What are the most worthwhile things to do in Tikal on a first visit?

The park is vast — Tikal National Park protects 222 square miles (576 km²), and the mapped core alone contains more than 3,000 structures — so a first visit needs a route rather than a wander. The route begins at the Great Plaza, the city's ceremonial heart: Temple I, the Temple of the Great Jaguar, rises 154 feet (47 m) on the east, built around 732 AD as the burial pyramid of King Jasaw Chan K'awiil I, whose jade-rich tomb was found inside it; Temple II, the Temple of the Masks, faces it from the west and is one of the few temples visitors may climb, by a wooden staircase, for the classic view straight across at Temple I. Between them runs the North Acropolis, a layered royal cemetery where Tikal's kings were buried and rebuilt over for a thousand years — walk its terraces and you cross dynasties stacked in stone.

From the plaza, follow the ancient causeways west. The Maler Causeway leads toward Temple IV, at about 210 feet (64 m) the tallest building in the city and one of the tallest structures built in the pre-Columbian Americas; its summit platform — the view used as the Rebel base on Yavin 4 in Star Wars (1977) — is where the sunrise ticket (entry 4:00–6:00 a.m., an extra Q100 for foreigners, authorized guide mandatory) earns its price. South of the plaza, the Lost World (Mundo Perdido) is the oldest monumental complex at Tikal, its Great Pyramid climbable and its E-Group platform aligned to the solstices and equinoxes — astronomy built in the city's first centuries, long before the Great Plaza's kings.

Budget the park's own hours honestly: entry is 6:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. on a Q150 foreign day ticket, and the full circuit — plaza, acropolis, Temple IV, Lost World — is roughly 6 miles (10 km) of walking. The two site museums, covered by a separate Q30 foreign ticket, show what the jungle gave back: the Sylvanus Morley Museum holds carved stelae and ceramics, and the second displays a replica of Jasaw Chan K'awiil's tomb with its jade mosaic mask — the original pieces being far too valuable to leave in the forest. Between the ruins, the wildlife is the third exhibit: ocellated turkeys strut across the plazas, coatis work the picnic area, keel-billed toucans and oropendolas call from the ceibas, and spider and howler monkeys cross the causeways overhead; the park's 300-plus bird species make dawn worth it even without a sunrise ticket.

Late afternoon in the Lost World: the Great Pyramid's steps empty, an ocellated turkey — electric blue head, bronze-green feathers — picking its way across the plaza grass below, and nobody else in the oldest room of the city.

Tikal's most significant building is one most visitors walk past: the Lost World's astronomical complex was already ancient when the Great Plaza was new, and the city's royal line claimed descent from its builders. See the Lost World first and the Great Plaza reads as the finale of a 1,500-year story rather than the whole of it — the site has been occupied since about 900 BC, and its official rediscovery only came in 1848, with the expedition of Modesto Méndez.

• Sunrise on Temple IV — Enter at 4:00 a.m. with your guide and sunrise ticket, then breakfast as the day visitors arrive
• Plaza at golden hour — Save the Great Plaza and Temple II's climb for late afternoon, when the light rakes the carvings and the crowds thin
• Museums at midday — Use the hottest hours for the two museums and the shaded visitor-center area

Climbing is restricted to the temples with wooden staircases — Temples II and IV and the Lost World pyramid; the rest are look-but-don't-climb, and rangers enforce it. There is no food or water for sale beyond the visitor-center area, and the ruins are a 20-minute walk from it, so carry both. The entrance checkpoint, where tickets are validated, sits 10 miles (17 km) before the ruins; day tickets cannot be bought at the plaza.

Plan one long day: sunrise on Temple IV, Lost World mid-morning, museums at noon, Great Plaza last — and a second day if the jungle gives you fog.