Oaxaca (said: waa haka)
Trip Start
Feb 04, 2009
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5
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Trip End
Ongoing
Oaxaca, Central Mexico and Gulf Coast, Mexico
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
We went out for dinner and booze (well... dinner - then I went home to carry on my recovery from the food poisoning while Bev and the rest of them hit the booze). One of our group, Simon from the Netherlands, did not come home.
About 5am we thought the revolution had started outside... VERY loud explosions nearby... later we found out that lighting fireworks that ĄBANG! like cannonfire is just what Mexicans do as part of their parties. At any time day or night. But no revolution (today, anyway).
We had a tour with our group the day after. We headed high into the mountains to visit a place called Hierve el Agua (meaning The Water that Boils). It was a place of breathtaking views and cool, clean water. Well worth the drive. (The site is located about 70 kilometers east of Oaxaca city, past Mitla, near San Lorenzo Albarradas. Relatively small amounts of water -- which, despite the name, is not hot (25°C) -- bubble up from four springs and, running over the cliffs, evaporate. The rock formations, primarily of calcium carbonate, are left behind. This is much the same process as forms stalactites and stalagmites in caves, but in this case takes place on the side of a mountain). Awesome.
Then we carried on to a Spanish church built on the site of an Ancient Mayan Temple (a common place for them to build their churches, it turns out) but we skipped it and went to the quaint markets surrounding it. This is where we started out gift buying for nieces and nephews.
Next stop was a small village where we were shown the traditional method of creating the intricate and colourful weavings, carpets and tapestries which can be found all throughout Central America. It is a fascinating process, and it was great to meet some native Indian people still doing what their family has been doing for generations... but with much better English than you might expect.
Just up the road from here was the Mescal factory. Mescal is quite like Tequila... we saw the process from the freshly harvested Agave root, through the process of cooking, drying (smelly!), fermenting and filtering... all in the back yard of this tiny little Mescal shop. We then sampled EVERY ONE of their Mescal varieties (at least 10 kinds... I lost count) and promptly bought a cappuchino mescal bottle for later (if theyīd taken us here BEFORE the carpet/tapestry/weaving place, there would certainly have been more purchases made).
Last stop was an ancient tree which had grown into rude and amusing shapes (well... at least one of the shapes was rude... a bum, in fact :) Tee hee hee). Some formations were quite impessive, really... but most delightful was the little girl who acted as our tour guide for the tree... the only English she knew was the names of the formations and the extremely useful "ŋdid you see?" (if you didnīt see, she would move closer to you, point again, and ask again if we saw... eventually, we always did).
Upon our return to the hotel, we expected a shamefaced (but satisfied) Simon to be hanging around... but no. No Simon. Milton and Daryl (Simonīs Netherlands buddy with an awesome name) started hunting... calling cops and whatnot.
We went out and ate pasta al fresco on a second floor balcony. The beer was cool, the breeze was nice. The view was enchanting.
Home, to bed... at midnight was awoken by someone yelling my name and banging on a downstairs door. I ran out (thankfully only half nude) and saw Simon downstairs! Woo Hoo! Not dead! He had been arrested for public drunkeness and having an open bottle of Mescal in his hands (he swears he was being quite reasonable when arrested). The cops gave him 2 black eyes while arresting him (throwing him to the ground,) took his bag, held him for 24 hours with no food or water or phone call, then returned his bag (sans camera, wallet, phrasebook, sunnies and mobile phone) and let him out. Lesson learnt: donīt drink in public. And donīt trust the cops.
The next day, we wandered in the city, visited a museum, saw a street party, generally mucked about... then jumped on our first overnight bus... heading for San Cristobal... but that is another blog entry. Stay tuned.
