Fiesta Inn Oaxaca Hotel

... potholes and all. It was a stressful couple of hours.

And
that bridge...holy
freaking ****. My heart still stops thinking about it. it was like
going up and down a cliff. (Maybe 30-40 degrees grade. I'm NOT exaggererating)

Thank GOD we had a gooseneck,. Bumper pull
would NEVER have made
it. I really don't know how the girls stayed on ...

... 8217;s party).  It is a jailable offense for foreigners to participate in political demonstrations in Mexico, so I generally steer clear of anything resembling politics and admire from a distance.  Most of the famous landmarks here are covered in political graffiti.  It is an ingenious way of communication in a land where the majority still do not own televisions and many are illiterate.

 

Anyway, we leisurely headed back to the ...

Tampico is much nicer than Monterrey! The family we are staying with is really cool. They are Catholic, so we've had a good chance to witness. We gave the husband a book called "More than Conquerers" so he could practice his english..... We went out for Tacos and Gringas - Muy Rico! We have an overnight bus tonight to Veracruz, then on to Cordoba - exactly what everyone says not to do!

... food - that's right! Not for 7 hours! It was kinda tortuous, but we arrived to meet our host family. They are very sweet! We went to a taqueria to eat and talk! I forgot to mention that the taxi driver to the bus in Monterrey let us pray for him and because we did, he wouldn't take any money for the ride! Sometimes I don't know who is ministering to who more...us, or the people God sends us to...

... Fortin, with it^s endless trails and morning glory...the only time during the day when i try to collect fresh air in my body, look down to city and trying to recognise what and where through the grey smog grown over the valley.. the city itself is beautiful...and always in action... music, dancing, children dressed in custumes, mimes performing comedies, street vendors and huge crowd fallowing.. i^ve fallen in love with the markets here...being still ...

... around town, at the smaller market where we had the most incredible seafood cocktails with oysters, prawns, octopus and ceviche. We went to the other market which was huge and busy, Francisco spent the entire day searching for empanadas which are actually from Argentina. He asked everyone in the whole market, it was scorching hot and we got nowhere fast. I got massively ****** off with his dawdling and indescisions and eventually Lucy ...

... female religious) to live but, in more difficult times, a place where some of the Mexican army was stationed. (Now that really does it!) Most of what we would call the churchyard, as in Grey's Elegy, is actally a huge Botanical Garden - which is a totally awesome sight as seen from the second and third floor balconies of the museum. This floratic (don't use this for Scrabble) garden contains several indigenous trees, vines, etc. that are no longer seen in Mexico.

... and say we were planing to travel around Mexico for a couple of months or go to the other border crossing. I had done so much research that I figured the Old Bird had no idea what he was talking about, or, he was trying to scam us. We went to the border and go through without any problems and no deceptions about our intention to travel directly to Guatemala and beyond. There is a lot of flooding in Matamoros, the other side of the border in Mexico. We ...

Since we were leaving that day around noon, I had several hours to explore the neighborhood.

... they lack the SRO turnout. Seeing all this, I begin to think about my time in Guatemala when Pope John Paul the somethingth died. Just below the mourning was a sincere hope that the next pope would be from Latin America. He wouldn´t be. The heart of the Church is in the developing world, but the hand remains in Europe.

Anyway, all that standing/ sitting/ kneeling got me hungry, so I headed over to the comedor (eatery) section of the market. Most of the ...