Chichen Itza

On my second day in Mexico Jaclyn and I participated in one of the resorts planned excursions to Chichen Itza, a Ancient Mayan village and observatory. The picture here is of the main attraction called El Castillo and has recently been elected as one of the new 7 wonders of the world. This temple has been designed so that on the day of the equinox a snake designed on the edges of the staircase with its head at the base appears (light shines on it).  To see what this looks like you can watch the video I found here or to pictures of the equinox.  Compare these with the picture I have here because they are seen at the same angle. Other highlights included a field known as the Great Ballcourt where a game was played. This field has been found at several other Mayan sites but the court here is the largest and is thought to be where the winners of games at other courts came to play as kind of a championship match...although the winner here would be beheaded! 

The game was played with a large rubber ball and teams consisted of six players per side. Hands and feet were not to be used, instead players hit the ball with their hips. One of the objectives of the game was to hit the ball through vertical cylinders mounted of the walls of the court, one on each side at the center of the field. This was a very difficult task as the cylinder was only 3 cm larger than the rubber ball. 

The stone carving to the right shows one of the winners (Captain's of the winning team), his head is on a stick that you can see coming out the top and bottom of his skull. There was a wall of these stone carvings that were representatives of the

 games winners. It is thought that these winners, after being beheaded by the captain of the losing team, would then play the games with the gods. If they can beat the gods then become a god.