From Teotihuacan to wrestling

Ever since we decided to go to Mexico City, I knew I wanted to visit Teotihuacan, ruins of an ancient pre-Aztecan city, not too far from the capital.

Mexico City

Puebla is a rather big city, but it feels like a small village compared to Mexico City (or DF, from 'Distrito Federal'), a gigantic metropolis of about twenty million people. Most of them must have been on the metro line that took us to the hotel, or at least that's how it felt as we squeezed in the wagon with our backpacks. The metro is super cheap, apparently the cheapest in the world at 0.20 euros per ride, and therefore extremely popular for transfers within the city. Especially since it allows to avoid the horrible traffic jams on the surface.

Oaxaca and Puebla, history goes through the stomach

Our time in Mexico is almost over, but before catching our flight in Mexico DF we had two more stops planned - in beautiful cities of Oaxaca and Puebla.

Puerto Escondido

After all those scary stories about the dangers of Guatemala it was a relief to cross the border and return to Mexico. In particular we loved coming back to San Cristobal, with its streets full of life and a great atmosphere. On a Sunday afternoon it looks like everyone wants to enjoy the good weather at a bar's terrace or simply walking along the main streets. We were very happy to spend some time in town with Noel's family again. Plus we got a chance to see San Cristobal on a sunny day, and not under a constant rain as it happened last time.

To the land of Quetzal

Tour agencies in Palenque offer transport packages to get you to Guatemala, for at least 30 euros per person. We thought it was pretty steep and decided to do it on our own.

Around San Cristobal

In spite of the frequent and heavy rains we could visit a couple of places around San Cristobal. The first visit was to the neighbouring town of San Juan Chamula, where people still live in a very traditional way. Men and women wear traditional garments in their daily life and live according to local rules and values. The peak of the local strangeness is by far the church.

Of food and hurricanes

We had our share of horror bus rides in Asia, but it was on the road from Palenque to San Cristóbal that I got truly scared for the first time on our trip. The scenery of green mountains was gorgeous and the bus was as good as new but it was the road and the speed that even made me put on a safety belt! I don't think I ever wore a seat belt on a bus before, but the million curves and steep precipices right next to the road made us hold on to it real tight. Despite all the expectations we did survive the ride and arrived to San Cristóbal in one, though very shaken, piece.

Palenque, monkeys and ruins

For the five hours ride between Campeche and Palenque we opted for a first class bus: five hours non-stop of silly movies and even sillier TV shows blasted at full volume. Forget about sleeping or reading a book. We'll probably opt for second class from now on: it may be slower but at least one can get some rest.

Mérida and Campeche, hot as hell

Mérida takes its name from the capital of the Spanish region of Extremadura that we visited several years ago and liked it a lot, and so we were looking forward to discover its Mexican counterpart.

Wonderful Chichen Itzá

It was hard to leave Tulum. It's not a pretty town but we liked the atmosphere, our hotel was very comfortable and we already had 'our places' to go for lunch and dinner. Plus there are so many things to do, especially if you like diving and snorkeling. This is definitely a place where we could imagine to live for a while. But our Mexican adventure has just begun and there's still so much to see. From Tulum we took a second class bus to Valladolid to visit the nearby ruins of Chichen Itzá, recently declared one of the new seven wonders of the world.

Down and under again

The Yucatan peninsula is famous amongst divers not only because of the world's second largest corral reef that runs along its Caribbean coast, but also because of cenotes - sinkholes filled with fresh water that are great for snorkeling and cave or cavern diving.

¡Viva México!

On the flight to Cancun we thought and talked about our apparent lack of desire to travel. How could we travel for two more months if neither of us found any joy in it? I have always wanted to go to Mexico and it was sad to feel so uninspired once we were getting there. Would we enjoy our stay, or just suffer through it? Should we resort to our backup plan of choosing a nice place where to spend all our time until the day of the flight back home? But unexpectedly everything went back to normal after just a few hours! Cancun is not an attractive city, and we weren't interested in spending much time there. Nevertheless a few tacos and a stroll around downtown immediately awakened our traveller's instinct and the desire to discover this vast country.