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| After crossing a nondescript drainage, you can follow
a short side trail to a house group and a chultún, a
storage unit carved into bedrock with a capstone beside it. The Maya
kept goods in the subterranean storage pits that were carved out of
soft limestone. Experiments with stone tools, like the choppers that
were made at the chert site, reveal that
this was a straight-forward operation. Various household goods would
have been stored in these pits, but none have lasted the centuries
since the collapse. |
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| Right near the chultún you see a water
vine (called bejuco de agua in Spanish), protected for our
benefit. These vines are an indication of the health of this forest.
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| While you sip the water you have carried with you on
this trek, you can appreciate the importance of finding water long
ago. The Maya must have nurtured this vine as part of their forest-garden.
Early explorers to this area often found they needed to rely on this
bounty from the forest. |
| The path winds south through the corozal with wild pineapples on
the left, leaf-cutter ants, or sompopos, on your right, and
ahead into the thick bush. The area was once cleared for a milpa,
or cornfield, in the 1980s. Before coming to the thick bush area,
you can see another house mound group and chultún off on a
short side trail on the left. Note that the chultún is outside
the house group, suggesting that these storage units may have been
shared by the neighborhood. |
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| Once in the overgrown field, the trail bears left back
toward the east and the core of El Pilar. While this trail returns
you eastward, future trail plans will offer an alternative route to
the complex of Pilar Poniente. |
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