The magical yellow city of Izamal

There’s a town in the state of Yucatán that is called the magical yellow city of Izamal, and we have tried to visit on previous stays in the area but never made it there. Today, really our third time trying in earnest, we spent the morning in Izamal. It really is quite a magical place, and even more vibrant and lively than we anticipated. Anybody can paint a city yellow, but Izamal is really charming. One of the first things we saw was a row of horses and carriages, many wearing hats. The main commercial street in the city has multi-colored flags stretched across the street, very nice touch!

Quick summary of how Izamal came to be: it was an important pre-Colombian Mayan center that then had a period of Spanish colonialism (1800s) during which time the church placed Catholic structures on top of the existing Mayan pyramids. The town, like many in the Yucatán peninsula, was a center of henequen production. After that industry collapsed (thanks a lot polyester rope) the town looked to attract tourists. A mayor from 1959-61 is credited for cleaning up the town and painting it all yellow.

The biggest structure in the town is a huge monastery. It sits atop pre-Columbian sites and the open area within the walls is noted as being the largest atrium in the Americas, second in the world to only the Vatican. The nativity scenes up on the altar of the church inside included both a turkey and a very large rabbit!

Some of the walls have this cool texture that comes from scoring a line, pushing a stone in the middle, then painting it yellow. The yellow is so present everywhere and, granted we were there only a few hours, but it did not get old! Except for maybe a few minutes when we were trying to remember where we parked the car! “I know it was on a yellow street…”

We mapped out a loop of sites to visit and headed away from the centro a bit, in order to see the Mayan pyramid remains. You can see below one pyramid that’s just right there, across the street from some (yellow) houses. Then a bit later in the gallery, a large pyramid with steps rebuilt so visitors can climb up. It doesn’t take much climbing to get up high enough for a big view around here! We also took a short walk around the pyramid area, where there were some very large trees! I think that’s a banyan tree.

I should add at this point that it was getting pretty hot. We had both made a good decision to get up early for this visit, leaving Merida before 7am to be in Izamal by 8:15, and also been lucky to have some cloud cover. Once it got to be about 10am and the clouds dispersed a bit, phew! Very hot. We finished up our stroll back through the town, past the monastery, and then to the market. In Mexico, the work week is 48 hours, with most people working a 6-day week, and Sunday is the day off. Town was full of people riding around on motorbikes and bicycles, in the market, generally out and about running errands, meeting and chatting, and having a bite to eat in cafes. We sat down in some red chairs with Coca-Cola branding (an indicator that you’re about to have an authentic Mexican market meal!) and ordered rellenos negro (turkey shredded and in a really delicious black sauce with a lot of aromatic spices for John) and chicken tacos (me) and a big cold bottle of Coca-Cola. Everyone was super nice and the food really hit the spot!