Copán and around
The ruins of Copán are one of the most magnificent of all Maya sites. While its compact scale is not initially as impressive as Tikal or Mexico’s Chichén Itzá, it boasts an astonishing number of decorative carvings, stelae and altars, including a towering hieroglyphic stairway. Throw in a wonderful site museum and the delightful and friendly village of Copán Ruinas, where most people stay, and it’s easy to appreciate Copán’s appeal.
Delightfully located in a sweeping highland valley, the city-state of Copánwas the southernmost centre of the Maya civilization. The Maya chose a beautiful site on the fertile banks of the Río Copán at a pleasingly temperate altitude of 600m. Today the countryside around Copán is glorious to look at, with green rolling hills of pastureland and tobacco and coffee farms interspersed with patches of pine forest. Though the archeological site is the main attraction, there’s plenty more to explore in the surrounding area, with hot springs, fincas and bird reserves close by.
Copán Ruinas
Just 10km east of the Guatemalan border, the small town of COPÁN RUINAS is a charming place of steep, cobbled streets and red-tiled roofs set among the lush scenery of Honduras’s western highlands. Despite a fast-increasing number of visitors, income from whom now forms the mainstay of the town’s economy, it has managed to remain a largely unspoilt and genuinely friendly place. Many travellers are seduced by Copán’s delightfully relaxed atmosphere, clean air and rural setting, and end up spending longer here than planned, studying Spanish, eating and drinking well, or exploring the region’s other minor sites, hot springs and beautiful countryside.
The forested, highland region around Copán is very beautiful and loaded with interest including waterfalls, hot springs, a minor archeological site, coffee fincas, ziplines and a spa. Tour operators can set up trips to all these attractions.
Macaw Mountain Bird Park and Nature Reserve
The Macaw Mountain Bird Park and Nature Reserve has abundant parrots, parakeets, toucans, six species of macaw, grey hawks and a great horned owl and makes a wonderful half-day excursion. Most of the birds have been previously kept as pets and donated to the centre, and breeding programmes have been started for very rare species such as the Buffon macaw and the yellow-lored amazon. There are walk-through aviaries and nature trails that wind through a lovely old-growth forest of cedar, mahogany, fig and zapote trees, interspersed with elevated viewing decks. You’ll also find a coffee-roasting house and an excellent café/restaurant serving gourmet coffee from the Copán region, as well as an information centre explaining the relationship between the Maya and birds, and a wonderful natural pool for swimming.
Las Sepulturas
Some 2km east of Copán along the highway is the smaller archeological site of Las Sepulturas, the focus of much interest in recent years because of the information it provides on daily domestic life in Maya times. Eighteen of the forty-odd residential compounds at the site have been excavated, yielding a hundred buildings that would have been inhabited. Smaller compounds on the edge of the site are thought to have housed young princes, as well as concubines and servants. It was customary to bury the nobility close to their residences, and more than 250 tombs have been excavated around the compounds. One of the most interesting finds – the tomb of a priest or shaman, dating from around 450 AD – is on display in the museum in Copán Ruinas town.
Luna Jaguar hot springs
Some 22km north of Copán, set in lush highland scenery dotted with coffee fincas and tracts of pine, the Luna Jaguar spa resort is a great place to relax. Here thermal waters pour into the cold-water river, creating natural pools and showers. L40 will get you into the man-made pools, but across the river, with another L200 entrance fee, you enter a world fit for a Maya king, with pools and footbaths all around.
The history of Copán
Archeologists now believe that settlers began moving into the Río Copán valley from around 1400 BC, taking advantage of the area’s rich agricultural potential, although construction of the city is not thought to have begun until around 100 AD. By 760 AD the population had reached 28,000 before decline took hold in the 800s due to scant food resources and disease. Don Diego de Palacios, a Spanish court official, mentions the ruins “constructed with such skill that it seems that they could never have been made by people as coarse as the inhabitants of this province” in a letter of 1576. But it was not until the 1830s that archeologists, notably John Stephens, the US ambassador to Honduras and British archeologist Alfred Maudsley began to map and decipher the site. For those interested in finding out more, Vision del Pasado Maya by Fash and Fasquelle, available from the museums, is an excellent historical account of the site’s history in Spanish.
Gracias
Founded in 1536 by Spanish conquistador Juan de Chávez, GRACIAS lies in the shadow of the nearby Parque Nacional Celaque. It’s a hot and dusty cobbled town, but well located for day-trips to surrounding natural attractions, including the park and some natural hot springs, about an hour’s walk south or around L60 each way in a moto-taxi – you can arrange for one to come and collect you for the return leg. These are small pools purpose-built for bathing in the 36–39° waters; an on-site comedor serves basic meals.
La Entrada
Northeast from Copán the CA-11 winds its scenic way through lightly wooded mountains and fertile pasture to LA ENTRADA, an unpleasant junction town 55km from Copán, useful only for its bus connections to San Pedro Sula, Santa Rosa and Copán Ruinas.
La Esperanza
Just north of the town of Siguatepeque, a good paved road heads west from CA-5 to the village of LA ESPERANZA, the centre of commerce for western Honduras and the capital of the department of Intibucá. During the week there’s nothing much of interest here, but the town livens up considerably during the colourful weekend market (Sat & Sun), when Lenca farmers from surrounding villages pour into town. It’s likely that if you’re heading to Gracias you’ll need to stay overnight in La Esperanza due to the lack of buses.
