Chichen Itza

Chichen Itza: Arrive at 8am or Accept the Consequences

Chichen Itza draws around 2.5 million visitors per year. By 10:30am on any given day from October through March, tour buses from Cancun (3 hours east) and Merida (1.5 hours west) have fully arrived and the area around El Castillo is wall-to-wall people. Going at opening and having 90 minutes before the crowds is not a clever tip – it is genuinely the difference between being able to look at things and being unable to move. Stay in Valladolid (45 kilometres east, 45-minute drive) rather than Cancun and you can be at the gate at 8am without a 3am alarm.

El Castillo

The pyramid is 24 metres high with four staircases of 91 steps each, plus one for the top platform, totalling 365 – matching the solar year in a design that demonstrates Mayan astronomical knowledge. At the spring and autumn equinoxes, the angle of the sun creates a shadow pattern on the northern staircase that looks like a serpent descending. The serpent heads carved at the base complete the illusion.

You cannot climb El Castillo. Access has been prohibited since 2006 following a visitor who fell. Georadar surveys in 2016 discovered a third pyramid inside the one inside the one you can see – three structures spanning perhaps 600 years of construction, each encasing the previous one.

The Great Ball Court

The Great Ball Court is 250 metres long, the largest in Mesoamerica. Its acoustics are extraordinary: a whisper at one end is audible at the other with preternatural clarity. The carved wall panels show the ball game in progress with a decapitated player whose blood becomes serpents. The stone rings through which the rubber ball had to pass are 9 metres above the ground. Whether scoring a ring ended the game or began it remains debated.

The Sacred Cenote

A natural circular sinkhole 60 metres in diameter and 20 metres deep, into which the Maya threw jade, gold, pottery, and humans – most likely as offerings during droughts. Edward Thompson, the American consul in Merida, dredged it between 1904 and 1910 and removed large quantities of material that ended up at Harvard’s Peabody Museum. Repatriation discussions are ongoing. Standing at the rim looking into the green water, knowing what the archaeological record documents, is sobering.

Temple of the Warriors

Northeast of El Castillo and receiving a fraction of the pyramid’s visitors: the Temple of the Warriors and its Columns Group are as architecturally impressive as the main pyramid. The Chac Mool figure at the summit is a masterpiece of Toltec-Maya sculpture. The Platform of Venus, the Platform of the Eagles and Jaguars, and the Osario pyramid are in the southern section; walk 200 metres south of El Castillo and the crowd density drops dramatically.

Admission and Practicalities

Entry involves a federal ticket (around MXN 533) and a Yucatan state charge (around MXN 98), paid separately at the gate. Bring cash; card readers are unreliable. About USD 30 to 35 at current exchange rates.

Ek Balam, 30 kilometres north of Valladolid, is worth a separate visit: its main pyramid can still be climbed, and the stucco facade of the Acropolis has some of the finest preserved Classic Maya sculpture in the Yucatan.