Into the Mountains to Ruins, Pools, the Jungle and the Forest

When we lived on Maui we decided to visit all the Islands, including the two smaller ones of Molokai and Lanai.  Molokai had fought and won against the cruise ships so they were not allowed to port at the island, while Lanai allowed the Four Seasons Resort to build two hotels on the island.  On the ferry over to Molokai most of the other passengers were locals returning from jobs on Maui to spend the weekend with family.  The first question we were always asked was where we were staying, followed by the question, when we were leaving.  The message was clear enough, we were welcome for a brief time but not welcome to stay forever.

Chiapas is the state that separates Mexico from Guatemala on the western side of the country.  It is one of the poorest states in Mexico and in the 1990’s unsuccessfully fought a guerrilla war to gain its independence from the rest of the country.  I am not sure if it is the result of isolation or from a want of independence but it is the least friendly state we have been in Mexico.

We woke in Hutulco early after a late night, the second in a row where we were up past 11… not something we are used to, even before we left on the trip, we were the only guests that made it out of bed besides Charles who was down working on his boat. 

 

We got the scoop from Roberto about where to stay in Chiapas our next destination, his suggestion was either Chiapa del Corzo or San Cristobal de las Casa and then Agua Azul and Pelenque.  With that we loaded up the car and headed out on what Roberto assured us it would be a 4 to 5 hour drive, we knew we drove much slower and planned on 6 hours, it took 8.  We had driven from sea level to 7,500 feet and when we left it was 86 degrees compared to the 56 degrees when we stopped. 

 

San Cristobal de las Casas maybe a charming town, we didn’t really explore it, it was the first place we really encountered difficulty with the dogs.  We finally found a hotel on the far side of town that would take them and let them sleep with us in the room, but by then it was 6:30, we were tired, hungry and sleepy.  I think the only reason they accepted the dogs, was that we were one of two rooms being used.  The Villas Vanessa is beautiful and I can imagine that it gets completely booked with people escaping the heat of the low lands, it would be a beautiful place for a wedding or a quincenera, but in mid March, before semana santa it is empty. 

Up at the crack of early the next morning we headed out to the water falls and swimming holes of Agua Azul.  I had read mixed reviews of Agua Azul and I have mixed reviews to give.  The first impression was a bit chaotic, with paying the entrance fee and trying to explain the group of women selling bananas and tamales that we were not interested, then to the parking area.  Once we were settled we started to explore the falls and pools.  There are three main pools for swimming roped off for safety, and each is separated from the one above by a waterfall.  It is lovely. 

After passing the first set of falls Fritz looked at me and said, “Wow, this place is really a tourist trap isn’t it?” which is the sad part of Agua Azul, lining the path are stores selling everything from shirts to key chains, and in front of every restaurant is someone waving you in.  The worst part about it is the 5 peso charge to use the restroom, this on top of the 100 peso charge for entering the park. 

They even charge 30 pesos to cross a foot bridge and there you can also hire a guide to take you to the less crowded pools.  We enjoyed our time there and not wanting to drive at night “camped” in the car that night in the parking lot.  The last tour bus pulled out around 6:30 and the first one was there at 7 the next morning.  It was a weekend so I assume it was a bit more crowded than during the week, but we counted over 15 buses during our time there.

Around 7:30 we headed for our next stop, the Mayan Ruins of Planeque.  We camped at a cute little spot called Maya Bel, filled with back packers, overlanders and people renting cabanas.  We hired a guide for a tour of the jungle, which I would recommend as one could easily get lost in the thick growth that surrounds the ruins. 

After a sweaty hike we exited the jungle on the tomb of the wife of the great ruler of Planeque, the difference from the jungle to the city that was there before was amazing, made more so by the fact that when the ruins were first rediscovered they were covered by the jungle.  Our guide explained that the Mayans that lived there had been the architects of their own demise, deforestation lead to changes in the climate and after a while droughts made it impossible to live in the area, a lesson for all of us in this time of global climate change. 

Hot, tired and starving we headed back to the main town a rather ugly dusty place filled with Elektras (think Best Buys), Oxxos (think 7-11) and shabby hotels, tacos in our belly it was back to the campsite to swim in the pool, share stories with another couple traveling around Mexico and watch the Howler monkeys play in the trees.
 

We thought about staying another day but decided to head out the next morning and move closer to the Guatemalan border so we could cross easily the following morning.  After being stopped repeatedly by young children holding ropes across the road begging for pesos we decided rather than retracing our steps the whole way back to San Cristobal de las Casas we would cut across from Ocosingco to Comitan.  The trip saved us about 5 hours but we were stopped twice by groups of men with makeshift blockades demanding 50 pesos to continue on our way.  Once in Comitan we headed to the Lagos Montebello and stumbled upon the Cabanas Esmeralda.  There we met a family from Mexico City who currently live in Chiapas and watched a pick up soccer game and gave them a Frisbee to play with.  They also invited us to join them on a day trip to the lake where we could use their Kayaks and teach the kids how to Stand Up Paddle Board (kind of funny as we are still learning ourselves).

This group of people has helped to change our minds about Chiapas and as we cross into Guatemala makes us sad to be leaving Mexico.

 

Hualtulco… Beaches, boats and Wonderful People

I am 5 years old as I follow my sister down the winding jungle path.  The path goes from my Uncles house, the one where the mangos fall on the tin roof and then roll off to the ground, to the Kauai Surf, where she and I play on the beach and sneak into the pool reserved for guests.  But this path is a bit different, mixed in with the tropical plants are cactus, and a large Iguana darts passed us on an empty but perfectly manicured street where soon large houses for rich foreigners will be built.  The beach is actually a large cove that looks like it would be great for snorkeling if the drop off and current wasn’t quite so severe, but the doggies get to run free and chase a ball that soon gets lost in the ocean.

We didn’t find the beach by chance but were shown were it was by Roberto the manager of the hotel where we are staying in a lovely little town called Hualtulco.   The town is a little development that is becoming a resort town, the hotels and restaurants cater to visitors from Canada, Mexico and from the people we’ve been lucky enough to meet from all over the world.

 

Our first night we eat at an amazing Italian Restaurant run by man who left Italy to live in German and a few years later found himself here.  After some white wine (the first in almost 6 weeks), some tequila and conversation with a Canadian Ex Pat and her German father, we return to our hotel with directions to a beach where we can take the dogs, snorkel and “must try the Camerons ala Diabla”.  At the hotel we meet a lovely couple originally from India who are on vacation from Grad School in North Carolina and learn more about the couple Roberto and Blanca who with their beautiful chocolate lab run the hotel.

The next day we adventure out to San Agustin beach, a short 20 minute drive to a long dirt road that ends in another bay, where we swim, drink beer, eat and watch the locals sell necklaces and Banana Boat rides to the mostly Mexican tourist that visit the town.  We also meet another Roberto, from Spain, who just finished a movie about the children who ride the train from Guatemala to the US in search of a better life. 

The next morning, Fritz gets another guest from our hotel to look at our solar set up to see if they can figure out why the fridge isn’t running right.  Charles, an American, who currently lives in Germany, is restoring a Trimaran which will go in the water on Saturday so he can sail through the Panama Canal and back to the Azores Islands off of Portugal.  If the road wasn’t calling us this is a place where we could stay for quite a while, so for now we will spend another day exploring its beaches and tonight we will celebrate with Charles the completion of his work on the boat.

Our plan was to leave in the morning after the party, but that changed and we hit yet another beautiful cove to dust off the boards and get wet.   Tonight there is another BBQ and tomorrow we will return to the truck with a cold fridge and try to find another place as welcoming as this, only this time in the jungle.

 

 

Zapolite “Dude” and Zapotengo no Frogs only Crocodiles

I like to think of myself as a liberal.  I believe in the legalization of Marijuana, I believe you should be able to marry whomever you choose, I have even been to a Grateful Dead concert (and I can’t say that I remember it) and in case you’ve forgotten I currently live in a truck.  Still there are some things that are too much for me, Male Naked Jogging at 6 AM (before my first cup of coffee) is one of them.

We left Oaxaca early in the morning, ready for the 6 to 8 hour drive through Puerto Escondido and to Puerto Angel.  Puerto Escondido had changed even more than Oaxaca but not in such a charming way, the rule that I had heard about where no hotel could be higher than a palm tree had been forgotten, and the ExPats outnumbered the waves.  We quickly moved south toward smaller towns and emptier beaches in Puerto Angel. 

We turned off the main highway where the sign indicated and began looking for a place to camp.  Our first location was an “Eco Camp”, they wanted $350 pesos for a bathroomless cabana and $150 pesos to camp in the parking lot.  It didn’t suite us and as we still had some daylight left we moved on.  We stopped at a hotel about 30 minutes (and maybe 10 kilometers) later still searching for a place to camp, in I went to see if it would work for us and our two dogs where I quickly ran into the hotels two giant (and snoring) Rottweiler’s. Knowing it would be a no go I asked a man selling snorkeling tours if he knew a place where we could stay.  He very happily took us to an interesting town called Zapolite.  I thought from my research that I was

 

 

prepared for Zapolite, I knew it was a hippy little place, with a clothing optional beach, what I didn’t know was that that was the only beach and that Hippy isn’t quite a strong enough word, it is more like a Rainbow Community that is trying to become a “Resort” town.  The only thing that out numbers the joints on the beach are the hotels and the bars, which are open from 6 to 6… that is night to morning!  We ended up staying two nights (we took a snorkel tour which was lovely but got us back too late to leave the first night) and were awakened at 4 AM on our second night by a drunk sitting in our camp, on our chairs speaking very loudly on his cell phone, he left eventually but was a bit put out that we didn’t offer him a beer!

Besides seeing whales, turtles and bunches of little fishes, the snorkel trip also gave us a great tip on a place where we could camp, Zapotengo, so off we went not sure what we would find.  The dirt road was a good sign, it looked like a place where we could camp undisturbed and when we got to the beach this is what we found.  Adriana who runs the restaurant lives on the site with her family.

The cabanas are available to rent

Or you can camp for free, though eating at the restaurant is welcome and recommended, if you can make them understand that you want to eat. 

When we were there the waves were beautiful, huge and dangerous, but this isn’t always the case, usually the beach is swimmable

And if you arrive around the 3^rd of May they have a party for Santa Cruz at the church above where we were parked.

 

Oaxaca you haven’t changed that much… but you’re “Ruined”

When I was young between High School and College a girlfriend and I took an adventure to Mexico.  We studied Spanish at a language school for a few weeks living with a family in Cuernavaca.  After our studies were over my friend went to Guadalajara to meet a friend and I went to Oaxaca. 

If you have ever been young and in love you will understand how I felt about Oaxaca.  It was beautiful, colorful and fresh.  I discovered the city on my own.  Exploring the Xocalo, the people selling flowers and birds off of their heads.  And being alone made all the difference in the world.  It was exciting and fresh and liberating in a way that I hadn’t experienced before.  I was there for just a couple of days, I climbed the grassy hills of Monte Alban the “University of Priests” where the ancient peoples came to study and ate the most delicious Mole, it was wonderful. 

Returning a few years later (more than I would like to admit), it has grown and changed and still I love it the same as I did when I was 20.

We drove in taking the pay roads the whole way and escaping from the freezing cold of Puebla, and at first I didn’t recognize the town.  Where before there had been hillside we were greeted by traffic and mechanics, but after a few great directions from Greta we were right in the historic center of town.  The Xocalo had changed from people selling flowers and birds into people selling balloons and trinkets but the charm of the city was still there.  Everywhere people were out walking around, street performers putting on a huge puppet show for hundreds of children and the energy of the city I remembered. 

After taking care of some needed suspension reinforcements on the truck (yes we took way to much stuff with us and are paying for it on every tope) we headed off to Monte Alban.  On the way through town to the grassy ruins we saw some of the changes the town had undergone.  Now there was a SuperMega and a Cineopolis where before there was empty space, but the biggest change was Monte Alban itself.

 Where I had once climbed half uncovered ruins, virtually alone I now found a fully excavated and restored city.  In the last 20 years they have learned that Monte Alban was the cultural and geographic center of the first City State in Mexico, the ruins stretch for over 20 kilometers and they are continuing to uncover and discover more about the peoples who once lived there.  The progress that they have made on the ruins is amazing and made me love the city all the more. 

 

Puebla, I can’t feel my face…

We rolled out of Teotihuacán early in the morning, so early that we decided to take the free road to Puebla.  It was only about 137 Km or 70ish miles so it should have taken us about 2 or 3 hours, that was even factoring in getting lost, which we try not to do.  Almost 5 hours later we rolled into Puebla, we hadn’t taken into account the Topes.  It was still an easy enough drive and Gretta Garmin got us right to our Hostel, a cute enough little place with parking for our truck about a block away, a first floor room with a courtyardish place right out front. 

 

We settled in and took a walk around 3:30, up to a huge park two blocks away.  At around 6 we decided to get something to eat, they have two different types of tacos from a spit there, the first our favorite Al Pastor and the second wasn’t pink but is now my new favorite.  The problem was by the time we were done with the first taco the second was cold, not just chilly, cold and not just cold, ice cold.  Puebla was cold, and not just chilly, but I can’t feel my face cold, or finger’s or toes cold.  We quickly retreated to the hotel room and planned out our next day.

Usually when getting to a place I get on line, figure out what we want to see and then in the morning we head out, here we ran into the first problem with the hotel, their wifi was out.  We switched to the backup plan of finding a map and figuring it out as we go and hit the hay fairly early.  Around 6 AM (our usually early riser get out the door time) we were getting ready to take the doggies back up to the park, find some coffee and get going when we ran into problem number 2 with our hotel.  They had turned off the water!  Because the temperature dropped down below freezing the night before, they completely shut down the water to the whole place.  This wasn’t much of an issue as there was no way I was showering that early in the morning, but toilets need water too.  We woke up the Senora of the hotel and she said the water would be on in a little while and off went to take care of the dogs and get coffee, but the gate was locked, which meant waking the Senora again and then again a ½ hour later (it took us that long to find the coffee) by which time we really couldn’t feel our face, fingers, toes or ears.  Man when I say Puebla is cold I mean it.  By 10 am we decided we were done with Puebla (the temperate didn’t get much about 45 there that day according to weather.com) and we decided to take off for warmer Oaxaca. 

We carried everything out to the sidewalk where I sat with the stuff and two dogs while Fritz walked the short block to get the car.  About 20 minutes later he came strolling back, without the car.  The Garage was closed and no one had any idea when it would be opened.  I really wish that I had a picture to share of “homeless Trisha” sitting on the street, shivering, with two dogs on her lap, or better yet a picture of the various strange looks I got from the people who made rather large circles around me as they walked by.  About an hour later, someone opened the garage, not the company that ran it, but a man with a key who had his car parked there.  We jumped on that opportunity and rescued our vehicle and escaped from Puebla.

The drive from Puebla to Oaxaca was great, there are quite a few funky little towns in between and a huge market where trucks sell their wares right on the side of the road.  It made up for the lack of cultural experience we had in Puebla, though one day we might go back, but not until summer!