(El Mirador trek day one here and day two here)
El Mirador
Today was the day!! After the long trek to El Mirador, not only do we get to climb up to one of the largest pyramids in the world (by volume) but also explore the rest of El Mirador. And that includes seeing the Popal Vuh! But more on that later! Ambrosia asked us the night before if we wanted to see the sunrise from El Tigre and since we all did that is how our day started!
We got up around 5 a.m. and made our way to El Tigre. I don’t think I’ll ever tire of a view like that. Being surrounded by nothing but jungle is a strange feeling. On top of that, it is just such a nice change. You are away from the hustle and bustle of everyday life and everything just slows down a bit. Since we did not have ‘to get anywhere’ today we all slowed down more and took our time. It was sort of like a rest day in between walking here and getting back. After the jungle had awoken we made our way back to camp to have breakfast.
Breakfast each morning is pretty similar – eggs, beans, and tortillas of some sort. Now I don’t like eggs or beans but I didn’t say anything till the last day, well Hector did, and the cook told him he should have told her sooner since she would have made me something else (the last day, when she found out, I had toast with jam). After breakfast we set off to explore!
There is a lot to see in El Mirador (‘The lookout’) but at the same time there is a lot that still needs to be excavated. El Mirador wasn’t officially reported until 1926 and it took another 36 years before it was mapped. It is part of the Mirador-Rio Azul National Park which is part of the Maya Biosphere reserve. This reserve is a 12,000 square mile area of rainforest in northern Guatemala that wasn’t established until 1990 and even since then much of the jungle has been lost!
Only about 2000-3000 visitors make the trek or fly to El Mirador each year. This is in comparison to Tikal which can see between 150,000 and 350,000 visitors a year!
History
It is thought El Mirador was home to about 200,000 people over 2000 years ago. It was once the capital of a complex society made up of many different cities. What is especially puzzling about El Mirador is its age. Many of the large structures, like those found at El Mirador, are thought to date to the Classic period (A.D. 250 to A.D. 900). However, pottery found there has been dated to the Late Pre-classic Period (300 B.C. to A.D. 150). Could such impressive structures actually date further back than previously thought? It has been speculated that the state of the El Mirador ruins may be due to the inferior mortar used and not its age. It seems the structures were not less complex the earlier they were built as was previously thought.
There is so much more history that I could go on for days but I think I will let the pictures do the talking since there is so much to show!
Popal Vuh Frieze
I do want to mention the Popal Vuh Frieze. It is the Mayan Creation story but literally translates to ‘The Council Book’. Its discovery changed much of the Mayan belief system. I was very excited to see this. Since the archaeologists were not there we did not get to get up close to it but it was amazing to see. It is one of the earliest sources of the Mayan creation story! Archeologists were investigating how water was collected in El Mirador and discovered it. The panel dates back to around 200 B.C. and decorates a wall of a channel meant to funnel rainwater.
The Popal Vuh is actually a book and many people thought Spanish priests had contaminated it through their translation. However, this frieze, from the Pre-classic period, depicts the Mayan creation story long before the Spanish arrived. It shows two twin brothers venturing into the underworld to rescue their father’s head which he lost in a ball game against evil lords of the underworld.
Jaguar Paw
The other structure I want to mention before I get to La Danta is Jaguar Paw. This is probably one of the most studied ruins in El Mirador. What is really cool about the temple is that you can still see some of the original colour. The pigment the Mayans used to paint/decorate the structure is still there!! Of all of El Mirador, Jaguar Paw is probably the best preserved.
La Danta
After exploring for a few hours we walked back to camp for lunch. The plan was to eat and then rest before setting off to La Danta before the sun started to set. It is a 3km walk from El Mirador to La Danta so we started heading that way around 4 p.m.
La Danta facts
Now La Danta is what you hear most about when talking about El Mirador. As I have mentioned it is said to be the largest pyramid (by Volume) in the world and also the tallest structure (236 ft. /72 meters) in the Mayan world! It is estimated to be 99 million cubic feet and one of the largest ancient structures in the world! Not only that, but it has been calculated that to build the structure would have taken roughly 15 million days of labor by man. Each block weighs about 1000 pounds/453.5 kg and would take roughly 12 men to carry. There are about nine quarries in the area where the rocks were taken from, with some around 600-700 meters away.
La Danta is a triadic structure composed of a large temple pyramid and two smaller pyramids on either side. Other Pre-Classic sites see this pattern repeated! The first tier alone of La Danta is 980 ft wide and 2000 ft long. It covers about 45 acres! The second platform is about four acres. The third platform is the base of a triad and also where the central pyramid plus two smaller pyramids sit. This pattern is meant to represent a celestial hearth containing the fire of creation and was not found before 300 B.C. The Maya thought three stars from the constellation Orion were the hearth stones around a fire (a nebula – visible below Orions belt).
Richard Hansen, the director and principal investigator of the Mirador Basin Project, said it took three years to stabilize La Danta. They decided to leave some trees on the structure to help protect it from the effects of then sun. They also tried many different mixtures (clay and lime to name a few) of mortar to help with stabilization.
Top of the World
The last section to get to the top of La Danta is a wooden staircase that is near the back of the main pyramid. I don’t really have the words to describe what I felt when I got to the top, but Chip Brown from the New York Times Magazine says it perfectly!
We walked back in the dark taking in everything we had seen that day.
We had two more days of walking to make it back to Carmelita. So far we had only seen one other group in the 3 days we had been out. Check back for my last post on the El Mirador trek. I’ll briefly talk about walking back and also what I packed.
Would you be interested in doing the El Mirador trek?
Lots of Love,
Buffy x
