Synopsis of the Equinox Tour:

Dzibilchaltun A+
Chichen Itza B-

Paul woke up a *very* cranky Melissa at 4:00 am. We got ourselves together and drove to Dzibilchaltun (a 20 minute drive). We arrived quite early but there were already many people there and there was a short line to get in. Once in the archaeological zone we walked the white road to the Temple of the Seven Dolls and waited in the lovely chilliness and darkness for the sun to rise in the temple door.

As expected, the hippie-gringos were there, but not in any really annoying way. One guy up front did yell "The suns are flashing in our eyes, turn off your camera flash!" Which was weird, because it was dark and everyone wanted a "before" photo to go with the "during" and "after" photos, yours truly included. Whatever. Snap. *Flash* Then the sun started to come up and Paul started filming. This was particularly funny when a woman standing next to Paul said "Perdon" so he moved over a bit and she stood RIGHT in front of him. Luckily for her, she was short and he could film over her. There was another guy who got in the way, but this was no surprise. I hate crowds and I was reminded why. This is pretty though:

We had a fabulous time watching the sunrise. We headed out of the ruins and to the car, which Paul promptly got stuck on a big rock in the parking lot. To his credit, the parking lot is 4 wheel drive terrain, the whole continent is rocky, and the "getting stuck" didn't damage the car as we then drove it 2 hours to Chichen later in the day. It was one of those times that you laugh about when it is over but at the time it is NOT funny.

We drove off the rock, thanks to Paul's excellent maneuvering (sp?) and had breakfast at Sanborns. Yum! Then we went home, took showers, and packed up for round 2: Chichen.

We arrived without incident in Piste around noon and actually parked a lot closer to the ruins than we had expected. We walked a bit to the park, waited maybe 20 minutes in line to get tickets and then went to have some lunch. The serpent slithers down the side of the Castillo from 4:00-4:15 so we had PLENTY of time. After lunch we walked around A LOT and saw these puppies. The Worleys might remember the momma dog which was pregnant when they were there. The puppies were SOOOO cute! It was all I could do to keep Paul from bringing one back to Merida.

We walked around in the sun and heat and finally it was time to see the shadow. We got our seats on the grass kind of early so we could see and sat in the sun and waited. At 3:57 you could see the shadows starting to form. At 4:02 a BIG rain cloud covered up the sun and sprinkled on us a bit - but it was so hot and the rain was so cold, it felt wonderful. Well, at 4:27 when the cloud still hadn't passed I convinced Paul to get up and move around. At 4:35 we left, having seen NOTHING.

Oh well, I'm so glad we went to Dzibilchaltun and saw the sunrise. Also, we briefly met up with our friends Melissa and John. It was great to see them for a bit especially since we didn't see the serpent. Argh! We drove back bummed and tired and got back to Merida just in time for some Law and Order. We fell asleep by 9:30pm.