Hunucmá

Hunucmá is the town you pass through on the way from Mérida to Sisal, about 23 kilometers inland from the port and the seat of the municipality that Sisal belongs to. With some 28,000 people it is a busy market and service town, but its center holds one of the most imposing colonial churches in this part of Yucatán.

After the Spanish conquest of northwestern Yucatán in the 1540s, Franciscan friars gathered the scattered Maya settlements of the area into mission towns, and here they built the convent and church of San Francisco de Asís, partly with stones taken from earlier Maya shrines. The result looks like a fortress: thick masonry walls, a tall and plain façade, and a vast open atrium in front, designed to hold large congregations of Maya converts who heard Mass outdoors.

The church still anchors the main square, with the market and food stalls around it. Hunucmá is worth a short stop for the church and a meal on the way to or from the coast, and it is also where the road to Celestún branches off to the southwest.