Port Tack to Adventure: Cenote Xkeken and Ek’ Balam

We can’t leave Yucatan without swimming in a Cenote. These were the sacred places of the Maya, the entrance into the underworld and the source for fresh water. There are no visible rivers in the peninsula of Yucatan because all the rivers are underground. Over millions of years, these rivers have dissolved the sandstone where the sandstone was weak, resulting in cave-ins, resulting in more dissolving and more cave-ins. These have left big sinkholes and caverns where the underground rivers form large pools, in other words, natural wells anywhere from 50 to 100 feet below ground. The Maya build their cities around the Cenotes, the only reliable source of fresh water for drinking and irrigation.

There are hundreds and probably over a thousand large Cenotes in Yucatan and Qintana Roo. We took advantage of one of the five near Ek’ Balam and went for a quick dip in the Cenote Xkeken; a huge underground cavern with a natural hole in the top that let sunlight in during the mid-day. The water was about 20 feet deep and the temperature about 85 degrees F. The Stalactites and stalagmites must have been growing for thousands of years and the roots from the trees above ground had made their way through the crevices in the rock and down to the water. It was a very magical site.

There were some kids painted as Mayan warriers outside the cenote. so we took a picture with them

After our swim, we took a quick drive to the Ek’ Balam archeological site about 100 miles from Cancun. The name Ek’ Balam means Black Jaguar in the Mayan language. Ek’ Balam was the seat of a Mayan kingdom for a long time from about 400 CE to about 900 CE. The city was an agricultural center for the Maya, they grew corn, honey and beeswax and cotton.

Constant war, overuse of the land, the insane need by the aristocracy to build temples so they could be remembered was the doom of the Maya. King Ukit Kan Le'k Tok' who build the Acropolis in Ek’ Balam for his own tomb was typical of the construction madness. That Acropolis alone probably needed the forest within miles around the city cut down. Making mortar requires lots of heat and since they did not have oil wells, guess where they got their heat? Wood. With the forest cut down there is erosion, can’t slash and burn to fertilize the soil since there are no trees to burn, they can’t produce corn and food, there are no animals to hunt because the forests are gone and when hurricanes hit, everything was wiped out. And that is why I think the Maya died out. Of course, the attack by the Toltec did not help and the coming of the Spaniards with their European diseases just ended up finishing the rest of them. Of course, there is still Maya these days and the Mayan language survives, but their high culture and civilization had no chance.

the Acropolis on the North side of the site is the largest structure at Ek' Balam and is believed to contain the tomb of Ukit Kan Le'k Tok', an important ruler in Ek’ Balam.

This is the temple in which Ukit Kan Le'k Tok' is supposedly buried, called El Trono (‘The Throne’). The doorway is in the shape of a monster-like mouth, probably depicting a jaguar.