On the trails of the Maya in Tikal

From Lanquin, we continued by bus to Flores in the north. The journey was supposed to take 8 hours, but it took us 12 hours to reach Flores. The reason for this was the bad roads and a broken ferry that was supposed to take us across a small river. There was a long line of cars waiting for the ferry, and the ferry itself didn't fit many cars. Also, a truck that was packed with too many people was too heavy and damaged the ferry when docking. For a long time, nothing happened, then they welded the ferry for a long time until we could finally continue. Why don't they just build a bridge???

Tired but still in a good mood, we arrived in the small town of Flores, which is located on a small island on a lake. Apparently, there was a festival going on here, with live music and constant loud firecrackers that set off the car alarms. So, we couldn't get much sleep. But at 4:30 am, we had to continue on the tour. We had booked a tour to the Mayan ruins of Tikal. Tikal is an ancient city of the Maya culture in the rainforest, with several remarkable step temples. Tikal was one of the most important Maya sites at that time and is one of the best-researched sites today. It covers an area of ​​65 square kilometers, the central area has about 3000 structures, and an estimated 10,000 buildings in the outer areas are still not excavated or explored. The Tikal area was declared a national park and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

You can visit countless pyramid-shaped and impressive temples, which are located in the middle of the jungle and can be climbed up on exhausting high steps. There were breathtaking views over the rainforest and the other temples. One of the temples served as a backdrop in one of the Star Wars movies, and some visitors even recreated the scene on site (including us, even though I have no clue about Star Wars). But we also saw numerous animals, such as monkeys, parrots, toucans, woodpeckers... On the way back to the exit, we had an exciting encounter with a howler monkey. At first, we only heard rustling in the jungle, then we saw movement in the trees until we finally spotted a monkey 10 meters away. Suddenly, the monkey started roaring wildly and incredibly loudly. For us, that was a signal to quickly make our way out, as we were afraid that the guy would call his friends or something.

Tikal is impressive and definitely worth a visit, even though all the climbing can be quite exhausting.