A millipede greeted me this morning as it was doing laps round my room's bathroom. Not what I see in Cambridge! As I dodged past the sprinklers keeping the vegetation green I thought of a SF book title "Breakfast in the Ruins", can't remember the book at all if I did read it. I wasn't sure what I was eating in the Desayuno Americano but there was plenty of it. There were splendidly warm bread rolls, slices of fruit like bananas, and two scrambled eggs. I suffered no ill effects from whatever it was I ate.

All the power sockets I came across were 3 pin sockets but happily I could use the 2 pin adapter I had so was able to recharge the iPhone and Macbook. That wouldn't be the case in the UK. I gathered my belongings together but was unable to move them myself to reception - a hotel worker insisted on moving them himself so another 50 peso tip. When I got to reception my day's guide Israel was already waiting for me. And off to Chichen Itza we went (which was next door to the hotel).

Chichen Itza was hot and sweaty but bearable. My guide sweated too so I didn't feel so bad. It took a while to enter - they were searching bags for sweets and too good camera equipment, some Americans in front of me fell foul of that.

Chichen Itza is a huge site, and more bits of the original site are being 'restored'. They're also upgrading the car parks and transport infrastructure. Also imposing was the number of visitors (flooded out when all the coaches arrive) and the number of stalls selling stuff, including whistles to imitate the noise the Kukulkan bird makes. By the great pyramid and the ball court the acoustics encouraged people to clap and whistle for the echoes.

The dominant pyramid at Chichen Itza stands by itself, though the place was a city of thousands you only see the important buildings now there. Cryptic with their unclear carvings, the archaeologists guess at what it all meant. It was like seeing the bones of a giant animal and only getting the vaguest impression of what the animal might have been like.

The Maya had roads which were white with crushed sea shells, walked in the night because of the heat of the day. They called roads the same name as they called the Milky Way. The Maya were clever, invented zero, the Great Pyramid is a massive calendar of days and months and star processions.

One gets shown the Pok ta Pok court where the goal hoops faced each other across from the near ends not the far ends. This is the largest Pok ta Pok court anywhere, a deadly arena. In passing the name Yucatan for the peninsula where Chichen Itza is came from the Spanish asking Maya what's the name of this place and the Maya replying we don't understand you.

Israel took me for lunch to a cafe whose back garden mimicked Chichen Itza on a slightly smaller scale. The goblet of iced lemonade was like divine nectar to me. I had fajitas, the pollo pibil would have taken too long. I was grateful for the torch on my phone when I went to the rest rooms - the toilet was in infernal darkness.

I didn't swim at the Yodkzonot cenote we went to see but admired the spectacular sight of a giant hole in the earth. The roots of trees descended from the surface down like witch fingers seeking to suck water up. In the past the Maya may have tossed girls into cenotes to please Chaac the water god. Now the cenote is just a natural swimming pool to cool off in.

Condor Verde who were Audley Travel's local partner made contact with me over WhatsApp and that was very useful during the trip. They answered silly questions about how much to tip, they booked restaurants for me, and acted as a great backup.

The Hacienda Merida where I stayed for three nights in Merida wasn't as good as the Chichen Itza hotel. Slightly more rundown. Breakfast only from 7:30am in the morning rather than 7am which made things tight if you had a 8am start. But my main grievance was the noise in the evening from local cafes which I had to use an app on my iPhone to counterbalance.

I ate this evening at the Museo de la Gastronomia Yucateca which was a great place. True I found the tortillas dull and not very digestible as I had done elsewhere, but I experienced pollo pibil (chicken cooked in banana leaves). One gets an appetiser of nachos (or something like that) automatically. I had sopa de lima (lime soup) as a starter.