QUIRIGUÁ, GUATEMALA
so after a long and grueling bus ride from chiquimula, we finally found ourselves in quiriguá. it was really overcast when we arrived at the entrance of town so all we wanted to do was find a place to crash. we had been traveling since 4:00 a.m. and had already been on seven buses so we were just excited to be laying our bags down and chilling out for a second.
quiriguá is located on what’s called “la ruta maya,” (a route that spans throughout mexico, guatemala, honduras and el salvador and weaves its way through some of the most important mayan archaeological sites). quiriguá was once a home to a mayan empire that at one point was more powerful than the one in copán (in honduras). for us, quiriguá was in a perfect location as it was only a couple hours or so away from the río dulce and the place we were supposed to meet the sailboat. so we would have one whole day to see quiriguá, and then leave the next day for the río dulce and our sailing trip.
the town of quiriguá is a quiet place....just one long road that leads through town making it easy to let the whole place know that you are there. we found one of the only hotels in town and finally were able to rest. the next day we slept in and woke up to rain. i was so seriously sick of rain at this point. it was just hovering around wherever we were and the thought that it would follow us on our sailing trip was just making us depressed. we ate at this really good comedor and then hopped on the local bus as far as it would take us. during the slow ride through the back woods, the bus kept stopping to pick up people, like a bus normally would, but it would also stop to pick up rocks. it wasn’t until we got to this big uphill climb that we figured out that the rocks did serve a purpose, as the cobredor unloaded them and put them by the tires so the bus could make it up the muddy hill. the bus continued through this back road until we came to the highway and we continued on that for a couple minutes. then the bus turned into this road off the highway and the cobredor told us that this was the road to quiriguá and the bus wasn’t going that way so “adios!” he had said that we could wait for another bus or a pickup but we didn’t feel like waiting around so we just started walking.
we walked for what seemed like forever, and the road was this sloshy, muddy mess because it had been raining. my pants were covered in dirt and gravel – i looked terrible! the road was really interesting, but kind of creepy too. it went smack dab down the middle of the rainforest and these big banana plantations – owned by del monte. i’m sure you’ve all heard of the whole “banana republic” thing and how these companies came down here and completely exploited this country, as well as other central american countries. well, the companies are still here under different policies, of course. but it was the weirdest thing because there seemed to be endless amounts of banana trees and all the bananas were covered by these blue plastic bags. then there’d be these signs that said “¡PELIGRO!” (danger) and we were like “huh?” at first we thought it was dangerous because it was so isolated and huge – like you could get lost, or worse, attacked by someone way out there. but then we figured it was because they probably sprayed some kind of pesticides or something on the trees and so it was dangerous because of the low flying aircraft used to do that, as well as the danger of the pesticides. anyway, then all of a sudden we were looking in the banana forest and we saw these conveyor belts....like these long, thin steel beams that had a tracking system on them and these big bunches of bananas were being carried through the forest and to the main area to be loaded onto trucks and hauled out for exporting. i guess you had to have been there to understand how weird this all was. people would pass us every once in a while on bikes or a motorcycle. and there were a few trucks that passed us, but for the most part it was silent and eerie. just all these banana trees around us accompanied by silence and the occasional sound of the banana conveyor belt. i suppose it wasn’t the safest thing to be doing – walking down that road. but it was peaceful and we did get to just take everything in, as opposed to passing everything by in a bus. at one point, we saw a huge tourist bus coming behind us and we were like “great,” but then it got held up because the conveyor belt of bananas had to cross the road we were on – like waiting for a train. we got a leg up and made it to the entrance of the ruins just as the bus was pulling up and were able to get into the park before the bus of tourists did. this obnoxious french woman tried to cut in front of us, but the guy handing out the tickets was having none of her rudeness and gave us our tickets first.
banana road...if you look closely, you can see the banana conveyor belt in front of the big bus.
banana forest
the sign at the entrance of the site
me and my pants
the site had a small museum at the front which courtney and i visited first. i was baffled at how the tourists that had come in on the tourist bus were shuffled to the actual ruins right away, skipping the museum entirely. i would hate to be part of a tour group. they just cart you around to different places without any real time to actually see and hear and feel what it is you’re there to see (i have a better story about this when you get to the part about our visit to livingston). they breezed in and out of that park according to the tour schedule and they didn’t even see the entire ruins. it was weird. anyway, we headed as far away as we could from that group. there were very few other people there so it was nice to be able to just walk around and take pictures without having a bunch of people around.
+2.JPG)
plaza where all of the stelae were located.
by far, the stelae in quiriquá are the attraction. they are the biggest and most intricate in the mayan world. stela E is 26 feet high!!! archaeologists can tell the exact date of when a stela was built because the exact dates are inscribed as part of the design. these are done with dots and bars, which at first are easy to understand. i went to a workshop once on the maya and we learned how to count. up to twenty or so is fairly easy. but after that, it gets confusing. for instance: 1 dot = 1 and 1 bar = 5. so like the number “15” would be three bars. the number “18” would be three dots and three bars. but then they also had the up and down bar which i can’t remember what that represents. so anyway, archaeologists can read the exact date of when a stela was created according to these bars and dots that were etched into a specific square on each stela.
the stelae also tell stories about who was in power at the time and what happened during that ruler’s time in power. there are also dates accompanied with the stories, so it takes a lot of studying to get the entire stela deciphered. i just think they are so amazing! as for a little history on the place, here you go:
quiriguá was inhabited around 250 BC – 300 AD from drifters from northern guatemala. during this time it was under copán’s (another mayan site in honduras) rule, and was pretty much copán’s only other mayan connection. probably the most well-known ruler in quiriguá’s history was cauac sky, who was able to challenge copán and eventually had copáns ruler at the time, eighteen rabbit, captured and killed. the reason he was better known (aside from his triumphant execution of eighteen rabbit) is because most of the stelae in quiriguá were constructed at the time of his rule, therefore, his time of power was put into words, so to speak. also powerful in quiriguá’s history was jade sky. while jade sky didn’t construct the stelae that cauac sky did, he made renovations to quiriguá’s acropolis. the history of quiriguá drops after jade sky, but it’s clear that quiriguá’s power fell into decline around 790 AD, which isn’t that many years before the fall of copán.
there are also lots of altars, as well as zoomorphs. zoomorphs are smaller rocks that represent images of both humans and animals. they have the same type of inscriptions with the date and stories. all of the stelae, altars and zoomorphs in quiriguá are protected from rain and such with thatched roof shelters.
STELAE
stela C
.JPG)
stela D
stela D
stela D
stela E
stela F
stela F
stela H
stela I
stela I
stela J
stela J
stela J
ZOOMORPHS
zoomorph P
zoomorph P
zoomorph P
there is also a beautiful ballcourt just beyond the ruins of the acropolis. but the stelae, altars and zoomorphs are the real highlight. whereas tikal (in northern guatemala....next on my list!) is known for its grand pyramids, quiriguá is the grand-daddy of the intricately carved and enormous stelae. it is really something to see and i was surprised that not more people were there. although i think that maybe the difficulty in getting there (unless you are part of a tour group and have a huge bus to travel in) may be part of the reason.
courtney and me in front of the ballcourt
ballcourt
ruins near the ballcourt
view from the highest point in the ruins, overlooking the plaza where all the stelae and zoomorphs are located
we spent nearly four and a half hours there and by the end of the day we were tired. we did NOT want to walk back down that road because for one, it was getting close to sunset and we really didn’t want to be on that road when the sun went down. secondly, it was just a really long walk and we had been standing all afternoon looking at the ruins. so we hopped a ride in the back of a pickup of a couple guys who were workers at the site and they dropped us off at the entrance to the highway.
quiriguá was so incredible! i was definitely happy – even though it was STILL raining – by the time we left for the río dulce the next day.
quiriguá is located on what’s called “la ruta maya,” (a route that spans throughout mexico, guatemala, honduras and el salvador and weaves its way through some of the most important mayan archaeological sites). quiriguá was once a home to a mayan empire that at one point was more powerful than the one in copán (in honduras). for us, quiriguá was in a perfect location as it was only a couple hours or so away from the río dulce and the place we were supposed to meet the sailboat. so we would have one whole day to see quiriguá, and then leave the next day for the río dulce and our sailing trip.
the town of quiriguá is a quiet place....just one long road that leads through town making it easy to let the whole place know that you are there. we found one of the only hotels in town and finally were able to rest. the next day we slept in and woke up to rain. i was so seriously sick of rain at this point. it was just hovering around wherever we were and the thought that it would follow us on our sailing trip was just making us depressed. we ate at this really good comedor and then hopped on the local bus as far as it would take us. during the slow ride through the back woods, the bus kept stopping to pick up people, like a bus normally would, but it would also stop to pick up rocks. it wasn’t until we got to this big uphill climb that we figured out that the rocks did serve a purpose, as the cobredor unloaded them and put them by the tires so the bus could make it up the muddy hill. the bus continued through this back road until we came to the highway and we continued on that for a couple minutes. then the bus turned into this road off the highway and the cobredor told us that this was the road to quiriguá and the bus wasn’t going that way so “adios!” he had said that we could wait for another bus or a pickup but we didn’t feel like waiting around so we just started walking.
we walked for what seemed like forever, and the road was this sloshy, muddy mess because it had been raining. my pants were covered in dirt and gravel – i looked terrible! the road was really interesting, but kind of creepy too. it went smack dab down the middle of the rainforest and these big banana plantations – owned by del monte. i’m sure you’ve all heard of the whole “banana republic” thing and how these companies came down here and completely exploited this country, as well as other central american countries. well, the companies are still here under different policies, of course. but it was the weirdest thing because there seemed to be endless amounts of banana trees and all the bananas were covered by these blue plastic bags. then there’d be these signs that said “¡PELIGRO!” (danger) and we were like “huh?” at first we thought it was dangerous because it was so isolated and huge – like you could get lost, or worse, attacked by someone way out there. but then we figured it was because they probably sprayed some kind of pesticides or something on the trees and so it was dangerous because of the low flying aircraft used to do that, as well as the danger of the pesticides. anyway, then all of a sudden we were looking in the banana forest and we saw these conveyor belts....like these long, thin steel beams that had a tracking system on them and these big bunches of bananas were being carried through the forest and to the main area to be loaded onto trucks and hauled out for exporting. i guess you had to have been there to understand how weird this all was. people would pass us every once in a while on bikes or a motorcycle. and there were a few trucks that passed us, but for the most part it was silent and eerie. just all these banana trees around us accompanied by silence and the occasional sound of the banana conveyor belt. i suppose it wasn’t the safest thing to be doing – walking down that road. but it was peaceful and we did get to just take everything in, as opposed to passing everything by in a bus. at one point, we saw a huge tourist bus coming behind us and we were like “great,” but then it got held up because the conveyor belt of bananas had to cross the road we were on – like waiting for a train. we got a leg up and made it to the entrance of the ruins just as the bus was pulling up and were able to get into the park before the bus of tourists did. this obnoxious french woman tried to cut in front of us, but the guy handing out the tickets was having none of her rudeness and gave us our tickets first.
banana road...if you look closely, you can see the banana conveyor belt in front of the big bus.
banana forest
the sign at the entrance of the site
me and my pantsthe site had a small museum at the front which courtney and i visited first. i was baffled at how the tourists that had come in on the tourist bus were shuffled to the actual ruins right away, skipping the museum entirely. i would hate to be part of a tour group. they just cart you around to different places without any real time to actually see and hear and feel what it is you’re there to see (i have a better story about this when you get to the part about our visit to livingston). they breezed in and out of that park according to the tour schedule and they didn’t even see the entire ruins. it was weird. anyway, we headed as far away as we could from that group. there were very few other people there so it was nice to be able to just walk around and take pictures without having a bunch of people around.
+2.JPG)
plaza where all of the stelae were located.by far, the stelae in quiriquá are the attraction. they are the biggest and most intricate in the mayan world. stela E is 26 feet high!!! archaeologists can tell the exact date of when a stela was built because the exact dates are inscribed as part of the design. these are done with dots and bars, which at first are easy to understand. i went to a workshop once on the maya and we learned how to count. up to twenty or so is fairly easy. but after that, it gets confusing. for instance: 1 dot = 1 and 1 bar = 5. so like the number “15” would be three bars. the number “18” would be three dots and three bars. but then they also had the up and down bar which i can’t remember what that represents. so anyway, archaeologists can read the exact date of when a stela was created according to these bars and dots that were etched into a specific square on each stela.
the stelae also tell stories about who was in power at the time and what happened during that ruler’s time in power. there are also dates accompanied with the stories, so it takes a lot of studying to get the entire stela deciphered. i just think they are so amazing! as for a little history on the place, here you go:
quiriguá was inhabited around 250 BC – 300 AD from drifters from northern guatemala. during this time it was under copán’s (another mayan site in honduras) rule, and was pretty much copán’s only other mayan connection. probably the most well-known ruler in quiriguá’s history was cauac sky, who was able to challenge copán and eventually had copáns ruler at the time, eighteen rabbit, captured and killed. the reason he was better known (aside from his triumphant execution of eighteen rabbit) is because most of the stelae in quiriguá were constructed at the time of his rule, therefore, his time of power was put into words, so to speak. also powerful in quiriguá’s history was jade sky. while jade sky didn’t construct the stelae that cauac sky did, he made renovations to quiriguá’s acropolis. the history of quiriguá drops after jade sky, but it’s clear that quiriguá’s power fell into decline around 790 AD, which isn’t that many years before the fall of copán.
there are also lots of altars, as well as zoomorphs. zoomorphs are smaller rocks that represent images of both humans and animals. they have the same type of inscriptions with the date and stories. all of the stelae, altars and zoomorphs in quiriguá are protected from rain and such with thatched roof shelters.
STELAE
stela C.JPG)
stela D
stela D
stela D
stela E
stela F
stela F
stela H
stela I
stela I
stela J
stela J
stela J ZOOMORPHS
zoomorph P
zoomorph P
zoomorph Pthere is also a beautiful ballcourt just beyond the ruins of the acropolis. but the stelae, altars and zoomorphs are the real highlight. whereas tikal (in northern guatemala....next on my list!) is known for its grand pyramids, quiriguá is the grand-daddy of the intricately carved and enormous stelae. it is really something to see and i was surprised that not more people were there. although i think that maybe the difficulty in getting there (unless you are part of a tour group and have a huge bus to travel in) may be part of the reason.
courtney and me in front of the ballcourt
ballcourt
ruins near the ballcourt
view from the highest point in the ruins, overlooking the plaza where all the stelae and zoomorphs are locatedwe spent nearly four and a half hours there and by the end of the day we were tired. we did NOT want to walk back down that road because for one, it was getting close to sunset and we really didn’t want to be on that road when the sun went down. secondly, it was just a really long walk and we had been standing all afternoon looking at the ruins. so we hopped a ride in the back of a pickup of a couple guys who were workers at the site and they dropped us off at the entrance to the highway.
quiriguá was so incredible! i was definitely happy – even though it was STILL raining – by the time we left for the río dulce the next day.
posted by laura v. at 3:43 PM
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