Archaeologists dive deep into the lost world of the Maya

CARA BLANCA, Belize -- Machete chops echo and leaves rustle underfoot when the vines clear, revealing cobalt-blue water in a cliff-sided pool.

Hidden beneath the dry-season forest, these waters, the blue cenotes (cen-NO-tays) of Cara Blanca, represent a mystery for scholars, one left by the ancient Maya. What lies within these sacred wells?

"Cenotes were portals to the underworld, Xibalba, for the Maya," says archaeologist Lisa Lucero of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign on a tour of the pools in May. "Offerings, artifacts — they would have left something there for the gods. We would expect to find something."

But the gods of Xibalba (shee-BALL-buh) won't yield their offerings so easily.

The secrets of the ancient Maya, whose Central American population centers were mysteriously abandoned more than a millennium ago, have long intrigued scientists. Why did such a complex culture disappear?

Lucero and her colleagues are among those trying to understand this lost world. They have been searching the 6-mile-long Cara Blanca site for ruins since 1998, working each year primarily in May and June, before the rainy season.

A team of world-class cave divers assembled by Lucero and geologist Patricia Beddows of Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., intend to descend into the depths of three of Cara Blanca's 23 pools next year. Hazards the divers will face include trees, caves and crocodiles, not to mention 160-foot depths.

"Cenotes bell outward underground, like caves. You can't treat them like there is clear water over your head. The waters are sulfur-rich. Hydrogen sulfide can make divers sick if they push it, which has happened," Beddows says. "And there is the depth problem." Dives in very deep waters put divers at risk of serious health problems, especially if they surface too quickly.

Plumbing the blue depths

The ancient Maya lived in Central America's lowland forests for thousands of years, starting around 300 B.C. to build a culture of widespread centers marked by pyramids and temples and, stone carvings suggest, ruled by a caste of boastful chiefs. The Maya abandoned these centers around A.D. 900, a mysterious "collapse" ascribed by scholars to warfare, drought, overpopulation and environmental degradation, or a combination of each.