Guatemala - Parque Nacional de Tikal

This was a full day of adventure! We were so lucky, we had no rain, not too hot, and we managed, without doing anything, to get an excellent guide. Having the guide was priceless, without help we would have spent the day looking at things and being in awe but not really getting the significance of what we saw.

We were taught about plants and their medicinal uses, the specific reason for the Mayans building the way they did, about animals and their behavior, about people going missing with and without guides, and shown the recommended range of buildings throughout the areas where the archeological work has been completed and where there is more to come. At one point Harold and the guide Rafael, who was of Mayan decent, sang popular Guatemalan songs for me as we were walking along the paths. Not often I get that kind of treatment!

There are two theories about what caused the demise of the Mayan culture, I will leave it with you to look it up on the internet and decide for yourself which one you subscribe to. Whatever the reason, the Mayan people who remained where greatly weakened and an easy take by the Spaniards. To this day there are 22 registered Mayan languages in Guatemala, two unregistered, and then Spanish. Quite a lot to learn if you want to know them all.