Location
El Chal is located in the municipality of Dolores in the department of Petén in northern Guatemala. El Chal is 40 kilometres (25 mi) south of Flores, the departmental capital. The archaeological site is within the southern area of a village also named El Chal, 600 metres (2,000 ft) to the south of the highway to Flores. The site is situated in the central Petén wet savanna in a well-drained area not subject to seasonal flooding. The local topography is karstic in nature, and includes hills that support some of the city's architecture.
El Chal is located within the valley of the San Juan River, which is a tributary of the Pasión River, at an altitude of 270 metres (890 ft) above mean sea level. The site is situated on a natural north-south communication route between the Maya Mountains and the central Petén region. This route was used during the Colonial Period and was likely to have been inherited from pre-Conquest times.
Some of the major architecture of the site core is covered by secondary forest, including some large trees, while much of the city's remains lie within the modern village, including mounds of various sizes. Some mounds were destroyed in order to build the modern streets, in other cases the mounds were robbed of stone that was reused in modern construction. There are also instances where modern houses have been built on top of ancient mound platforms. Modern houses had previously also occupied the outskirts of the acropolis but were relocated during the Guatemalan Civil War in the late 20th century due to guerrilla activity.
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