Mexico Dennis G. Jarvis · CC BY-SA 2.0
The descent
The entrance, at 31 m.
The real relief above Balankanche, measured on the Copernicus model every 30 m, and the cave going down at the same vertical scale.
The depth is the one published by those who explored it; the shape of the galleries is a sketch, not a survey. No depth has been published for this cave yet.
31m
Entrance altitude
from the 30 m relief model
26°C
Inside, all year
the yearly average outside, at the entrance
Inside and outside
26 °C inside, all year.
Deep inside, a cave keeps the average temperature of the year outside: about 26 °C here, in January and in August. In April the afternoon reaches 36 °C at the entrance, 9 °C warmer than inside: take a jacket. The best months to escape the heat are all year round.
- 29°18°Jan
- 32°19°Feb
- 34°20°Mar
- 36°22°Apr
- 36°23°May
- 32°24°Jun
- 31°23°Jul
- 31°24°Aug
- 30°23°Sep
- 29°22°Oct
- 29°19°Nov
- 29°18°Dec
Outside: afternoon and night averages for 1991–2020 (NASA POWER) brought to the altitude of the entrance. Inside: the yearly average, which deep parts of a cave keep. Near the entrance it follows the weather a little.
Maya cave site in Yucatán, Mexico
Balankanche is a cave in Mexico. The entrance is at 31 m.
Getting there.
- Wild cave: only with caving equipmentNo paths or lights inside. Go only with a caving club or a qualified guide.
- Chichén-Itzánearest town · 3.4 km in a straight line
- Felipe Carrillo Puerto International Airport Tulum (TQO)nearest airport with scheduled flights · 106 km in a straight lineCar hire at MID airport (Mérida)Discover Cars · sponsored link↗
Plan the visit
Guided tours, a bed nearby, a car.
Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.
From above.
The ground above the cave, with the relief shaded, the line of the section and what people have mapped around the entrance.
N
1.5 km
Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 (EOX, CC BY 4.0), 6.0 × 6.0 km, north up. The line is the section above. Points © OpenStreetMap contributors.
Around the entrance.
- 1other cave entrances within 3 kmGrutas de Balankanche
- 2car parks within 2 km
- 26hotels and guesthouses within 8 kmHotel Ik-Kil, Hotel Doralba Inn, Hacienda Chichen & Yaxkin Spa and 23 more
- 4restaurants and cafés within 3 km
- springs within 2 km
- sinkholes within 3 km
- caving clubs and spots within 15 km
- viewpoints within 3 km
- marked hiking routes within 3 km
- climbing crags within 3 km
- named waterfalls within 4 km
- information boards and visitor centres within 3 km
- bus stops within 2 km
- campsites within 8 km
Counted in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit, around the entrance. A low number may just mean nobody has mapped it yet. © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL).
Towns nearby
- Chichén-Itzá3.4 km in a straight line
- Piste7.2 km in a straight line
- San Francisco Grande7.9 km in a straight line
- Kaua13 km in a straight line
- Tinum19 km in a straight line
- Dzitás20 km in a straight line
- Uayma24 km in a straight line
- Cuncunul25 km in a straight line
Month by month
The weather outside, at the entrance.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Afternoon | 29 | 32 | 34 | 36 | 36 | 32 | 31 | 31 | 30 | 29 | 29 | 29 |
| Afternoon | 29 | 32 | 34 | 36 | 36 | 32 | 31 | 31 | 30 | 29 | 29 | 29 |
| Night | 18 | 19 | 20 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 23 | 24 | 23 | 22 | 19 | 18 |
| Rain (mm) | 39 | 31 | 27 | 35 | 91 | 194 | 140 | 174 | 216 | 153 | 69 | 43 |
| Rainy days | 7 | 5 | 4 | 5 | 11 | 18 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 17 | 9 | 6 |
| Sun hours/day | 6.7 | 7.2 | 8.0 | 8.6 | 8.1 | 6.6 | 7.6 | 7.7 | 7.1 | 7.3 | 7.4 | 6.8 |
| Afternoon | Afternoon | Night | Rain (mm) | Sun hours/day | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jan | 29 | 29 | 18 | 39 | 6.7 |
| Feb | 32 | 32 | 19 | 31 | 7.2 |
| Mar | 34 | 34 | 20 | 27 | 8.0 |
| Apr | 36 | 36 | 22 | 35 | 8.6 |
| May | 36 | 36 | 23 | 91 | 8.1 |
| Jun | 32 | 32 | 24 | 194 | 6.6 |
| Jul | 31 | 31 | 23 | 140 | 7.6 |
| Aug | 31 | 31 | 24 | 174 | 7.7 |
| Sep | 30 | 30 | 23 | 216 | 7.1 |
| Oct | 29 | 29 | 22 | 153 | 7.3 |
| Nov | 29 | 29 | 19 | 69 | 7.4 |
| Dec | 29 | 29 | 18 | 43 | 6.8 |
Averages 1991–2020 (NASA POWER) for a cell about 55 km wide, brought to the altitude of the entrance (31 m) with the standard lapse rate. Not a forecast.
Photographs
Inside and around.
Recent years
Wet years, dry years.
Rain of each month as a share of the 1991–2020 average. A dry year means a lower river and hotter rock; a wet one, more water in the gorge.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 62% | 36% | 57% | 44% | 189% | 254% | 115% | 103% | 77% | 341% | 272% | 262% |
| 2021 | 151% | 96% | 138% | 131% | 146% | 101% | 75% | 111% | 77% | 82% | 159% | 89% |
| 2022 | 276% | 342% | 124% | 307% | 66% | 92% | 105% | 122% | 61% | 29% | 109% | 114% |
| 2023 | 209% | 80% | 181% | 5% | 28% | 45% | 147% | 126% | 73% | 75% | 276% | 145% |
| 2024 | 239% | 124% | 142% | 141% | 0% | 188% | 136% | 109% | 91% | 161% | 93% | 95% |
| 2025 | 136% | 237% | 96% | 132% | 77% | 74% | 67% | 99% | 88% | 100% | 100% | 163% |
130% or more: wet month 70% or less: dry month
Caves nearby.
Balankanche
Mexico
- —Depth
- —Galleries
- 31 mEntrance altitude
- 26 °CInside, all year
Where these figures come from
| Name, type, published depth and length, visitors | Wikidata (Q1156198) · CC0 |
|---|---|
| The relief above, the entrance altitude, the section and the 3D model | Copernicus DEM GLO-30 · © DLR e.V., © Airbus Defence and Space GmbH, Copernicus/ESA |
| Climate | NASA POWER, 1991–2020 |
| Entrances, springs, sinkholes, opening hours and what is around | © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL |
| Images | EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons |
Every figure is an average, an estimate or a count from a public dataset. Licences and methods: data sources.
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