Water, Water, Everywhere

I lowered my camera into the hole

I stood in the patio of the new house and said to myself, "Well, well, well," then recognized the pun and added, "well."

That's four wells I have found so far on the long-uninhabited downtown Mérida property I bought a month ago.

In Yucatán, this is not unusual. This is a flat, porous land where water does not run off. It filters down; there are no rivers or streams. In a place where people have lived for many hundreds of years and city water utilities have existed for only a few short decades, wells have long been a necessity for human survival.

The Maya drew water from natural caves, cenotes and hand-dug wells, and also collected rainwater. The Spanish continued these same practices, and as Mérida grew, large numbers of wells were excavated.

Most of the older buildings in Yucatán have hand-built stone-lined wells, used to produce fresh water (a practice no longer common in the city), and now used also for runoff and for sewage. These wells are large enough in diameter for a person to descend into. For that reason they can be dangerous, especially where they have been abandoned, have partially collapsed and are hidden by undergrowth and debris.

As the back patio in my new place was slowly cleared of many years' accumulation of brush, weeds, leaves and trash, wells became obvious. One looks something like an old-time storybook water well. It's easy, looking down into its rock-walled cylinder, to see the water about eight meters (26 feet) down. The well straddles the lot line and is shared with a neighboring house. The wall separating the properties goes right over the top, a very common situation around here.

Another well in the patio is identified by a round concrete slab embedded in the ground, with a smaller concrete cap sporting a crude metal lift handle centered in its middle. Once brush was cleared, it was easy to see.

There's a well under this floor

Later, I got curious when I started clearing out a covered outdoor laundry area and saw that the drain tube went straight into the floor, which was finished with colorful, antique pasta tiles. By stomping with my foot, I found a hollow area beneath the floor. Later, I asked about it when talking with an elderly neighbor whose family had owned the house. She confirmed that there is a drainage well under the laundry sink.

That's three wells. The fourth was the most obvious, marked by a large concrete slab, recessed into a low rectangular stone foundation, with a pipe leading into it through a small aperture. A rusty, old-fashioned water pump sits to one side. All this is enclosed within what was a three-sided hut, now roofless. The size and proportions of this one made me think that this could be a noria, a larger, rectangular well, easily large enough to climb down into.

I couldn't see anything by looking into the tiny opening, and it would be dangerous to try to stand on the deteriorated roof over what could be a very deep hole and try to lift the concrete well cap by myself. I concentrated instead on a pile of wood and old doors and windows, weighted down by rocks and concrete blocks, covering the other end of the large slab. After letting scorpions and thousands of ants disperse, I moved one final panel of termite-eaten wood and discovered a round opening leading down into darkness.

Not having anticipated the need for a flashlight, I was unable to see much, so I lowered my camera by its strap into the hole and took a few flash pictures. They don't help much to clarify what's down there, but there definitely is stone construction below ground. However, parts of the cavern look irregular, raising the possibility that the well may have been built where a natural fissure or cenote already existed. There are many cenotes in Mérida, including a small one under the patio of the house I am renting right now. It's a possibility here, too.

Only time and further investigation will tell what I've really got there under the patio.

Meanwhile, I may have detected another large hollow, possibly indicating a cistern, well or cenote under a floor inside the house. More exploration is on the agenda to sort that one out.


Text and photos Copyright 2014 by Marc Olson