Mexico City – Teotihuacan

When people think of pyramids, the first place that comes to mind is the Egyptian pyramids at Giza. Some people might think of the pyramid at Chicen Itza. For some reason, however, not many people seem to know about Teotihuacan. This is so surprising given how stupendously large the two pyramids here are!

I must admit, that I wasn’t really aware of Teotihuacan until I saw the movie “Frida”. There’s a scene in the movie where she goes to this massive pyramid and has a little chat on the steps. I was shocked. There’s pyramids in Mexico and they’re THAT big? I simply must go. So I did.

Teotihuacan is about 40 minutes drive north of Mexico City. Most people get here on a guided tour. They’re well organised, relatively cheap and also visit the Basilica de Guadalupe. Personally, I’d rather saw off a toe than sit on a tour bus with fat, stupid people for eight hours. The other option, was to hire a private driver and get a private tour. Much better. It’s a little more expensive, but I love the freedom it gives.

The main benefit of getting a private tour, is that you get to the pyramids before the tour buses arrive. When I arrived, there was maybe ten other people on the pyramid. A couple of hours later, there were hundreds of people crawling over it. Money well spent!

First stop was the biggest pyramid. It’s known as the Pyramid of the Sun. It’s just a little bit shorter than the big pyramid in Egypt, so it’s impressively large. Unlike the Egyptian pyramids, this pyramid is designed to be climbed. There’s a large staircase that runs up the eastern side of the pyramid. It’s mostly a gentle slope, with one section that’s very sleep. There’s a whole bunch of steps though and by the time I reached the top, I was utterly exhausted.

As the pyramid is dedicated to the sun, the traditional thing to do is to be on top at noon. People think that you can get a mystical energy by being here at this time. Bollocks. The other thing people like to do is to stand right on top of the pyramid and point your fingers into the air so as to channel the cosmic energies. Double bollocks. I still did it though – it made for a kooky photo!

From the top of the pyramid, you get a great view over the surrounding countryside. It’s dotted everywhere with small temples and a whole lot of lumps and bumps – archaeology just waiting to be excavated.

Walking down the pyramid, I walked the short distance to the Pyramid of the Moon. It’s not nearly as big, but it’s a lot better built. The sides of the Sun pyramid bow out and wobble all over the place. The Moon pyramid is much neater and straighter. For some reason, you can only climb to the first level of the Moon pyramid, so the view is not as great.

Next to the Pyramid of the Moon is an excavated house of house – the Palace of the Quetzal Butterfly. It’s covered with some very impressive murals, carvings and built in flowing water and flushing toilet – just the thing for the modern ancient Mexican!

By the time I left the Pyramid of the Moon, the tour groups had arrived in force. Along with them, came the hordes of hawkers, selling various tourist tat. The number of these people is alarmingly large. They follow you around, set up stalls all over the ground and generally make a nuisance of themselves. Compared to other places I’ve been though, they’re pretty tame, so a polite “No quiero nada, gracias” sends them on their way. Light weights!

Next on the agenda was a spot of lunch. On the urging of the guidebook, I had the driver drop me off at Restaurant La Gruta. Even though this place is a bit of a tourist trap, I absolutely loved it! The whole area around Teotihuacan is riddled with caves. Recent research has shown that the Pyramid of the Sun is actually built on top of a sacred cave. The special feature of La Gruta, is that is too is built in a cave.

The entrance is at ground level. You then walk down inside the earth to a massive natural cavern. There’s a few holes in the side of the cave, which allows you to see what you’re eating. There’s also a lot of candles lit all over the place, which gives the whole restaurant a really cool atmosphere. Sure, they truck in bus loads of tourists, but I still think it was nice. The food was actually good too!

After lunch, I headed to the last big attraction at Teotihuacan – the temple of
Quetzalcoatl. This was originally a medium sized pyramid, but over the lifetime of the site, it was changed numerous times. After a big of digging, researchers uncovered an earlier version of the temple with some very impressive decorations. It seems that at the time, a perfectly good temple was built over to create an even bigger temple. This preserved the old temple in amazingly good knock. The sculptures on the side of the temple are just amazing.

Well, that was that. I’ve had the time of my life at Teotihuacan. It was easily the most interesting and amazing place I’ve been to in Mexico. I’ll always remember the awesome sight of those two enormously large pyramids sitting on the valley floor. Impressive stuff.