So half a county and two days later I might finally have time to catch my breath. I will catch up soon

Walked along this stream for part of the way

So it was up early to head to the Sierra Norte the mountains to the north east of Oaxaca to go on our two day semi organized hike. We had to walk to the disgusting second class bus station on the far side of town to find the bus we needed. The bathrooms were incredible on how terrible there were, though I used them anyways so go figure. Better than suffering on teh bus… Speaking of the bus… standing room only on this trip and Scott and I were shoved to the far far back of the bus so it was a painful and bumpy 2 hour + ride to the small town of Cualjimoyas. We found our guide and ended up sharing the guide with a girl for Belguim. It cut the cost it half so why not, even if she wasn´t in as good of shape we are it would be nice to have someone to talk to in english while we walked.

The walk was amazing, though really reminded me a lot of our biospheres here in CA too. That huge diffrence was the Bromeliads and Orchids… We don´t have those. Well we don´t have cloud forests either. Sinec this was through much of the native areas the paths were dotted with farms, fish hatcheries, donkeys, cows and the like.

We then reached a Overlook of the valleys and changed guides to a small girl who looked like she might be no more than 16.. I´m sure she could ahve outwalked me though, no problem.

The final part of the hike was a brutal down hill and then a stop at a fishfarm for a quesadilla. Then on to the village of Latuvi where we would be staying the night in the little tourist Cabanas built for this project. The town was tiny with maybe 650 people most of which were subsitnance farmers.  The Cabanas were AMAZING the best rooms we have stayed in sinec we haev arrived. The Picture I have doesn´t do justice to it because it doesn´´t  show the other beds in the room or the huge bathroom with a fantastic shower. We grabed a quick dinner and some beers at the store and just hung out with teh Belgian until it was time to go to sleep. Long day and little did we know that the next day was going to get even longer…..

Just the start of the Amazing Flowers on the walk

Donkey!

They apparently like to farm trout up here. The rivers were full of them too. It was great to see.

More trout farming!

I am too cool for for words aren´t I?

A diffrent one flowering... Sorry didn´t turn it.

The overlook halfway through the hike!

 get

Cactus Growing out of Rocks covered with fungus... Not the dessert!

One of the first orchids we saw.

Another pull away shot

Shiney bugs

Huge Room, can´t even see the other two beds.

The Ruins of a housing complex in the ruins.

So just to admit it up from I forgot to charge my camera and had to take almost every single picture on this day with Scotts camera. That wouldn´t be a big deal, but we are yet to find a location with the equipment to get his pictures on to a computer and the owners of the internet cafes around here are painfully weak in thier computer skills. They might be able to buy them, but honestly they can barely run them or maintain them. Just another thing on the post I ca´n´t wait to type about all the little weird parts of the Mexican Experiance.

So the second morning in Oxa started with a bang.. Getting up and run walking the 20 minutes to the tour plae that provides rides to Monte Alban the Mayan ruin that is pretty much right outside of Oxa. 1.75 for the round trip, I´m okay with that! WE went with the Japanese kid we had met the night before and a spanish guy our age that was also staying at the hostel. It was a lot of fun. The ruins were amazing and a big change from the earlier ruins as the Mayans seemed more concerned with the exacting details of the construction that just shear size. They weren´t quite as decorative inside it seems. That took the first couple hours of the day and I will have more pictures than the few below when I can finally get his camera connected to a computer!

Walkway up to the main site... One of the few pictures before the camera died.

One of the many tombs attached to the housing areas.

So after that the super excitment of heading back for food began. This time the four of us headed to the food market just south of the main market. The place is totally not what you would expect. Each littler eatery has it´s own little white tile tables and well design kitchen. We all got a assorment of Moles. Scott tried the Mole Colaradito and I had the Mole Amarillo. Both were good, but not quite the same as the amazing black mole from the night before.

Then it was off to wander around some more and book tickets for the trip the next day to hike in the Sierra Norte and visit some of the native villages.

Then we took a GLORIOUS siesta and then couldn´t quite shake it so I walked across the street to the grocery store and bought chips and salsa.  Wonderful snack that go us going to all wander down towards somewhere again… Ended up finally at the Zocalo (Square) and I wish I had my camera. It was a huge graduation party for the local engineering school. They had a model cow things that was strapped with all kinds of fireworks that students were passing around to the music of the live band and dancing with the cow held above thier heads while the fireworks exploded all around them. I bet it got hot!

Then we had to wander around alittle more and got some tacos that were really tasty but fatty and then a cold chocolate milk. Wow the chocolate milk here is amazing!

Then a quick sandwich to finish off the night and we hit the sack… Big day of traveling out to the middle of no where in the villages.

Mole for Lunch... Looks better than it was.. Too much chocolate not enough chiles.

Okay so Scott and I have arrived in Zipolite a tiny little beach town in the southern part of Oaxaca, Mexico. Amazing doesn´t even start to describe this place. It´s slow and quiet, there are no museums, and there are no monuments. It´s finally a place that go go go people like me can relax and catch up on thier personal time!

So Oaxaca  itself was fun too. We got into to town in the early afternoon and found this funky funky little place called the Magic Hostel… Not much of a place, but for 18$ a night for a private room who is gonna complain too much. After that it was off to FOOD, cause I am always cranky and hungry after 6 hour bus rides.. So we found a little comedor and I of course went for the Chicken Mole. It was pretty basic and really chocolatly I was not quite that impressed. Then we just wandered around town a little. One thing we noticed quickly was that every little corner had a empanaditas stand. Little sweet filled turnovers. Of course I bought one!

You can see like 4 stands selling them. It´s worse than Starbucks, but tastier.

Here they are in all thier fried puff pastry filled with stuff glory.

Some colorful stuff in the Market.

Then we pretty much just bummed around the market and the surrounding food markets. After we finished with that we headed to check out some of the local cooperative shops that are setup by the surrounding villages. In the one that showcases work  by the local female artisans I skipped my usual shot glass and bought a whole small tequila set. Then we headed back out and lo and behold it was time to go Mezcal (Local name for Tequilla more or less) tasting. I just had to buy some to go with my set and I actually like the smokey character quite a bit. That in hand and a couple beers to settle lunch I we head to check out one last place. A weaving store that is reported to be one of the best in Mexico. We ended up not seeing much of the weaving because as soon as we got to the back room with the designs and the loom we started to talk to the guy at the loom (ended up being the owners brother) about politics and other world issues and ended up listening to a Cd of his sons band and having a drink of Mezcal with him and all of the other random friends that happened to drop by. It was great fun! Never got a chance to see the weavings though.

Next it was back to the hostel for a little siesta before dinner. A great habit that I wish I could get into here. Probably not going to happen though. Ended up meeting a nice kid from Hawaii that is going to school in LA and he joined us for dinner. This time I got what was called a Talyuda which is rather like a tortilla pizza. Scott got the Black Mole this time and I tasted a little. It was PERFECT exactly like I expected! Spicy, rich and complex. Wash that down with a couple beers and then it was time to head back to the hostel, have a good night drink of Mezcal and off to dream land.

I have to get back to beach relaxing, but hopefully I´ll be back after diner or something to post day two. I need to bring scotts memory card for the photos.

View from the room. Including my Hammock

So I didn´t remember to put my card in my Camera so I have to work a little harder to get access to the first day of Oaxaca pictures. So I will wait until I have a little more time to blog about that.  Then I ran out of battery so the rest of them are on Scott´s camera… So I will get back to you of it.

The Disc that was found originally that started the whole excavation of the site.

The second day in Mexico city wasn´t quite as action packed as the first afternoon. We got a later start and then headed down to the Historic Center and saw the Catherdral and the theTemplo Major, which is the remains of the temple that was present whent he spanish invaders took over the city. Here are some photos to enjoy.

A Church that we couldn´t go into on the way to the center.

The GIGANTIC Organ in the Catherdral. There are two.

Snake Statue in the Templo Mayor

So really lets sum up the city part of Mexico City pretty quickly. The museums are amazing. Their equivilent of Golden Gate Park is pretty other than the very very green water. The food was okay. The prices too high and the people not really that friendly compared to every were else. I was happy to get out of there, but because of some f the sights I dont regret going. Please enjoy the photos as I am going to just try to enjoy Oaxaca instead! Really we saw the sites and had some dinner a couple drink and went to bed each day.

A badger at the Anthro Museum.

Biggest Traffic Circle I have every seen

This is there big city park. It houses a couple museums and wonderful gardens.

A big castle that was originally a military college, then a few moer things. Now its a great national history museum

We got caught in a little rain storm on the way back to the hostel. I dont melt

Okay It time to find more food. I have a few more pictures to post from DF but I will get to them tomorrow, when I give the update on Oaxaca!

Pyramid of the Moon

So I know that I am about three days behind, but heck it is my vacation so no one can complain that much.  We have arived in Oaxaca and are absolutely loving it, but I will save that for a later post after I have taken a few more photos. I was rather more thirst and hungry today than photo happy.

So the mighty pyramids of Teotihucan… There are two. The bigger is the temple of the sun, which is the third tallest pyramid in the world. Only one inegypt and one other in Mexico is taller. The only part that isn{t very much fun is that it was built in many diffrent stages one on top of eachother and is essentially solid. No incredible and decadent tombs inside to tour. Never the less it was an amazing hike up to the top. Heck the city itself in about 2 miles long. The second at the far end of the complex was the pyramid of the Moon. Smaller and you could only climb up to the top of the first level.

One of the awesome murals

Some od the most interestng things at the site wre the eleaborate murals that covered the walls of the residential and temple structures.  It was nice to get away from the church theme for a little while I think.

Did I mention it was quite a walk up and down the pyramid of the sun.

So after that and a quick wander through the museum we went back into the little town next to the site… VERY LITTLE. It took us forever to find a restraunt, and we finally did. It was a little pricey but it was clean and there when I was starting to get faint from lack of food.  Then finally got back to the nice little hotel we are staying at! The next stop the hell of mexico city.

See I like the pyramids. Two thumbs up

So I know I am totally behind on getting anything up on even the Pyramids, and I plan on rectifying that as soon as possible, but for now just letting everyone know that we are safely in Oaxaca. More later on!

So I am going to play catch up on Queretaro this morning, and if I can find the facilities I will maybe talk about my day at the Pyrimids tonight of this afternoon. So we got into the Queretaro early in the day and booked into a cute little older hotel in the center of town. Literally right on the square. It was a TINY little room, but the location was too good to complain about. This being sunday the town was abolustly alive with people. This was great, except they were all at church too so we couldn´t exactly got and check out the amazing churches that it is famous for. Oh well we did get to see the city highlights of the aqueduct.

One of the highlights was getting to see a Aqueduct

Huge event going on outside the Main Church in town, couldn´t get inside.

Look a butress to hold up the Walls. I learned something in world history.

Awesome little candy shop with great young women runnig it.

One of the best highlights was stopping into a great local candy shop and chatting with the young women runnign the place. I was able to try the traditional apple brandy that they grow and make in Queretaro. It was fantastic and I bought a bottle. I also bought a box of goat caramels. The local specialty I was told.

Finally we found our way to dinner and decided since a well reviewed vegetarian place was just up the street from the hotel. We would eat light. Scott got a huge mixed salad and I got the fixed price 4 course meal. Fruit salad, asparagus soup, potatos and veges with tomato sauce and then a gramhm cracker thing for dessert. It also had a alafa water… very interesting… Then honestly we found a beer and went to bed. … LONG day on our feet. OKay time to grab some breakfast!

Cheers