In 1988, I drove from Belize into northern Guatemala with a Swiss friend named Vendu as we headed to the Mayan ruins of Tikal. On the map, it was only a hundred miles away, but it took us three days to get there on small dirt roads littered with potholes. At one point we drove in second gear for sixty miles. The road was thick with dust, and I couldn’t go fast enough to lose it, so we had to keep all the windows up.
The weather was as capricious as the road. One minute it was sunny, the next, rain poured down so hard I could barely make out the road. The storms only lasted a minute, but they made the potholes slippery and treacherous.
We crawled along slowly.
At the end of the second day, we stopped in the town of Flores. Unfortunately, Flores was surrounded by swamps and infested with mosquitoes. Our room had neither glass nor screens in the windows, and they feasted on us. I had a light sleeping bag, but it was too hot to shelter myself inside it, so I spent the night slapping my face and scratching.
Even my precious L.L. Bean Deep Woods bug spray didn’t help.
The next day we finally reached the Tikal site. I parked my truck by one of the ruins and set up camp. My muffler had been knocked loose in the final stretch, but I managed to reattach it with a couple of wire coat hangers.
Tikal was one of the largest urban centers during the peak of the Mayan empire, which then encompassed the entire Yucatan peninsula and stretched across Central America to the Pacific. A thousand years ago, Tikal was at its very heart, thriving with a population of fifty thousand.
The site was dominated by three large towers; the tallest (Temple IV) soared up over two hundred feet and lay buried under a thousand years of jungle growth; the second (Temple V) was being cleared. Only the third tower (Temple I) was free of vines and trees and accessible to the public. The cleared tower had a steep staircase leading up the middle of one side.
Vendu was an artist and soon veered away to paint. I found him in a clearing with a nice view of one of the towers. Over the next few days, he spent hours traipsing through the brush, painting the plants and birds.
The cleared tower was open for tourists, but I found myself drawn to the one that lay covered in jungle growth (Temple IV). I moved my truck to its base and spent the next day walking around staring at it numinously. A full moon rose just after sunset on our third night, and I decided to climb it.
Vendu walked with me to the base and gazed up its steep flank; the growth seemed impenetrable with no easy way to scale it.
“I stop here,” he said flatly. He’d admitted before that the Mayans and Aztecs scared him, and he didn’t want to get closer.
I peered up through the dark foliage of the jungle that surrounded us. High above, the moon lit up the trees; silver beams penetrated the canopy and illuminated the jungle below.
“What do you think you will find in the temple at the top?” he asked.
What, indeed, drew me there? Did I hope to find traces of the old gods? Or any god, for that matter?
“I’d be happy just to experience a ghost,” I said. Everyone says there is more to life than what we see. They talk about heaven and hell, and celestial experiences, and the gods, but so far, any evidence of it had been hidden from me.
“Careful what you wish for,” said Vendu.
I paused. “I’d just like to find something tangible.”
I took a deep breath and looked up once again. Then I began climbing up the side of the tower. There were so many vines and creepers that I couldn’t even tell where the staircase was. I knew the jungle to be thick with snakes and picked my way along slowly, fearful that any root I laid my fingers on might turn out to be the midsection of a snake.
It was steep—like 70 degrees—and I had to lean forward as I climbed.
Finally, about halfway up—around one hundred feet—I emerged above the tree line, and my world was flooded with moonlight. The vines and branches faded away; visibility was much better, but when I looked up, my heart raced as I realized I was barely halfway—this pyramid rose to two hundred and twenty feet.
I saw the other two towers rising through the jungle canopy, also aglow in moonlight.
I reached the top of the tower and saw a small temple. It was built of stone and opened on two sides. The enclosed room retreated into a dark area too sheltered to be disturbed by moonlight.
I peered inside and saw nothing but utter darkness.
I wished I had a flashlight.
I stepped into the chamber and stood motionless as my eyes adjusted. Vines covered the walls and ceiling, and the floor was littered with decaying growth. I knew from reading the placards on the other temple that this was where the offerings took place. The Maya, like many Mesoamerican cultures, practiced ritual offerings tied to eclipses or major battles.
I froze when I thought I saw a man on his back with his knees up, but as my eyes adjusted, I realized it was a carved stone.
I sat next to it and listened to the jungle below me. Insects buzzed loudly; animals were moving about in the moonlight. It was a soothing symphony, and while I listened, my racing heart rate slowly chilled out.
Soon, a strange tiredness came over me. Despite my efforts, sleep overtook me, and I drifted off with my head on the carved stone…
... above me, the sun hovered, but the sky around it looked wrong—stained a deep, unnatural red.
I tried to move, but I couldn't. Something held me fast.
Smoke curled around me, thick and sweet, and voices chanted, low and steady, growing louder.
The moon crept across the sun until only a burning ring remained, and the world went dark and close.
A shape leaned over me, and I understood, with total certainty, that I would not walk away from this place.
I woke, screaming.
The temple room was empty and still. I scampered outside, breathing hard.
The moon had long disappeared, and all was black.
In the dim light, I slid and crawled down the tower. I fell once, about ten feet, and only managed to grab a thick root by random luck. Later, I injured my leg when something hissed at me and I scrambled away.
When I reached my truck, I found Vendu sleeping in the back. He slid over to make room for me.
As he looked into my eyes, he asked, “Everything is good?”
I nodded, but he didn’t buy it.
