Southern Colonials: Merida, Campeche, and San Cristobal

by Richard Quinn | Jan 15, 2016 | Mexico, Road Trips, Travel

  Visiting the Spanish Colonial cities of Mexico is almost like traveling back in time. Narrow cobblestone streets wind between buildings, facades, and stately old mansions that date back three hundred years or more. There are beautiful plazas, parks, and soaring...

The Amazing Mayan Murals of Bonampak

by Richard Quinn | Jan 6, 2016 | Travel

Note: there is an updated, expanded version of this post available on this site at the following link: The Amazing Mayan Murals of Bonampak Down by the Guatemalan border, in a remote corner of the Mexican state of Chiapas, there’s a small Mayan ruin known as...

The Puuc Hills: Apex of Mayan Architecture

by Richard Quinn | Jan 4, 2016 | Maya, Mexico, Road Trips, Travel

Most of the Yucatan Peninsula is relentlessly flat, devoid of any geological feature much taller than a tree, but there is an area just inland from Campeche and Merida where the karstic limestone bedrock folds on itself, creating a jumbled range of low mountains known...

The Extraordinary Mayan City of Edzna

by Richard Quinn | Dec 30, 2015 | Travel

Edzna (Edz-nah, pronounced just like it’s spelled) is one of the best kept secrets in the Yucatan. The average tourist has never heard of this particular Mayan ruin, so you would think, based on its lack of notoriety, that there’s nothing particularly...

Becan and Chicanna: Mayan Cities in the Rio Bec Style

by Richard Quinn | Dec 19, 2015 | Maya, Mexico, Travel

The Rio Bec region includes most of the southeastern portion of the Yucatan, the area where the borders of modern-day Mexico, Belize, and Guatemala all come together. There are a number of important Maya sites in that region, and they share a common suite...

Coba and Muyil: Mayan Cities in Quintana Roo

by Richard Quinn | Dec 13, 2015 | Maya, Mexico, Travel

The historic range of the Maya was a vast expanse that encompassed fully a third of the land area of Mesoamerica:  the entire Yucatan peninsula, much of the Mexican states of Chiapas and Tabasco, all of modern day Guatemala and Belize, and the western sections of...

Tulum: The Mayan City by the Sea

by Richard Quinn | Dec 12, 2015 | Travel

Tulum is not all that large, as Mayan sites go, but its spectacular location, right on the east coast of the Yucatan Peninsula, makes it one of the best known, and definitely one of the most picturesque. This was a late post-classic Maya site that was at it’s...

Photographer’s Assignment: Chichen Itza

by Richard Quinn | Dec 11, 2015 | Maya, Mexico, Photography, Travel

As photographers, we all have our specialties: the subjects, locations, or events that really get our creative juices flowing, and inspire our best work. For some, it’s wildlife photography. For others, landscapes. Or seascapes, sunsets, misty mornings. Sports!...

Uxmal: The Most Perfectly Preserved Mayan City

by Richard Quinn | Dec 8, 2015 | Travel

Uxmal, (pronounced, oosh-mahl), is, in my opinion, the most aesthetically spectacular of all the Mayan cities. The beautiful jungle setting, the quality of the architecture, the state of preservation, the wonderful plazas replete with flowering trees. This place has...

Palenque: Palaces and Pyramids in the Land of the Maya

by Richard Quinn | Dec 7, 2015 | Travel

A newer version of this post is now available under a revised title: Palenque: Mayan City in the Hills of Chiapas. The new version has updated text, illustrated with more than two dozen original photographs. Click the photo to be redirected.  Palenque! This ruin of an...