An archaeological adventure visiting Mexico’s pyramid cities

MEXICO CITY » It was an archaeological adventure: a 12day family trip to Mayan and Aztec pyramid cities, from Mexico City to the Yucatan jungle.

Our timeline spanned from the ancient city of Teotihuacan, founded before the birth of Christ, to sites like Chichen Itza, Tulum and Templo Mayor, built in the centuries before the Spanish conquest of the early 1500s.

Dozens of these sites dot Mexico. But we didn’t want to go completely Indiana Jones. We looked for variety and ease of access. To get the most out of our visits, we hired Englishspeaking guides at every stop. TEMPLO MAYOR AND TEOTIHUACAN

We started in Mexico City. Visiting Templo Mayor, just off the Zocalo or main square, we had the site almost entirely to ourselves on a weekday morning. It’s the newest of the pyramids we saw, but in worst shape, having been destroyed and built over by the Spanish 500 years ago. Visually it’s not even a pyramid, but a below street-level ruin of seven multi-layered pyramid foundations. Electricians working in a basement discovered it in 1978 when a floor collapsed, revealing a round stone depicting Aztec goddess Coyolxauhqui.

That piece and thousands more are displayed in a museum overlooking the ongoing excavation. The excavation site displays stone-carved snakes and a few other sculptures, their faded colors giving just an inkling of Aztec Technicolor grandeur.

More impressive visually was Teotihuacan, an hour outside Mexico City. Teotihuacan, which predated the Aztecs, was established in the second century B.C. in the Mesoamerica era and lasted almost 1,000 years. Lurching skyward and seen for miles around, two giant pyramids anchor the oncethriving city where 100,000 to 200,000 people lived in more than 2,000 buildings.

The Pyramid of the Sun is 213 feet tall (65 meters) and is connected by the Avenue of the Dead to the smaller Pyramid of the Moon. The place is an archaeological bonanza, with digs and research ongoing.

Unlike many other pyramids, you can climb to the top of both Teotihuacan behemoths. But it’s not easy. The shorter ascent up the moon pyramid is steeper and more treacherous than the climb up the sun pyramid, which teems with tourists, but is easier to navigate. The payoff for both climbs: incredible vistas. Near one entrance inside a cavern is La Gruta restaurant.

TULUM

From Mexico City we flew to the Yucatan. Avoiding the tourist mecca of Cancun, we stayed in an Airbnb in Playacar, a gated community south of Playa Del Carmen, and rented a car. The roads we took were in great shape, including a new fourlane highway from Cancun to Merida (be warned, there are few offramps) on the route to Chichen Itza, and a new twolane road from Chichen Itza to Tulum.

Area maps are full of pyramid sites but we kept it simple, stopping first to see the beautiful, breathtaking seaside ruins of Tulum in Quintana Roo. Situated on an expansive bluff overlooking the ocean, the old city was a fishing, trade and religious center. Several thousand Mayans lived here from the year 975 until the Spanish arrival.