We stayed in the small town of Xpujil and arranged for a taxi driver to drive us to the ruin site and wait to take us back to our hotel. The day began at 6am at the urging of our driver. He encouraged us to do so in order to see more of the biosphere wildlife in the early morning and to beat the heat of the day. During our 2- to 2.5-hour ride, we saw mostly wild turkey.

The driver stopped his taxi whenever the turkeys were on or near the road and waited for them to be out of the way. He told us that the male turkey would attack a vehicle that it thought was a threat, and that they can dent the car and break the headlights. We had hoped to catch glimpse of a jaguar or puma, but it didn't happen.

Once at the ruin site, we learned that Calakmul dates back to 100 B.C. Tall trees were gracefully rooted on ruin stairs and the ground was hard packed dusty almost clay coloured. Flowering trees and many different bird calls delighted my senses.

There were so many buildings; I read somewhere that there are 7,000 buildings on this site, some very large temples, and many smaller residential type dwellings. Sitting among them, it wasn't too hard to fantasize a home in one of the rooms.

Aside from a work crew of about eight and two other tourists, we were alone in Calakmul. The weather had heated up and we were slightly fatigued from hiking up and down the temples when we decided to return to the main office where we found our driver chatting and not at all bored with his wait. He offered to tour us to Balamku, Becan, and Chicana. We were ready for a siesta and decided to save those sites for another day.

The ride back was busier with traffic, but the sites were visible now that the sun was up and we were able to see the tips of Becan ruin rising up out of the jungle. We enjoyed lunch with a margarita and were snoozing in our comfortable room back at Xpujil by 2pm. The cost of the taxi, at 500 pesos, was a little steep for our frugal budget, but it was a highlight of our journey and I’m glad we went.