Monday, January 13, 2025

Riviera Maya - Day 3 - DIY Adventure

[Composed 11/29/2024]

If yesterday was about operating in VIP Mode, today is strictly DIY. We started the day visiting another Mayan archaeological site: Coba

Coba provides a nice contrast to Chichen-Itza: it's more spread out, situated in the jungle versus an open area and is generally less polished. This all makes Coba less popular, and therefore, less crowded and chaotic. When we first arrived, we felt like we had the entire site to ourselves.

While you can hire an official guide, we opted to go the digital route by purchasing the Coba Ruins Cancun Mexico Tour Android App.

The app consists of a map with 19 stops or points of interest (POI). At each POI, the app gives a brief audio description of either the surroundings or background information on the Maya. The app allowed us to move at our own pace and be fully independent. The information in the app is high quality and seems well researched. Take stop 14, for example, which describes the Mayan view of heaven and hell:

The Mayans were and are - a religious bunch. They believed that when someone died, their soul went directly to a place called Xibalba, a scary underworld. In Xibalba, there were tons of terrifying beings and creatures, such as the Flying Scab, Bloody Claw, or Bloody Teeth, as well as a river of blood and pus.
...
There were only a couple of ways to go directly from earth to Tamoanchan while skipping Xibalba: you had to be sacrificed, die giving birth, be killed during war, or die while playing the ball game Pok-a- Tok. No wonder the Mayans were cavalier when it came to human sacrifice-after all, all sacrifices went directly to heaven!

In a few paragraphs of explanation the app reframed human sacrifice from a gory punishment to something far more sacred. That kind of insight would be impressive from any source, and even more so from a few dollar Android app.

So yes, the app did an admirable job. And yet, if we had it to do again we'd almost certainly hire a guide. What the app provides in quality, it lacks in quantity. There are just so many structures and details within those structures that as informative as the app is, it leaves many questions unanswered. What I missed most out of the app was the ability to point to some random curiosity and ask: hey, what's that?

I suppose the best option would be to hire a guide, and then listen to the digital tour afterwards, trying to get the best of both worlds.

Until recently you could climb Nohoch Mul, the main pyramid at the site (here's an account of someone doing this in 2017). During our visit, they were doing construction at the base of Nohoch Mul, so not only was climbing out, but the base was roped off. My guess is that the days of climbing the big pyramid are gone. Given my fear of heights and appreciation for this fragile site, I'm on board with this change.

With that said, a number of structures throughout Coba do allow for tourists to climb on them. The first large temple we saw, for example, allowed you to ascend a few levels. There's something profound about walking on the same steps that another individual tread over 1,000 years ago. I'm guessing one day all the ruins will be roped off, but until then, the ability to get up close and personal to the ruins is a notable feature of Coba.

It wasn't lost on me that workers at Nohoch Mul were using hand tools to shape stones they were installing at the site. 1000 years may have passed, but Mayans are still doing stone work at Coba.

Yesterday was Thanksgiving, and while we didn't have a chance to eat our traditional Thanksgiving meal (hot dogs, of course), we did have a Thanksgiving moment today. While exploring Coba's first group of structures we caught sight of turkey. Except, by our standards, this was no ordinary turkey: it was an Ocellated Turkey. His iridescent plumage made him look like a magical version of our typical gobbler.

Shira, with an assist by the tour guide app, was responsible for navigating Coba. And so when she announced that we'd seen all the buildings I was initially disappointed. Google Maps clearly shows that there's an observatory (Observatorio Astronómico de Cobá); why hadn't our app talked about this structure?

The answer underscores just how much misinformation exists about Coba. Consider what Chat GPT has to say about the Observatorio Astronómico:

The Observatorio Astronómico de Cobá, or the "Astronomical Observatory of Cobá," also referred to as the "Round Temple" or "Structure 10," is an iconic circular structure at the ancient Mayan site of Cobá in Mexico. While its precise role remains debated among archaeologists, its design and location suggest it had significant astronomical, ceremonial, and possibly administrative purposes.

We did, however, visit Xaibé, a building that our audio tour explained served as a watch tower situated at a set of key road intersections. ChatGPT explains

Xaibé, located within the ancient Maya site of Cobá in Mexico, played an important role as a key ceremonial and possibly administrative structure. The word "Xaibé" translates to "crossroads" or "place of convergence" in Mayan, which aligns with its location at the intersection of key sacbeob (ancient raised stone causeways) that connected Cobá to other parts of the city and surrounding settlements.

Turns out, both of these descriptions refer to the same physical structure. Our app hadn't mentioned anything about an observatory, because from its perspective, one doesn't exist.

The fact that you can get ChatGPT to cough up different explanations for the same location by changing the name isn't just a ChatGPT quirk. It highlights that enough misinformation of the web exists, that from Google Maps and ChatGPT's perspective, it's common knowledge that there's an observatory at Coba.

Harvard's Peabody Museum hosts a detailed history of Coba's excavation. Nowhere does it mention an observatory. This site clears up the mystery a bit: "This structure ([Xaibé]) has been erroneously termed an observatory." So yeah, any facts about Coba need to be consumed with care.

After Coba we planned to head to Punta Laguna for hiking and hopefully monkey spotting. But before we did, we needed the a bit of recovery time: a bathroom break, lunch, etc. In hindsight, the time spent around Coba's nondescript entrance turned out to be among the day's highlights.

It started with the bathroom break: we found ourselves with access to clean restrooms, something never to take for granted. I then wandered into a nearby gift shop, where a conversation about honey ended with a tequila and xtabentún tasting. Did I need to buy an absurdly priced bottle of the green, anise and honey flavored Mayan liquor? No. But, the salesman was just too good. The time spent kibbitzing with the shop owner meant that when we wandered to our car, we heard a rustling in the trees above. To our sheer delight, looking up, we saw a small troop of monkeys.

After taking countless pics of the furry cuteness above, we headed back to our car. I stopped to gawk at one more oddity: a large tree laying on its side. Instead of being dead, one of its branches had become a new trunk and was now thriving. A couple of the local guides noticed me pondering the tree. One explained that perhaps 10 years ago, he'd come to work after a hurricane and found the tree had blown over. The scene before us was a vivid depiction of resilience: out of an impossible situation, the tree simply found a new way to grow.

From Coba's parking lot, we drove a short distance to a Mayan restaurant. While Shira navigated the menu, I wandered to the marshy green space next door, where I was captivated by a couple of Northern Jacanas and some colorful dragonflies. When I returned, Shira had ordered. Lunch appeared minutes later and was excellent. It wasn't just that the food was good (it was!), it was that the whole experience just clicked. The open air restaurant, the colorful tablecloths and decor, the perfect breezy weather, the bright colors on our plate, the excellent flavors. It was a sort of pristine sensory experience that restaurants in the states strive for, and this random lunch spot, arguably in the middle of nowhere, effortless nailed.

After lunch we made our way to Punta Laguna. It was this article that planted the seed of visiting this park. I wanted to get some time hiking in the 'real' jungle, and unlike many of the touristy experiences around Playa De Carmen, Punta Laguna checked this box.

As we drove to Punta Laguna via QROO 109, something our guide said the day before came back to us. At one point, he remarked that he planned to take us on a longer route in order to avoid a so called 'dangerous road.' We were fairly certainly that this was exactly the road he'd had us bypass. The problem with route 109 was that it contained randomly placed, massive potholes. It was driving in a video game: the road would be smooth and picturesque, and then seemingly out of nowhere, obstacles that required careful maneuvering appeared. Shira did an admirable job weaving between the potholes, and we made it to Punta Laguna without incident.

At Punta Laguna we found ourselves once again with the opportunity to hire a local guide. This time we didn't hesitate, and we were assigned a young man who's basic English was apparently the best out of all those guides available. He had a single goal: get us to see as many monkeys as possible.

While we were clearly in a wilderness park, our first spotting came by walking down an access road. It was great to see monkeys, but this wasn't quite the jungle experience I was hoping for. After ticking off that first troop, we backtracked a bit and headed into the jungle proper. Now we were talking!

Our guide navigated us along a network of trails, constantly on the lookout for signs up of monkeys. The trails were well established and it felt great to be doing a bit of old school hiking. Though, having no map and seeing no indication of blazes, we absolutely needed the guide.

We saw a couple of impressive butterflies, a hard working colony of leafcutter ants and a number of gorgeous flowering plants. But it was the monkeys that stole the show. Craning our necks, we found half a dozen different troops as we followed the guide. They were noshing on the leaves, swinging from branch to branch and otherwise just hanging out. Nearly as impressive as the monkeys themselves was our guide's ability to communicate with them. He had a handful of different calls he could make, each demonstrating that he had years of experience roaming the preserve.

From Punta Laguna we made our way back to our hotel. In the main reception area, we approached the concierge to figure out dinner plans. This morning, before we left for Coba, Shira had a lengthy discussion with the concierge on duty about our dinner plans.

The Mayakoba resort we were staying at had a number of dining options available; many of them striving to be luxurious. As Shira browsed the stack of menus and chatted about availability, she wasn't really finding a home run. Given our Kosher / Vegetarian dietary restrictions, many of the extravagant options just seemed like overkill.

What about Ember, Shira asked? Ember is the Mayakoba's Kosher dining option. Was that an option? The concierge promised to look into the possibility and text us if he could get us a reservation. By the time we got back from our day of travels, we hadn't heard anything. We assumed Ember was booked up or otherwise unavailable. Still, we didn't think it would hurt to check for sure.

The concierge picked up the phone and called over to Ember. After a few moments of chatting he asked if we wanted a reservation for 15 minutes from now? While promising, that was a bit too early for us, as we needed time to clean up from our day's adventures. After further negotiation, they were able to fit us in for a reservation at 7pm.

We hurried back to our room, cleaned up and then walked from our location at the Fairmont to the extravagant lobby at the Banyan Tree. The hotel would have been gladly driven us, but we savored the evening walk. The grounds of the resort are meticulously cared for, so strolling along the paths is a worthwhile activity in itself.

It was appropriate that we should eat at Ember, as it's one of the reasons that inspired us to visit the Riviera Maya in the first place. While introducing ourselves to Courtney, our travel advisor, we mentioned that we keep kosher. She responded by mentioning that near Cancun, there was a five star resort that had kosher dining. That comment stuck with us, and when other plans we had didn't gel we considered Mexico. Admittedly, Shira was more interested in the '5 star' part of the comment, and ultimately it was the history, ruins and convenience of the area that pulled us in. But, Ember, that 5 star kosher dining option is what sparked the idea in the first place.

We checked the signs at the Banyan tree, but could find no mention of Ember. We asked various staff and was given direction, until we were directed to a quiet meeting room that was set up as a dining room. Ahhh, this made sense: Ember wasn't in a fixed space. If they had a large group, they could move the 'restaurant' to a large space, if they had fewer reservations they could use one of their smaller multi-purpose rooms.

We were quickly seated and a waiter started bringing us our first course. As we chatted with him, he explained that tonight we were the only guests dining at Ember. The phone call from the concierge was to fit us in; it had opened up the entire restaurant for us at the last minute. Now that's impressive customer service.

Shira and I then went on to enjoy a private 5 star, Kosher meal, with a personal waiter standing by to serve us. It simply could not have been more surreal. The sea bass, onion soup and stewed beef were all excellent. We left Ember stuffed and feeling like we'd had a one of a kind experience.

After two full days of traversing the countryside, we were excited about the plans for tomorrow: to chill at the beach and resort. Let the lounging begin!

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