Cahal Pech

A couple of days ago we went up the hill to the Cahal Pech Archeological site, a small Mayan ruins right in the town of San Ignacio. It's 1 of 3 Maya sites (along with Xunatunich and Tikal) that we plan on visiting while we are here.

 Here is a photo of an ancient Mayan. They must have been quite small, as he looks to be about 4 feet tall!

As you can see, I would have been a giant back in that time! Still would have been a Princess though!

It's kinda impressive architecture and a little awe inspiring.

For 4' tall people the stairs are totally not to code!

This is part of what the map said was a "ballcourt". Maybe where football started?

1 of many narrow passages throughout the site. This was done for protection moreso then anything...if attacked the attackers would have to come single file through the many passages and you could repel them with a smaller force.

Here is an idea of the height of some of the plaza's. Must have been considered REALLY high for 4' people!!

The Mayan people were an industrious, technologically advanced people that dominated this part of the world for the better part of 1000 years...it was quite cool to see what they built! Cahal Pech is the smallest of the ruins we expect to see, so it was a good primer for the big sites.