Yucatan: Weekend By Air

The Mayaland Hotel, which adjoins the ruins of Chich�n Itz�, 85 miles and two hours from M�rida , was built in 1930 when there was no road. Travelers, frequently lured off the Ward Line's boats that put into Progreso, came by train to Dzitas, then bumped over the last two miles in Model T Fords. The Carnegie Institution had started work uncovering Chich�n in 1924, and when the road was brought in, 16 years later, the tourists flocked to see what marvels the archaeologists had uncovered and patched together.

For one thing, there was the ball court where seven players on a side, all of them priests, cavorted on a court 200 feet long and 90 feet wide. Elbows, feet, hips and knees could be used to coax the ball through a narrow basket hung on each side wall. It was religion as well as sport and the Mayans played for keeps. The captain of the losers lost his head as well as the game.

The Temple of the Jaguars is a tortuous climb, but inside the adventurous (and the energetic) will find a red stone jaguar with jade eyes. A quarter of a mile down a jungle road is the Sacred Well, a watery pit into which Mayan virgins were sacrificed to woo the god who would bring rain. When it was dredged at the turn of the century the well gave up pieces of jade, jewelry of copper and gold, and human skulls, some of which are now in Harvard's Peabody Museum.

Spang among the ruins, the Mayaland Hotel's 37 rooms include several thatched-roof cottages, Mayan style. It charges $15 a day per person, American plan, and the meals can include chicken wrapped in banana leaf, eagle cake, eggplant pie and other temptations of the Indians. The Mayaland and the Hacienda Uxmal, as well as 48 acres on which the ruins of Chich�n Itz� repose, are owned by Fernando Barbachano, and his travel agency operates package tours to all ruins.

Cozumel calling

Barbachano is also developing the once decrepit hacienda at Chich�n where the Carnegie archaeologists lived. It will have 18 guest rooms, a pool, riding horses and a more resorty air than the Mayaland, which runs its house strictly for ruin gazers. Another Barbachano project is a 20-room hotel on Cozumel Island, whither a DC-3 drones out every day in an hour and 10 minutes from M�rida , landing on a U.S.-built jet air base. There is snorkeling, fishing for marlin, sail, barracuda and tarpon (bring along your own tackle), sunning on a 10-mile strip of sand and treasure-hunting in town. Cozumel is a free port.

Expeditions can be arranged for wild boar, wild turkey and even monkey. There are night hunts in 15-foot canoes for alligator, sorties in search of jungle deer, which from hearsay are every bit as big as chihuahuas. As a guide was saying the other day, "We kill them like rabbits here." There is no season on cats, but you've got to give the man 10 days on safari in the jungles of Quintana Roo , flying up from M�rida to airstrips hacked out of the bush. The duck hunting season runs from November to March. Hunters work out of small boats in the inland channels on either side of Progreso, 20 miles from M�rida , and the target is widgeons, canvasbacks, pintails, mallards and, as far as I can tell, everything but Long Island duckling.