Yucatan, Mexico

The End of the End of the World


Shaman Adolph
Xaman Adolfo carries out a purification ceremony in the Mayan village of Pac-Chen.
Mayan Death II
Chichen Itza skull reliefs provide a basis for performing Mayan sacrifices.
Mayan death
Detail of one of the skulls of the Mayan temple of Chichen Itza, temple the subject of countless predictions and professions.
vision of heaven
Man contemplates the complex around the top of the Kukulcan pyramid
old new age
A billboard makes humor with the Mayan Profession of the End of the World.
On Rails
Guide drives visitors to the Chunkanan hacienda in a carriage on rails.
protected pond
Lagoon full of crocodiles in the village of Pac-Chen, in the state of Quintana Roo.
Mayan representation
Colorful replicas of Mayan artefacts decorate Xcaret Park, on the Maia Riviera.
End of the World at the Bottom
Bathers refresh themselves in the cold waters of one of the cenotes of the old hacienda Chunkanan.
Calakmul
Sun sets over the jungle that covers the Yucatan Peninsula and illuminates one of Calakmul's pyramids.
Another door to the infra-world
Entry to a Cenote near Tulum, Mexican state of Quintana Roo.
Staircase to the Infra-World
One of countless entrances to the underworld that dot the tropical Yucatan peninsula.
Mayan Witchcraft Reenactment
An extra of a Mayan priest animates the themed show at Xcaret Park, in the province of Quintana Roo.
Quetzacoatl to double
Heads of the god Quetzacoatl in Chichen Itza.
Profession?
Vultures absorb solar heat on top of one of Edzná's pyramids
Shaman Adolph
Xaman Adolfo carries out a purification ceremony in the Mayan village of Pac-Chen.
The announced day passed but the End of the World insisted on not arriving. In Central America, today's Mayans watched and put up with incredulity all the hysteria surrounding their calendar.

The middle of December was approaching.

As was to be expected, the number of curious people, scholars and journalists arriving in Mexican lands in the Yucatan increased.

The van that was supposed to transport us in the state of Quintana Roo arrives late. We are convinced that, even so, it is exclusive to us, but when we open the door we find inside a figure as unusual as it is recognizable.

Paul Monzón, a Peruvian colleague living in Madrid who we had recently met in Caracas, wasted no time.

The game with the unavoidable theme had to be repeated over and over again: “Don't tell me you're also coming to avoid the end of the world. I am the chosen one. I'm trying to see if I can find a special stone, the only one that can avoid disgrace”.

Rio Secreto: one of the Countless Entrances to the InfraMundo Maya.

We enjoy his goofy introduction and catch up on the conversation as we're led to the Rio Secreto, one of so many unofficial yet fascinating entrances from the region to Xibalba, the Mayan underworld.

Bathers-Cenote de Cuzamá, Mérida, Mexico

Bathers refresh themselves in the cold waters of one of the cenotes of the old Chunkanan hacienda, one of the entrances to the Xibalba

According to several scientific articles and the prevailing theory resulting from the discovery, in 1978, of Glen Penfield, this region was once the core of a kind of previous end, unlike the caricatured by Paul, real and unpredictable.

While looking for black gold for the company PEMEX – Petróleos Mexicanos, the geophysicist found a 300km diameter crater supposedly formed by a meteorite collision about 65 million years ago.

It would later be given the name of a village in its geometric center, Chicxulub.

The Meteorite That Will Have Driven the Dinosaurs to Extinction

The impact caused one of the biggest tsunamis ever, several thousand meters high. A cloud of superheated dust, ash and steam has spread from the crater since the moment the meteorite sank.

Materials from the planet's surface and asteroid debris were projected out of the atmosphere and heated to incandescence as they re-entered burning the surface already in the process of combustion due to possibly global fires.

Meanwhile, massive shock waves have triggered widespread earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.

The emission of dust and other particles blocked the passage of sunlight. They caused a strong cooling and made the survival of dinosaurs and most beings unfeasible.

Vultures, Coba, Quintana Roo, Mexico

Vultures absorb solar heat on top of one of Edzná's pyramids

This end dragged on for many millennia of prehistory but, as it had already happened, the resilient Earth and her miraculous life prevailed.

The Cenotes, the Xibalba and As Remotes Mayan Origins

Today, even in the limestone depths carved by the collapse of the crater walls – the countless cenotes and peninsula caves – improbable creatures are found: blind and leaping crickets with enormous sensory antennas to indigenous guides with nasal speech caused by sinusitis and determined outsiders who are not well prepared for those amphibious environments.

This is the case with Paul, who reveals a deep panic of any less shallow water, refuses all attempts to help him cross turquoise-flooded galleries, and forces his hosts to lead him along an alternate dry route: “This way, Paul! There's another pond out there, don't get involved in that!”

Born in Peru, even if he doesn't know it, Paul may have Inca, Quechua or any other ethnicity in the area.

These days, we must believe that their eventual distant ancestors benefited from the cold of the last ice age. That without any kind of swimming, they managed to cross the Bering Strait from Asia to the Americas, where they distributed themselves as the Earth warmed.

There, they acquired unique characteristics resulting from the mutation of the original genetics under the influence of the ecosystems they encountered, from the Alaskan tundra to the tropical jungle to which the neighboring people called Maya would adapt in much of Central America.

Pac Chen Lagoon, Quintana Roo, Mexico

Lagoon full of crocodiles in the village of Pac-Chen, in the state of Quintana Roo.

Pac-Chen: the Sloping Pond the Mayans Reveal to the World

Later we visited together Pac-Chen (Sloping Pond) where a community of that ethnicity organized to provide foreigners with radical experiences.

There, we zipline over a pond in which crocodiles swim. Afterwards, we are blessed by the resident shaman Adolfo who, before allowing us to take a look at the village's large cenote, purifies us with sacred fumes and prayers in the native language.

Xaman, Pac-chen Quintana Roo, Mexico

Xaman Adolfo carries out a purification ceremony in the Mayan village of Pac-Chen.

The Peruvian colleague then returns to the attack. Ask for a few minutes for a short interview. Your questions are simple and straightforward. They get different reactions.

As we feared, the last one addresses the credibility of the popular end of this era and the respective end of the world.

Adolfo is annoyed. Take a deep breath and evade the topic. “My only belief is that you must worship the mighty God who is in heaven.

That's my only belief.” We confirm that the disgust with the question comes from afar and is shared by most of its counterparts.

The Mystical and Worshiping Civilization of the Land of the Mayans

It is known that, for some time, the Mayan people enjoyed favorable conditions and, divided by tribal groups, sometimes allies in other adversaries.

The Mayans spoke nearly 50 dialects, developed an advanced civilization whose gods were the natural elements, atmospheric phenomena and celestial bodies, with both Good (day, life, sun) and Evil (night, death, jaguar) being considered divine.

Accordingly, the Mayans were diehard astronomers, astrologers, and numerologists.

Quetzacoatl, Chichen Itza, Mexico

Heads of the god Quetzacoatl in Chichen Itza.

“Well, it looks like they've seen almost all of the archaeological complexes,” says Wilberth Salas Pech, our semi-Mayan guide from state of Campeche, just kidding. “We have to go through Tortuguero. That's where the big secret is, he quips."

The Mayan Stelas and the Mayan Apocalyptic Prophesies

According to what we learned, that historic site was pillaged several times and housed a cement factory.

Despite this, or perhaps because of it, three scientists discovered in Monument 6 a stele that refers to the end of the 13th Baktun (5125 years of our calendar) verified on the winter solstice that would take place on December 21, 2012.

The most recent and possible translation by Sven Gronemeyer and Barbara MacLeod says (several pieces are missing from the stele) which, in addition to this information, also communicates that “a vision will occur; the public appearance (or exhibition?) of B'Olon-Yookte at the time of his investiture.

Mayan Art, Xcaret, Mexico

Colorful replicas of Mayan artefacts decorate Xcaret Park, on the Maia Riviera.

According to Mayan mythology, B'OlonYookte K'Uh' would refer to the Nine Lords of Night, nine gods each of which ruler over nine-night cycles.

In turn, the Mayan work of the Quiche group, Popol Vuh claims that the gods created three failed worlds. That the fourth world prospered, succeeded, and became the home of man today.

According to your description, each of the previous worlds ended at the end of the 13th baktun.

This closing of the cycle was at the origin of one of the most frivolous fevers of eschatological premonitions in recent times.

The Inevitable Analysis, Theories and Counter Theories

The esoteric writer John Major Jenkins assured that, on that date, the Sun would position itself over Xibalba Be, “the black path” galactic of the Mayans.

From this and other conclusions, mythological narratives and interpretations, countless figures, sects and entities emerged with other apocalyptic theories invariably disproved by science.

Skull relief, Chichen Itza, Mexico

Detail of skull of Chichen Itza, temple the subject of numerous predictions and professions, including the End of the World.

The American channels History, Discovery and National Geographic were at the forefront of media pollution and broadcast a series of series that described terrestrial “ends” caused by solar storms for which the Earth would not be prepared due to a sudden geomagnetic pole reversal.

Also earthquakes, super volcanoes, plagues, collisions with asteroids, droughts, new glacial periods, extraterrestrial invasions or whatever was scary enough.

However, another stele found in the Temple of Inscriptions of Palenque contemplates that the temple wheel will always continue to rotate and even mentions the date of 4,722 AD, when 20 will be completed. baktuns (1 piktun) since the last creation of Cosmos.

Helper Maia, Xcaret, Mexico

An extra of a Mayan priest animates the themed show at Xcaret Park, in the province of Quintana Roo.

In turn, the 10th stele of Tikal (in Guatemala) counts 20 picktunes and thus projects a planetary future of millions of years.

But all over the world and, of course, especially in the United States, thousands of Preps remained alert. They clustered around Mayan or non-Mayan End of the World beliefs.

They built shelters, accumulated canned food and weapons to defend themselves from the attacks of other human beings. Many have signed up for survival courses such as those from the Sigma 3 company.

We took a look at one of these programs in a restaurant in Campeche.

We are indignant when we see how references to the invented end of the Mayan calendar are freely interspersed with images of Yankee citizens grouped in the countryside under shelters made of dry leaves and semi-automatic rifles at the ready because, in the words of one of these preps:

“When desperate, people do all sorts of crazy things” and, according to another inscription, “Civilizations fall. That's history. Things aren't as safe as we'd like them to be.”

It was recently revealed that Nancy Lanza, the mother of the young assassin from Newtown High School was one of these paranoid characters, the owner of five registered guns.

His distraught son carried out a sacrifice worthy of the worst slaughters perpetrated in the name of the gods, on the towers of Chichen Itza or Ek Balam. He was visibly desperate.

Mayan Pyramid, Chichen Itza, Mexico

Man contemplates the complex around the top of the Kukulcan pyramid

Fed up with so much distortion and exploitation of their culture, Guatemala's Mayan leaders took the trouble to express that "they are against deception, lies, distortions, folklore and the commercialization of their culture."

Against interpretations that “distort the true meaning of the cycles of time”.

Yucatan, Mexico

The Sidereal Murphy's Law That Doomed the Dinosaurs

Scientists studying the crater caused by a meteorite impact 66 million years ago have come to a sweeping conclusion: it happened exactly over a section of the 13% of the Earth's surface susceptible to such devastation. It is a threshold zone on the Mexican Yucatan peninsula that a whim of the evolution of species allowed us to visit.
Cobá to Pac Chen, Mexico

From the Ruins to the Mayan Homes

On the Yucatan Peninsula, the history of the second largest indigenous Mexican people is intertwined with their daily lives and merges with modernity. In Cobá, we went from the top of one of its ancient pyramids to the heart of a village of our times.
Overall, Mexico

The Most Caribbean of the Mayan Ruins

Built by the sea as an exceptional outpost decisive for the prosperity of the Mayan nation, Tulum was one of its last cities to succumb to Hispanic occupation. At the end of the XNUMXth century, its inhabitants abandoned it to time and to an impeccable coastline of the Yucatan peninsula.
Izamal, Mexico

The Holy, Yellow and Beautiful Mexican City

Until the arrival of the Spanish conquerors, Izamal was a center of worship for the supreme Mayan god Itzamná and Kinich Kakmó, the one of the sun. Gradually, the invaders razed the various pyramids of the natives. In its place, they built a large Franciscan convent and a prolific colonial houses, with the same solar tone in which the now Catholic city shines.
Mérida, Mexico

The Most Exuberant of Meridas

In 25 BC, the Romans founded Emerita Augusta, capital of Lusitania. The Spanish expansion generated three other Méridas in the world. Of the four, the Yucatan capital is the most colorful and lively, resplendent with Hispanic colonial heritage and multi-ethnic life.
Campeche, Mexico

Campeche Upon Can Pech

As was the case throughout Mexico, the conquerors arrived, saw and won. Can Pech, the Mayan village, had almost 40 inhabitants, palaces, pyramids and an exuberant urban architecture, but in 1540 there were less than 6 natives. Over the ruins, the Spaniards built Campeche, one of the most imposing colonial cities in the Americas.
San Cristobal de Las Casas, Mexico

The Home Sweet Home of Mexican Social Conscience

Mayan, mestizo and Hispanic, Zapatista and tourist, country and cosmopolitan, San Cristobal has no hands to measure. In it, Mexican and expatriate backpacker visitors and political activists share a common ideological demand.

Mexico City, Mexico

mexican soul

With more than 20 million inhabitants in a vast metropolitan area, this megalopolis marks, from its heart of zócalo, the spiritual pulse of a nation that has always been vulnerable and dramatic.

Machu Picchu, Peru

The City Lost in the Mystery of the Incas

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PN Tayrona, Colombia

Who Protects the Guardians of the World?

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Amboseli National Park, Mount Kilimanjaro, Normatior Hill
Safari
Amboseli National Park, Kenya

A Gift from the Kilimanjaro

The first European to venture into these Masai haunts was stunned by what he found. And even today, large herds of elephants and other herbivores roam the pastures irrigated by the snow of Africa's biggest mountain.
Thorong Pedi to High Camp, Annapurna Circuit, Nepal, Lone Walker
Annapurna (circuit)
Annapurna Circuit: 12th - Thorong Phedi a High camp

The Prelude to the Supreme Crossing

This section of the Annapurna Circuit is only 1km away, but in less than two hours it takes you from 4450m to 4850m and to the entrance to the great canyon. Sleeping in High Camp is a test of resistance to Mountain Evil that not everyone passes.
coast, fjord, Seydisfjordur, Iceland
Architecture & Design
Seydisfjordur, Iceland

From the Art of Fishing to the Fishing of Art

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Boats on ice, Hailuoto Island, Finland.
Adventure
Hailuoto, Finland

A Refuge in the Gulf of Bothnia

During winter, the island of Hailuoto is connected to the rest of Finland by the country's longest ice road. Most of its 986 inhabitants esteem, above all, the distance that the island grants them.
The Crucifixion in Helsinki
Ceremonies and Festivities
Helsinki, Finland

A Frigid-Scholarly Via Crucis

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Saint George, Grenada, Antilles, houses
Cities
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Tsukiji fish market, Tokyo, Japan
Meal
Tokyo, Japan

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In a year, each Japanese eats more than their weight in fish and shellfish. Since 1935, a considerable part was processed and sold in the largest fish market in the world. Tsukiji was terminated in October 2018, and replaced by Toyosu's.
Correspondence verification
Culture
Rovaniemi, Finland

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Bungee jumping, Queenstown, New Zealand
Sport
Queenstown, New Zealand

Queenstown, the Queen of Extreme Sports

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Eternal Spring Shrine
Traveling

Taroko George

Deep in Taiwan

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little subject
Ethnic

Hampi, India

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Got2Globe Photo Portfolio
Got2Globe Portfolio

life outside

Santo Domingo, Colonial City, Dominican Republic, Diego Colombo
History
Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic

The Longest Colonial Elder in the Americas

Santo Domingo is the longest-inhabited colony in the New World. Founded in 1498 by Bartholomew Colombo, the capital of the Dominican Republic preserves intact a true treasure of historical resilience.
Ruins, Port Arthur, Tasmania, Australia
Islands
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Reindeer Racing, Kings Cup, Inari, Finland
Winter White
Inari, Finland

The Wackiest Race on the Top of the World

Finland's Lapps have been competing in the tow of their reindeer for centuries. In the final of the Kings Cup - Porokuninkuusajot - , they face each other at great speed, well above the Arctic Circle and well below zero.
Cove, Big Sur, California, United States
Literature
Big Sur, USA

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Over 150km, the Californian coast is subjected to a vastness of mountains, ocean and fog. In this epic setting, hundreds of tormented souls follow in the footsteps of Jack Kerouac and Henri Miller.
capillary helmet
Nature
Viti levu, Fiji

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Sheki, Autumn in the Caucasus, Azerbaijan, Autumn Homes
Autumn
Sheki, Azerbaijan

autumn in the caucasus

Lost among the snowy mountains that separate Europe from Asia, Sheki is one of Azerbaijan's most iconic towns. Its largely silky history includes periods of great harshness. When we visited it, autumn pastels added color to a peculiar post-Soviet and Muslim life.
Merida cable car, Renovation, Venezuela, altitude sickness, mountain prevent to treat, travel
Natural Parks
Mérida, Venezuela

The Vertiginous Renovation of the World's Highest Cable Car

Underway from 2010, the rebuilding of the Mérida cable car was carried out in the Sierra Nevada by intrepid workers who suffered firsthand the magnitude of the work.
gaudy courtship
UNESCO World Heritage
Suzdal, Russia

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It was a lavish capital when Moscow was just a rural hamlet. Along the way, it lost political relevance but accumulated the largest concentration of churches, monasteries and convents in the country of the tsars. Today, beneath its countless domes, Suzdal is as orthodox as it is monumental.
now from above ladder, sorcerer of new zealand, Christchurch, new zealand
Characters
Christchurch, New Zealand

New Zealand's Cursed Wizard

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El Nido, Palawan the Last Philippine Border
Beaches
El Nido, Philippines

El Nido, Palawan: The Last Philippine Frontier

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Mtshketa, Holy City of Georgia, Caucasus, Svetitskhoveli Cathedral
Religion
Mtskheta, Georgia

The Holy City of Georgia

If Tbilisi is the contemporary capital, Mtskheta was the city that made Christianity official in the kingdom of Iberia, predecessor of Georgia, and one that spread the religion throughout the Caucasus. Those who visit see how, after almost two millennia, it is Christianity that governs life there.
Chepe Express, Chihuahua Al Pacifico Railway
On Rails
Creel to Los Mochis, Mexico

The Barrancas del Cobre & the CHEPE Iron Horse

The Sierra Madre Occidental's relief turned the dream into a construction nightmare that lasted six decades. In 1961, at last, the prodigious Chihuahua al Pacifico Railroad was opened. Its 643km cross some of the most dramatic scenery in Mexico.
Society
Dali, China

Chinese Style Flash Mob

The time is set and the place is known. When the music starts playing, a crowd follows the choreography harmoniously until time runs out and everyone returns to their lives.
Visitors at Talisay Ruins, Negros Island, Philippines
Daily life
Talisay City, Philippines

Monument to a Luso-Philippine Love

At the end of the 11th century, Mariano Lacson, a Filipino farmer, and Maria Braga, a Portuguese woman from Macau, fell in love and got married. During the pregnancy of what would be her 2th child, Maria succumbed to a fall. Destroyed, Mariano built a mansion in his honor. In the midst of World War II, the mansion was set on fire, but the elegant ruins that endured perpetuate their tragic relationship.
Ross Bridge, Tasmania, Australia
Wildlife
Discovering tassie, Part 3, Tasmania, Australia

Tasmania from Top to Bottom

The favorite victim of Australian anecdotes has long been the Tasmania never lost the pride in the way aussie ruder to be. Tassie remains shrouded in mystery and mysticism in a kind of hindquarters of the antipodes. In this article, we narrate the peculiar route from Hobart, the capital located in the unlikely south of the island to the north coast, the turn to the Australian continent.
Napali Coast and Waimea Canyon, Kauai, Hawaii Wrinkles
Scenic Flights
napali coast, Hawaii

Hawaii's Dazzling Wrinkles

Kauai is the greenest and rainiest island in the Hawaiian archipelago. It is also the oldest. As we explore its Napalo Coast by land, sea and air, we are amazed to see how the passage of millennia has only favored it.
PT EN ES FR DE IT