Xochicalco

Last weekend I went on a school excursion to Xochicalco. This is a site of an ancient indigenous city which has been largely reconstructed from its ruins. There's a really nice museum that has tons of artifacts excavated from the city like these:

This was a society that practiced human sacrifice. Famously, they had a game which was a cross between basketball, hacky-sack, and russian roulette. The way it worked was that two teams competed to get a rock-hard ball through those rings you can see below. Players could use any part of their body except their hands. The captain of the winning team was sacrificed, naturally. I guess the center part of the playing field has filled over the years.

The city was on top of a mountain with astounding views. This city was a center for astronomy. Apparently people from nearby cities would visit to calibrate their calendars.

There were several pyramids. They had surfaces of ornately carved rocks.