Chichen Itzan
My husband recently joined me on his first cruise in over 20 years. While looking at shore excursions, I was excited to see Virgin offered a Shore Thing (how they refer to Shore Excursions) to Chichen Itza. My husband loves history and ruins. Chichen Itza is one of the seven modern wonders of the world.
Even though the tour was a very long day, we both agreed it was worth it. There is no way I would book this trip without going directly with the cruise line. We were assured before we left that they would wait for us not to stress if our tour was late. First, we boarded a 30-minute ferry from Cozumel to Playa del Carmen. The top deck was full when we got on the ferry so we ended up downstairs. I got a window seat. I kept my eyes on the horizon and did not have issues with motion sickness. After we got to Playa del Carmen we walked to our bus which took about 10 minutes. The modern bus with air conditioning took us to Chichen Itza. It was a little over a 2-hour drive to the ruins. We were given a bathroom break. Then our guide, Nico took us into the ruins. He led us around for almost an hour. Nico, a Mayan descendant, explained to us what we were seeing. We were then given about 30 minutes to explore on our own. A few members of our group shopped but we returned to the ruins. After our free time, we boarded the bus and did the whole thing again to return to the ship. Since it is such a short timeline they had boxed lunches for us when we got down with the ruins. We had a traditional sandwich from the region, chips, and your choice of coke or a beer.
The ruins are amazing. I have been to three sets of ruins this year (my family loves history): Xunantunich in Belize in May, Chaccobeen near Costa Maya in August, and now Chichen Itza. I saved the best for last. There was so much to see. Our short visit did not even begin to cover the whole area; we just saw the highlights, but again, we are thrilled we did it. If you love History like we do, I would say this is a must!
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