Limhi's Tour of Tulum

We tend to take a lot of vacations to sunny, warm destinations. If we need an excuse, we say it is because we need a dose of vitamin D, which comes from being in the sun. We just returned from a 6 day trip to the Mayan Riviera where we stayed at the Barcelo Maya Tropical Beach Resort. It was our second time there and several family members have been more than once too. The first time we were there, it was just after a hurricane had hit and done a lot of damage to the grounds. This time, the grounds were perfectly manicured with thousands of coconut trees and tropical plants. There wasn't a blade of grass out of place.

On the second day of our trip, we went to Tulum. It is about 25 miles from the hotel so we took a taxi. During the drive I took our brand new camera out and played with it. We even took pictures of the driver going 120km, which was a bit over the speed limit.

It wasn't until we had hired a guide and were on the tram that we realized that the camera had been left on the cab. To make a long story short, I tried hard to recover the camera but never did. UGH! Oh well, we had a fabulous time anyway and we had a second camera with us.

There are several brothers who conduct tours at Tulum and at other archeological sites on the Yucatan Peninsula. When you go to Tulum, there is a little thatch hut near some of the stores where you can ask for a guide. If you ask for an LDS guide, you will get one of those brothers. Last year Mosiah was our guide and there were several non-LDS people on our tour. This year we got a private tour with his brother Limhi. Limhi told us that his mother was a costodian in a church building when she was pregnant with him and he was literally, born in the church. There are 9 brothers and 3 sisters and among the brothers we know of Nephi, Lehi, Helaman, Lemual and Limhi. A very interesting family. Limhi's tour includes his own speculation to some extent, but his testimony is strong and he had some very intersting stories about his experiences. The picture above is us standing at what Limhi called the tree of life.

There are buidings where the sun comes through holes on certain dates including the equinox, solstice and in the case of the picture Bob is holding, on April 6th.

Limhi told us that buildings were painted and he showed us how certain flowers changed colors when they were burned, and that was how they made the paint.

There were several almond trees and Limhi showed us how hard it was to open and get to the nuts inside the shell. He told us that Helaman's Army was so strong from eating almonds. He suggested 7 almonds every 2 hours.

At the end of the tour he told us stories about President Hinckley, who he had met on 3 separate occasions. We had a great day in Tulum.

More on our trip later......