I woke up after another cold night thinking "should I skip the pyramids and sleep more? It's easy to do it again from Mexico City on another trip". Glad I didn't. Too cold to fall asleep anyway, so I went to the breakfast buffet to recharge: "last Mexico WHS here I go!"
I actually thought it would be busy but not really, and definitely relative to its size. Compared to El Tajin there were probably only 15% Mexican tourists and that is assuming they even are. El Tajin was ~98% but could be seasonal. Arriving at 8am at the front gate I first checked out the Serpent temple. A guide was there talking a lot about tombs. Unsure if they actually know facts or make it up. Funnily enough there is a sign at the entrance to explain it was NOT made by aliens!! Shame on people to even think so in today's science age (History Channel I'm looking at you). From the distance you can obviously already see the Sun and Moon temples and awe at them. People can climb up? I should have rested up more! It also takes a loooong time to walk towards them. One wow factor is the short climb from a lower area and see the temples arise beyond. Magical. There are dozens of structures along the way with some signs (in 3 languages usually) if you are interested but most people don't bother. Your main goal are those pyramids!
I climbed the Moon temple first because there appeared to be less people and then I would be on the way back already, but that's just me. However, people can easily obstruct pictures at the Moon temple but not so much at the Sun one which is much wider (obviously). The Moon temple gives you an awesome view, probably better the Sun because it looks down the long pathway you just schlepped yourself through to get here. I sat on the top and dangled my legs down to refresh. It's quite chilling here but for the occasional silly jaguar sound (who buys that toy?!). Off to the Sun temple which took me only 1 quick stop to get up, mainly because there were so many people and it all goes slower. Once on top you can sit at the very peak and...take a peek into all directions. This is the highest point and probably higher than Calakmul but the epic jungle setting and being "on top of the treeline" is missing here. Instead you can admire the zone below which is probably better than exploring it bit by bit, most being just walls now anyway.
So did I learn anything about the place? Not really. It is now in my memory for being a beautiful tall bunch of pyramids. I kinda think that's what most people take away. It's probably a bit like Bagan where you take in the scenery and climb a temple (before it was banned) but actually caring what the temples stand for was not of the tourists' interest.
I actually got the ticket stub picture of Teotihuacan, yay!