Zona Arqueológica Palenque

Absolutely stunning! Way less people compared to Chicen Itza, less people selling stuff, cheaper to visit, more peaceful, more beautiful, stunning waterfalls and jungle. You can sometimes enjoy the place totally alone.

We had a rental car so we drove here early before the place opened. There is a gate where you enter the Palenque park (take a look at my picture taken from inside the vehicle. Btw this pic was taken when we were heading out of the park so it is taken from the opposite direction). At the gate some people usually stop you and offer you map, a professional guide etc. You can easily find a map online (if u have access to internet / have downloaded it beforehand) + there are some maps along the way and I find it difficult to get lost, so you really don't need one. There should not be any fees to pay at this point.

If you drive for like a minute longer you will reach the "main parking area", museum and ticket office. Parking is free. The parking lot is quite big, but I suggest going early in order to find a parking place. You can also continue further and drive to the end of the road and leave your car there (not sure if it is free or not).

At the ticket office you need to buy 2 different tickets (1 for the ruins + museum, 1 for the park). I find this utterly stupid, but it is common in Mexico. Cannot remember how much the tickets cost (maybe 150-200 mxn in total?), but they were super cheap compared to Chichen Itza for example. The museum was closed and nobody told about it, which was kinda disappointing.

The fastest route to the ruins was just across the street. First you enter the beautiful forest, see waterfalls and smaller ruins and finally make your way uphill to the larger ruin area. The paths are just fine, but making your way uphill can be difficult for someone who is totally out of shape. You can also enter the park from the other entrance (at the end of main road). Then you will see the main ruins first.

There is one more temple (it is called "the forgotten temple") further away in the forest (20min walk?). It was cool, but did not feel very special after visiting the bigger ruins. You need to take some sort of jungle path in order to get there. You can get there without a guide, but it might take a little longer since some of the signs along the path do no longer exist. If you follow the path seen in Google Maps you will get there easily. The location of the temple is marked totally correctly.