Calakmul, deep in the Jungle

   Today we visited the Calakmul Biosphere Reserve (Reserva de la Biosfera de Calakmul) located in the western part of the Yucatan Peninsula in the state of Campeche, bordering the Guatemalan "department" of El Petén to the south. The Reserve is slightly larger than the state of Deleware and includes about 12% of the jungles of Mexico. Calakmul, which was established in 1989, is one of the largest protected areas in Mexico. During the Mayan ascendence, Calakmul was one of the largest and most powerful ancient cities ever uncovered in the Yucatan. The Reserve is a treasure trove of Mayan history. It contains the remains of roughly 1000 ancient structures.

   Calakmul in Mayan means "the city of two adjacent pyramids". Robert climbed to the top of one of the pyramids, which peeked just above the treetops. The spectacular view of the surrounding jungle, a huge green carpet stretching for miles, interrupted only by other Mayan edifices peeking up and out of the jungle. The Reserve has incredible biodiversity, including panthers. Calakmul's bat caves are home to around 3.5 million bats that emerge every night to forage for insects.

   We saw many of the same species of birds that we had seen all around the Yucatan peninsula, however a new bird to us today was the Bat Falcon (Falco rufigularis). We were sitting down in the shade, resting after Robert's climb to the top of one of the pyramids. I was looking around and spotted the Bat Falcon high in a tree behind us. Its breast is barred black and white and its belly is orange. This bird resembled a little gentleman in an orange-red sweater with a small black waistcoat perched in a tree. Very cute. We watched him through the spotting scope for several minutes. Bat Falcons launch aerial attacks on their prey from conspicuous perches. They hunt bats, small birds and large insects such as dragonflies.

   As we were driving down the gravel road to leave the Reserve, we dodged a car coming toward us in a curve. Our radiator was damaged. Berry waited for the tow truck at La Selva Restaurante. Cell phones being useless in the jungle, Robert went to search for the only landline telephone in the town. All was well in the end. The tow truck picked us up and drove us to the much larger city of Chetumal. Exhausted at this point, we were thrilled to see the Holiday Inn in Chetumal, where we stayed the night. It was "el Dia de los Muertos", the "Day of the Dead" in Mexico, like our Halloween.

Robert and Berry

photo courtesy of wikipedia