Tour Name

Cahal Pech Archeological Site (Place of ticks), Cayo District (Belize)

Tour Length

Tour normally takes between 1-2 hours.

Tour Type - EASY

Tour requires some walking and climbing, depending on the weather, the track can be wet and slippery or dry, it can be humid, hot, wet or just that perfect cool day. (Your guide will make suggestions on what to take depending on local weather forecast)

What to Bring   

  1. Bug repellant

  2. Sun Block

  3. Hats/Caps

  4. Binoculars

  5. Comfortable walking/climbing shoes

  6. Dress to the weather.

Price - starts at $45USpp

Price varies according to location.

Price from the central are of San Ignacio is $45 USD per person. Group rates are offered.

Ask our Travel Specialist about prices and transportation information from your location.

What is Included

  1. Transportation

  2. Licensed Guide

  3. Park Entrance Fees

  4. Water

  5. Snack with soda or juice

Tour Chronology

Situated on the outskirts of, it is only a ten minute drive from the center of San Ignacio Town to the site. The drive itself is within town limits, and includes driving or walking to the top of Cahal Pech hills where the site is rested.

There is a visitor’s center at the entrance of the park, where your guide will brief you on what to expect on the trails at the park. He will also give u a brief History of the site and also the type of evacuation work done there. It’s a short walk from the center to the site, it is a relatively small site so the actual tour is short and confined within the immediate area.

You can get lunch at the nearby restaurants or if you choose to go downtown San Ignacio where there are a variety of restaurants to choose from. There are also good gift shops downtown if you want to browse around and purchase souvenirs.

Tour Description

Although the actual date that Cahal Pech was discovered is unknown, the first published record of the site dates to the late 1930s. It wasn't until the 1950s, however, that the first archaeological investigations of the site began. At this time Linton Satterthwaite from the University Museum of the University of Pennsylvania conducted preliminary mapping and excavation. Except for two brief paragraphs in a 1951 publication, Satterthwaite never produced a detailed report of this work but a copy of his notes were subsequently retrieved from the University Museum and are presently stored in the library of the Belize Department of Archaeology. In his brief summary of this research Satterthwaite concluded:

Cahal Pech is a site with an unpropitious Maya name meaning "Place of the Ticks." This ceremonial center includes pyramid temples, palaces, and a ball court. Five stelae and an altar (plain) show presence of the stela cult. Some major buildings were roofed with the Maya vault, some apparently not. There was a gradual architectural growth, the occupation probably running through the entire Classic Period, and we have ceramic hints of a longer occupation.

Excavations during the past 12 years suggest that during the Classic period Cahal Pech and its sustaining area may have encompassed a realm of approximately 10 square miles. The site core consists of some 34 large structures, including several tall non-domestic structures, a number of large range-type buildings, two ballcourts, and possibly a sweathouse. Archelogists work  suggests that Cahal Pech contains evidence of some of the earliest Maya settlements in Belize. Data recovered at the center indicates that the first settlers began to occupy the site sometime between 1200 to 1000 B.C. It is believed that these settlers either entered the Belize River Valley from the west in Highland Guatemala, or they may represent incipient cultivators whose ancestors lived in the area during the Archaic period. Between 1000 to 600 B.C., the Cahal Pech community acquired many exotics like jade and obsidian from sources to the east and north of Guatemala City, marine shell from the Caribbean Sea, and appropriated many of the early symbols of the Gulf coast Olmec Culture. Many figurines and carved designs on pottery suggest that these people shared similar ideologies with their counterparts in other areas of Mesoamerica. Indeed, Cahal Pech also contains one of the earliest carved stela (monuments) yet discovered in this region of the Maya lowlands.

Several caves just upriver from the center contain evidence which suggests that the occupants of the site conducted periodic rituals within these subterranean caverns. Preserved organic remains of corn, cacao, and anato seeds, and the skeletal remains of infants and adults suggest that the rituals conducted in these sites may have included human sacrifice and offerings to deities associated with rain and agriculture.

During the Classic period (A.D. 300-800) the site continued to flourish and many of the large temples and palaces that can be seen at the site today were erected during this time. During the last centuries of the first millennia, however, many of the occupants of this once thriving site began to abandon the center. Often referred to as the Maya Collapse, we are still unsure of the reasons why the site was depopulated, particularly because other centers in the Belize Valley continued to thrive for several more centuries. Present research at the site is attempting to ascertain the cultural history of this crucial period and to assess the reasons for the site's early rise and subsequent decline.