The route from San Cristóbal to Palenque proved to be yet another filled with hairpin turns and sprawling jungle vegetation after just five hours of which landed us at our destination. Upon arrival we grabbed a couple Coronas (it was 5:00, just there), witnessed a mango storm (a bizarre five minutes of strong winds knocking ripe mangoes out of the trees and onto vehicles, tin roofs, and the blacktop with loud bangs and splats), and quickly researched a place to stay (we went with the economically priced, nondescript hotel next to where we were enjoying aforementioned beers). At this point we were running low on time, trying to get to the eastern coast of the Yucatan Peninsula, still deciding whether or not Cuba would make the itinerary (spoiler alert, she did), before eventually making our way through Guatemala to arrive in Quetzaltenango in time for our Spanish classes, all in just over two week’s time.

It was, perhaps, with this jumbled timetable and state of mind paired with the intense heat and humidity that led to a slight case of “ruins fatigue” and our visit through Palenque was a little less intense history-wise than previous ruins-visits; nevertheless the temples were breathtaking and quite unique from what we had seen thus far and many a photo was taken. So voilà, Palenque.

Templo de las Inscripciones

Standing in the Palace; note that my shirt is not only backward, but also inside out. It’s almost excusable that I didn’t notice as we had gotten dressed in the dark and headed out very quickly that morning. Julien didn’t notice until about an hour into the visit. This is evidence of our mental state.

Mist rolling in

El Observatorio del Palacio

Crawling about tunnels under the Palace

Templo del Sol – Templo del change-my-shirt-back-to-normal /

Templo de la Cruz

Templo de la Cruz to the left and Templo de la Cruz Foliada to the right

Views from the top of Templo de la Cruz

Tobacco-smoking god in the Templo de la Cruz

Part of the reason to get to the site bright and early is to avoid the heat of the day, but another important reason is in order to avoid the rain, bound to pour during this, the rainy season. We were in town when we got caught in a downpour, and we had to seek shelter in a cafe for a few hours until the storm passed.