's what the bus ride looked like, it was very nice.
The bus system in Mexico worked pretty well really. We took a lot of first class busses between towns and they were all clean and on time. All of them showed movies too which was especially nice on some of our all-day trips. In Palenque we saw the lovely ruins, which were pretty expansive again. The main draw there was the jungle setting. While it may seem a bit boring to see so many Mayan ruins in four days or so they all seemed unique enough to justify the visit, I can't really think of one of the three I'd like to skip in retrospect. Here's two pictures of the Palenque ruins:

(click for bigger) After the ruins our tour took us past an enormous waterfall whose name escapes me and probably will forever. It was quite impressive.
After the waterfall we saw "Aquas azules" which were supposed to be a beautiful blue but in our case more of a brownish shade. Oh well. It was still pretty cool as there were dozens of little waterfalls across a mile stretch of river, and it was a lovely way to end the day (although we didn't swim).
That's the end of part 1, STAY TUNED.