Chicken Eats Ya! (Chichen Itza)

I went to Mexico for my grandparent’s 50th wedding anniversary, along with fourteen (count ’em fourteen!) of my family members!  It was a really fun trip as far as family bonding goes, but as a fairly seasoned traveler for a 20-year-old, it was not my kind of trip.

We spent the vast majority of the trip lounging on the beach, which is awesome if that’s what you enjoy, however, that is not my cup of tea.  We did a couple of fun things like swimming with dolphins, snorkeling off a catamaran, parasailing and taking a day trip to a cenote and the Chichen Itza Archaeological Site.

Swimming with dolphins was totally not what I was expecting…. In fact, they kinda freaked me out.  You never knew where they were coming from and their teeth were more intimidating than I had expected them to be.   The catamaran ride was really cool because the Caribbean Sea is so beautiful, and we saw a lot of really cool things like bright fish, coral, a sting ray, sea urchins, sea turtles, etc. Parasailing was really awesome, it was my second time doing this, but it’s just as cool the next time around (plus, kept me from being bored on the beach).

The highlight of the trip for me, though, was Chichen Itza, which my little cousin kept calling Chicken Eats ya, and my entire family now calls it that.  We took a bus to this Cenote called Ik Kil.  A cenote is pretty much a sinkhole into these amazing underwater rivers with sapphire and teal water!  This one had huge vines from above that fell into the water that made it look like waterfalls frozen in time.  There is a paved walkway down to the bottom where people can jump into the cenote.  A few of us walked down the path and looked up from the bottom, and only two jumped in (If I could go back, I would’ve jumped in… So, do it if you go), I only touched the water with my toes…

Then we stopped and ate lunch at this tiny mexican restaurant.  It had some really awesome food and there was even some entertainment of dancers!

Then we went on to the main attraction!  CHICHEN ITZA!  It was such an amazing archaeological site.  We were there in the summer, so of course it was really busy and they’re always sure to highlight the main temple, the marketplace and the ball court, but if you take the time to walk around to the other ruins there are a lot of other really amazing sites like the nunnery, the observatory and other courtyards and pillars that you can touch and walk into, which I always love being able to touch pieces of history and culture.

 

So, if you’re on a resort in Mexico, and it’s not really your vacation style, be sure to get off the resort and do/see some amazing things!

For more posts and travel articles I find interesting ‘like’ the For the Love of Wanderlust page on Facebook. Simply click HERE.