 | Copán Things To Do | Tips 61 - 70 of 83 |  |
Popular Things To Do | Other Things To Do Tips | All Tips (83) Near the ruins is the town of Copan - nice place for lunch and some shopping.
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Copan also has a collection of zoomorphs. Zoomoprhs are mythical creatures created out of parts from different real animals. There use is unknow but it suspected they told myths. Leave a Comment
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The Mayan ruins may not be the bigest but well worth the visit. There is a mistict feel about them. We rented some horses after the tour and had a great time visiting the fertility site, where they claim birth was given to the Mayan children, anyway it was a fun excursion. Leave a Comment Address: Just outside the town of Copan
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The most famous monument of Copán Ruinas is located directly south from the Ballcourt. It is easy to find it, because it is covered by a huge and ugly roof. Under this ugly roof, you will find the beautiful so called "Hieroplyphic Stairway". This was built during the reign of King Smoke Shell who ruled from 749 until 763.
The stairway has 63 steps in total, and all of these steps are completely covered with carvings, that tell a story about the history of the Royal family and the Maya culture as a whole. It is the longest series of hieroglyphs that is found in the Mayan world. Although a big part of the story has been understood -which tells us a lot about their history- a big part is still a mystery because parts of the stairway are missing or heavily damaged. To prevent further damage to be done, it was decided to build the roof over it.
Right in front of the Stairway you will see another statue. This time it is not King 18 Rabbit, but the king that was the brain behind the stairway, King Smoke Shell (probably). Leave a Comment Address: Hieroglyphic Stairway, Copán Ruinas
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When you are visiting Copán Ruinas, and especially when you are entering the ruins, it is very likely that you will see lots of animals. The most visible and interesting are the many beautifully coloured parrot that fly around here. They live here naturally, but they clearly are being fed here, because they all gather around the main entrance to the park. Even though they are not 100% wild, they are very impressive and fantastic to see. And the advantage is, you can get very close to them which is great to take pictures of them.
And another animal that you will see is the "agouti". This animal looks like a huge version of the guinea pig, and is about 50 centimetres long. It sniffs around at the sides of the paths and is probably looking for food there. This also helps you to take pictures of the animals.
And finally, just outside the park you will be surprised by the enormous amount of beautiful butterflies that fly around here. In all colours of the rainbow, and sometimes very big.
It is also said that several monkeys live in the surroundings of the ruins, but I haven't been lucky to spot them. Leave a Comment Address: Copán Ruinas
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At the West Court stands the Stela P, This stela has the portrait of Kak Uti Chan and is erected around 623 AD.
The stela with the nice sculptures at the site turned out to be a replica. The original one is at the Sculpture Museum, close to the visitorscentre and the main entrance of the Copan area. Later we had a look at this original one, but it was nice to get first an idea of its original ambiance. Leave a Comment Directions: West Court at the Acropolis of Copan.
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From the West Court we had a very good view at the so called cemetery at a lower level. It is a rather vast area with well protected buildings surrounded by many shady trees.
This area is supposed to be the dwelling of the last ruler of the city of Copan. Leave a Comment Directions: Copan, south of the Acropolis, the west and east Court
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Stela N at the base of Temple 11 is erected in 761AD and is representing Smoke Shell. With its intricate reliefs it is the most elaborated stela. At the two main sides of the stela is the face of Smoke Shell, who is thought to be buried under Temple 11 -the Temple of the Inscriptions- though notomb has yet be found. At the sides of the stela are glyphs. By the depth of the reliefs there are even some traces of paint to see. Leave a Comment Directions: Stela N is located at the northern base of Temple 11 at the southern end of the Central Plaza
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This popular site opens at 8AM. Weekdays are probably better than weekends, but I think the real trick is to arrive at opening time. Because buses travel early from Guatemala you do not even have to stay overnight in the town of Copan. Although Copan, the town, is a pleasant and clean town that it seems would be a nice place to stay overnight.
I arrived at about 8:15 on a Monday morning and except for the Honduran staff, it seemed that I had the place to myself for about an hour and a half. I am not anti-social but I find being alone at a fantastic archeological site always is inspiring.
One little tip, if you pick up your transportation from the border insist that it drop you off at the ruins. This should not cost any extra. You can walk back to the town after your visit. Leave a Comment
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After we had allready great views from the summit of Temple 11 at the Plaza Central, we went down the steps at the westside of the temple to reach the green Plaza Central. This plaza just north of the temple 11 is the place where the Ball Court and Hieroglyphic Stairway are located.
The Ball Court is the second largest one in Central America. The Stairway is the most famous monument of ancient Copan. I liked the route we walked through the ancient site with our guide. We approached the site from the south through the rainforest and walked northbound instead of entering from the north at the Gran Plaza close to the main entrance. Leave a Comment Address: Plaza CentralDirections: At the northside of the ancient site of Copan, just south of the Gran Plaza de Estelas.
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