Category: Mexico

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PLAYA DEL CARMEN – Quintana Roo, MEX

Today marks the penultimate day of the Mexico leg of this trip as I jet off to Havana, Cuba midday tomorrow. Apart from the usual end of trip group dinner, we all had the day to head off to all points of the tourist map on our “Pat Malone’s”.

I went on a bit of a 200 Peso taxi town tour for a couple of hours, before grabbing a bite to eat and heading back to my hotel room for an arvo of paying bills (yeah … yeah, I know I’m adulting while on holidays), finalising Cancun & Havana transfers and some Netflix chill out.

I have to admit it, I really didn’t get any of the vibe or buzz that others reckon Playa del Carmen’s good for, other than it’s JAFTT – Just A Farqin’ Tourist Trap. But I did love the artists work lining 5th Avenue during the later part of the evenings.

We all trundled off in a hired bus at 7PM and headed to Carboncitos, to be wined and dined on a travellers last supper where email addresses and auf wiedersehen’s were exchanged.

Speaking of perceptions – what did I think of Mexico?

Let me just put it out there to start with: we travelled over 3,700 kilometres (2,300 miles) by road and admittedly we were nowhere near the states bordering the US, in which the drug cartels and people smugglers seeming operate unencumbered by law enforcement, but not once were we robbed, assaulted, accosted, threatened or ill at ease – even with my 4AM morning walkabout’s.

A couple of interesting observations

  • The Mexican diet consists of huge amount of carbs & starch laden ingredients
  • Mexican food is not inherently spicy – you add the amount and level you want
  • Salsa to us westerners is not the same for Mexicans; it’s not a diced tomato affair, it’s the accompanying sauces you add yourself
  • Street food is fine – eat where it’s popular with the locals. My gastric issues were from a restaurant had plenty of positive online feedback
  • The further you head south into Mexico, the more fruit and vegetables you will see on your plate
  • As much as I wanted to like Mezcal, it’s not as smooth on the taste as people rave about
  • I’m head and shoulders taller the most of the Mexican, same-same as most Asian countries I’ve visited
  • The locals who I’ve interacted are hardworking, honest and funny people who are genuine in trying to help, even with our limited knowledge of each other’s languages
  • The only weapons to be seen were in the hands of the Federale’s and State/Local law enforcement, who seemed to have a presence on every street corner

It’d be fair to say that I thoroughly enjoyed the trip, even while not feeling 100% for the last couple of days.

A fair amount of the trip success goes to the “Lithiunian Legend” our G Adventures CEO – Irmante “Jumanji” Sungailaite, who was fun, knowledgeable, patient and great peeps. At times their job is like herding mercury with a toothpick and I for one certainly appreciate all the hard work and effort that often goes unheralded and I thank Jumanji for being her good self.

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PLAYA DEL CARMEN – Quintana Roo, MEX

With nearly two weeks on the road in Mexico, today was the first “sleep-in” day for the trip, in that we had a 10AM departure. With my gastric issues of the past few days, my body decided this was also the opportune time to let me sleep in until just after 7 o’clock – so I must be pretty crook for that to occur.

The plan for the day was to take a couple of hours and cruise into Playa del Carmen and then have the afternoon to ourselves before heading out in the evening for an included tour dinner.

All up it took us just over 3½ hours to get into our accommodations at the Portea Hotel, about three blocks from the Caribbean Sea.

I spent the afternoon exploring the so-called highlights of 5th Avenue including the beach and if you turned down the volume, you’d swear you’re in any over-commercialised, touristy area in the world – not my go at all.

I simply turned onto 5th avenue and walked barely 100 feet and was offered drugs, women, “special shows”, food, drink, tours and a facial – a facial FFS??? What tha??? I suppose it makes a change from the God Botherers who were looking to convert me earlier in the trip.

G Adventures has an in-house social project which encourages and supports locals in both improving themselves and their community and generally sometime during the trip, a visit is scheduled that is usually in the form of an information session/demonstration and a meal.

Tonight’s Planeterra Foundation visit took place in a local suburb at the El Hongo site which is bringing the arts to the local youths, which hopefully inspires them to take part in programs to develop their skills and give them confidence for a brighter future.

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VALLADOLID – Yucatán, MEX

After yesterdays shemozzle with shitting through the eye of a needle, I was looking forward to the new day bringing change of luck.

As we were leaving at 7AM, I was up at 4AM as per normal, packed up my gear, grabbed the laptop and headed out to the 24-hour Café La Habana for spot of breakfast and to update my Blog.

Not two blocks from the café, a garbage truck pulls up & loads up and then starts compacting its load as I walk past. You wouldn’t read about, but something exploded and I got covered with the foulest smelling liquid you’d ever have the misfortune of being sprayed with. What can you do other than grin and bear it? I get to the café, order a coffee and head to the men’s room to try and clean most of the crap off before eating.

We arrived at the world renowned Chichén Itzá site just on 9AM and my first impression was –  wow there’s a shit ton of people here. We were met by a very knowledgeable local guide, who lost my interest after taking ½ an hour just to explain the Mayan’s time-line in history, so I simply wandered off to explore on my own.

I ended up with most of the site information by listening to the various English speaking guides delivering their presentations to their respective groups, a trick I learnt years ago when not wanting to pay exorbitant guide costs in Bali.

I was done and dusted with the site in an hour and a half, then waited another two hours for the rest of the group to be done and arrive back at the bus. In speaking with our group, it looks as if they missed out on seeing the back 1/3 of the site due to time constraints.

Our departure corresponded with a huge influx of tour buses loaded with cruise ship passengers from the resort towns of Cancún (2½ hour drive) and Playa del Carmen (2¼ hour drive), which turned the joint into an absolute zoo.

My impressions of the site??? If it was the first pyramid, I’d have been impressed, but after 4 previous sites, Chichén Itzá would be way down on the list. Unlike the previous sites, you cannot go exploring in & around the site as you are kept well away from everything. The experience is also lessened by all the trinket and souvenir vendors that virtually encircle the entire interior of the site. The management and official facilities of the site seems to be somewhere in the Gordon Gecko “Greed Is Good” and government corruption mantras of “Give ‘em nothing, Take ‘em nowhere and Make ‘em pay for the lot”.

We got into the adjacent town of Valladolid and our accommodations at La Aurora Hotel Colonial around 2PM, which left the rest of the day to explore the town of approximately 50,000 in which I enjoyed strolling the colonial facades of the Calzada de los Frailes.

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MÉRIDA – Yucatán, MEX

Its only taken 3 weeks and a chicken enchilada meal, at the Menta Deli Rest in Campeche city, for me to start destroying the thunderbox with the squirts from 3AM this morning.

As much as I’d like to say I spent the day exploring Mérida like the conquistadors’ rather than Don Quixote, it was more like hopping from baños to baños, shitting through a flyscreen door without hitting the wire. The worst part was after about a dozen sit down orchestra performances, my freckle started playing Johnny Cash’s “Burning Ring Of Fire” with a fair amount of vigor.

After dropping of my dirty laundry at a local lavandaria I spent an entertaining ½ hour in a pharmacy explaining that I need something to “detener el fuego” (stop the fire) and pointing to my arse. God bless the poor lady assisting me and thankfully with her patience and Google Translate, we came up with a solution after discussing the merits of anti-bacterial gel, Preparation H hemorrhoid cream and several other tubes of undefined liquids. For all I know, the solution she provided could be infant teething cream, but it does the job with near immediate relief.

I caught up with a couple of the tour group for lunch at the Bistro Apoala for an amazing Snapper fillet with gnocchi, which was one of the best dishes I’ve had in a long while.

The rest of the afternoon was spent either in bed or on the throne, with the exception of picking up my laundry, which came in at 5.5 kilograms (12 pounds) and for for 70 Pesos ($5.18 AUD) it was professionally washed, dried and folded – talk about being a bargain.

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MÉRIDA – Yucatán, MEX

With today being Sunday, which marks the beginning of the daylight savings season here in Mexico, we lost an hour of sleep to begin the day.

Around 8AM all 16 of us piled into the Mercedes Sprinter van, filling all available seats and spaces and headed northeast to our first stop of the day, the Restaurant el Crucero in Campeche state, nearly 3 hours from Palenque.

From there it was the long haul portion of the drive – 3½ hours and 174 kilometres (108 miles) into Campeche city, where we had 90 minutes to grab some lunch, stretch our legs and hit the road again for Mérida.

We arrived at our accommodations at the Hotel Santa Maria just on 5PM and had an hour to freshen up, before heading out on an orientation walk. I used this time to simply fall into the hotels pool and then managed to go arse-up on the slick tiles surrounding the pool, smashing a decorative planter in the process. Talk about a bull in a taco shop!

The walks lasted nearly two hours as the town was full of locals and family’s, which added to a vibrant and fun atmosphere. Dinner was held at the locally renowned Restaurante Trovo Amaro, in which I was impressed with the pulled pork dish – Cochinita Pibil, consisting of Pork loin marinated in achiote, wrapped in banana leaf and accompanied with purple onion and sour orange sauce.

From there it was down to the Pipiripau Bar where I found their signature drink of the same name was very “more-ish” and totally dangerous as it was so smooth and refreshing.

Comment of the day came at dinner when paying the bill. One of the tour members, a Hungarian female teacher, who’s been living & working just outside of London for the past twenty years. She was scratching around for some change to pay the tip and as I had a heap of coins on me, I offer them up to her saying “I’ve got a pocket full of shrapnel if you want it”.

She looks at me and goes “You what?” I tell her that I have a heap of coins in my pocket she can use if she wants. She says “I’m glad you cleared that up – I thought you said you had a strap-on in your pocket” Ahhh, the English language – a lot of people speak it, not a lot understand it.

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PALENQUE – Chiapas, MEX

Today marks 3 weeks on the road and according to Polarsteps I’ve travelled just on 1,799 kilometres (1,119 miles) this week, for a total of 24,174 kilometres (15,021 miles) for the trip so far.

Most of the group decided to head out on a jungle walk from 8AM this morning. Having had many hard slogs though dense vegetation while living in North Queensland, I decided to pass on the morning walk.

We did plan to meet up with the group at 10AM for a guide walk through the Zona Arqueológica Palenque (Palenque Ruins). This saw us on the side of the road like natives and paying 10 pesos each (74 Australian cents) to ride on the “collectivo” local bus to get to the site.

The Palenque ruins date from 226 BC are claimed to be one of the best examples of Mayan structures, with the discovered areas covered up to 2.5 km² (1 square mile), but it is estimated that less than 10% of the total area of the city is explored, leaving more than a thousand structures still covered by jungle.

Compared to the Teotihuacán Pyramids and Zona Arqueológica de Monte Albán sites, the excavated Palenque site is considerably smaller, but a heck of a lot greener obviously – as they hacked the site out of the jungle.

After a couple of hours of climbing up, around and over the site, I decided to cough up the 20 pesos ($1.50 AUD) to catch the collective into Palenque township, located about 10 kilometres (6 miles) away.

After a great lunch at Restaurante Maya Cañada, where I had a grilled Chaya stuffed chicken breast with Xcatic sauce, that was absolutely brilliant.

From there it was siesta time and some serious time in the pool, while sampling mango margaritas – Fitzy happy much 😉

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PALENQUE – Chiapas, MEX

Even though I had a early morning wake-up call set for 3:30, I was up at 3AM to finalize the rest of my gear for our early departure.

We hit the road as scheduled at 4:30 AM, headed for Xoxocotlán International Airport, where we caught the Aeromexico AM2407 service to Mexico City which departed on time at 6:30 AM. With the short 1½ hour layover, we were back in the air on Aeromexico AM507 service to the Carlos Rovirosa Pérez International Airport in Villahermosa, Tobasco arriving at 11AM.

From there it was cramped 3 hour 140 kilometre (90 mile) bus ride to our accommodations at Hotel Maya Bell, which is located deep within the Zona Arqueológica Palenque (Pre-Hispanic City and National Park of Palenque), in the adjoining state of Chiapas.

I had every intention of heading into town to check it out over the afternoon, but had to change rooms as me and pedestal fans don’t have a good working relationship (I’ve had two catch fire over the years). It may have also had something to do with the frozen mango margarita’s, the lure of the pool, my DILLIGAF attitude or a combination of all of the above????

While a few of us were sitting around the pool, word filtered through that one of our female Irish group members had left their phone and passport on the bus and was trying to locate them …. without a lot of success unfortunately.

The evening was spent celebrating one of the group members’ birthday, that included Linda trying to belt the living suitcase out of her piñata – a fun way end to end the day.

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OAXACA – Oaxaca de Juárez, MEX

I decided to take advantage of a $40 USD ($55 AUD) “Oaxaca Highlight” day tour that was scheduled to last 12 hours.

First stop of the day was Zona Arqueológica de Monte Albán (Monte Albán ruins) located in the hills overlooking Oaxaca, about 9 kilometres (6 miles) away to the west. The site dates back to 650 BC and in its heyday, was the one of the greatest Zapotec ‘holy’ cities, with a population of over 30,000. It is estimated that only about 10% of the site has yet been uncovered.

As we were promised a late lunch, we stopped to stretch our legs at El Árbol del Tule (Tule tree) that measures 42.0 metres (137.8 feet) in circumference, before continuing on to the Petrified Waterfalls of Hierve el Agua (Spanish for “the water boils”).

Although the site name itself would certainly imply boiling water would be found, the truth is that you can actually swim in the three natural pools located within the area. The petrified waterfall name comes from the fact that the subterranean waters bubbling to the surface, move so slowly that the minerals actually attach to the waterfalls on the way down the mountain.

Just as we were about to leave, a storm blew through with plenty of thunder, lightning and rain which slowed our departure down by ½ an hour, while we waited for two people caught out in the elements.

When we were advised of a late lunch, I didn’t think 4:15 would be time, but here we are at El Famoso Buffet & Mezcaleria with an offering that looked and tasted to have been out for most of the day. A bit over an hour later, we stopped at Casa el Colibri Weaving Gallery which for me was about as interesting as watching paint dry.

Final stop of the day turned out to a whole lot more informative and enjoyable than the mezcal tasting from last night. Our hosts at Mezcal Don Agave took us through the whole process from plant selection to final packaging and distribution. We then sampled ½ a dozen of their products with the best for my mind was the mescal that was distilled with a chicken breast, that made the sipping liquor smooth and with literally zero back taste, which is what I struggled with at last night’s tastings.

We got back to the hotel right on 8 bells and as we had to get up before our 4:30 AM departure, I only had a time for a quick tub, pack & stack my gear and hit the fart sack to check the eyelids for holes.

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OAXACA – Oaxaca de Juárez, MEX

Everyone was up and out the door of the Gilfer Hotel at 7:30 AM, loaded into 5 cabs and off to the Autobuses CAPU for our 8:25 AM departure on the Autobus Ado service to Oaxaca de Juárez or more simply – Oaxaca (pronounced wuh-haka).

At 550 Peso’s ($40.16 AUD), the “Premier” seating service was quite enjoyable in a comfortable air-conditioned coach that seemed to be only a couple of years young. The 345 kilometre (215 mile) 6-hour trip passed seemingly in no time, with the exception of a head-on collision between a ute and an overtaking car, high up on the mountain range along the Puebla/Oaxaca border.

We checked into the Hotel Oaxaca Real and as our rooms had not been finalised by housekeeping, we headed off on an orientation walk that eventually took us over to the Mercado 20 de Noviembre where we parked up at the Comedor María Alejandra, where for a measly $15 AUD I thoroughly enjoyed a “Mexican counter lunch” of Tlayuda Mixta and 3 beers no less.

The dish consisted of a large 12-inch partially fried or toasted corn tortilla, covered with a refried beans paste, shredded cabbage, flat iron pork and beef, Oaxaca cheese , chouriço (a type of pork sausage) and a cilantro & chilli sauce …… which sounds like an odd combination, but awesome eating.

From there it was over to the Chocolate Mayordomo cacao/chocolate factory and then onto one of our CEO’s favourite bars for some happy hour cerveza’s and margarita’s.

After an early evening freshen-up, those of us who are a bit partial to adult beverages gathered at 9AM for a Mezcal tasting at the “Einstein of Mezcal’s” mezcaleria – In Situ. I settled on a sampling containing the Penca Verde, Agave Karwinskii and Agava Rhodacantha varieties and unlike tequila, these are a sipping spirit not shot materials.

I’d have to say that even when engaging the “correct” sipping technique of (a) exhaling all air in your lungs, (b) take a sip of mexcal, (c) breathe in through your nose, (d) swallow the mescal and (e) breathe out through your mouth, I found all three had a harsh after taste and not a smooth sipping experience at all.

A few of us ended up at the Praga Coffee Bar overlooking the Templo de Santo Domingo (Church of Santo Domingo de Guzmán) for a couple of nightcaps.

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PUEBLA DE ZARAGOZA – Puebla, MEX

As we have just the one full day in Puebla de Zaragoza (formally Heroica Puebla de Zaragoza and also known as Puebla de los Ángeles) – simply called Puebla, I decided to forgo visiting the nearby town of 324 churches – Cholula, or reportedly the largest Mexican pyramid – Tlachihualtepetl (The Great Pyramid of Cholula).

As much as anyone can form an education opinion on 24 hours in any place, I found Puebla to be an easy, safe and interesting place to get around in. The Spanish and Catholic influence is visible everywhere in the architecture and churches. The one-way street, hidden Mercado’s and hole-in-the-wall spots that open out to large courtyard restaurants, guest houses or commercial enterprises.

Highlight of the day for me was walking around the La Catedral Basílica de Puebla (Puebla Cathedral) and being wowed by the craftsmanship and décor of the building the commenced construction in November 1575 of its 14 lateral chapels and main altar – its simply stunning in its grandeur and intimacy.

I also took in the chapel of the Virgen del Rosario (Chapel of the Rosary), which is attached to the Iglesia de Santo Domingo (Temple of Santo Domingo) which apparently boasts 4½ tons of 24 carat gold leaf throughout the chapel. The amount of gold is impressive, but the church is not in the same class as the Puebla Cathedral.

Lunch was one of those “stumbled on to a hidden spot” deals where I was just looking through the street market doorways, saw a couple of the tour group members and decided to park up for a feed at Mesones Sacristia. In all honesty, it turned out to be a great spot for a casual lunch with authentic local cuisine.

I headed off on my own for the rest of the afternoon, with aim of trying to take some shots of a few areas that I’d scoped out earlier.

Tomorrow we’re off to Oaxaca, a 5-6 hour locals bus ride, so you should be able to work out how the evening will go – recharging electronic devices to reduce boredom and repacking.