From Oaxaca to Palenque

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Originally uploaded by theslaad.

We hung out some more with people from the hostel in the evening in the end, so it was quite a quiet one, but fun and late. We got up the next morning and went back to the market that we had eaten in the previous day. It was very cool. There were piles of dry chilies in baskets, all different sorts.There was an aisle full of huge piñatas - snow white, spongbob squarepants, you name it, it was there. There were also stalls selling packets of mole ingredients. If we were coming straight home form here we would have bought some, but it wouldn´t travel very well in our rucksacks. Also in town there were a couple of shops selling the bitter chocolate. We bought a bar - 52% cocoa solids, so we´ve been eating it in very small quantities!

That evening we caught an executive(!) overnight bus to San Cristobal de Las Casas. We had a lot of leg room, enough even for Chris, and there were tv screens. In our guide book it had said that usually films are in their original language with Spanish subtitles, but unfortunately for us, they were dubbed. We got a little sleep and arrived early enough in the morning to check into a hotel and have a bit more sleep. We did have to have an extremely confusing conversation with the receptionist though. He came up to our room a few minutes after we´d checked in and started saying things we didn´t understand. We think he was just trying to tell us that we had to check out the following day at 1pm, but we´re still not really sure!

Refreshed and ready for more exploring we headed out into San Cristobal. We were quite intrigued about this area. In 1994 there was a rebellion by The Zapatistas, who overran the city wearing balaclavas and wielding guns. When the Mexican government tried to oust them, the people of the city refused and gave the Zapatistas their support. It all stems from there being such a large indigenous population in the area, who are somewhat overlooked by the Mexican government. As we were walking around, there were quite a few men standing around in uniforms carrying assault rifles, we don´t really know who they were!

The indigenous people make very nice crafts, so we had a look around the large market and bought a couple of things. We also encountered some children who wanted to know our names, ´for school´, after we´d written them they asked us what donation we´d like to make to the school. We gave them a bit of money, hoping it goes where they said it would. When we walked up to the San Cristobal church we met some more children doing the same thing. We gave them 50p or so and then went to a stationers and bought a packet of pencils, so that the next children we meet can just have those instead of money!
The walk up to the church was worth the effort, as we could look out across the city. A beautiful blue church that we had walked past earlier, really stood out. That evening, we ate in the best restaurant so far in Mexico - Emiliano´s Moustache. The food so far has been quite hit and miss. It is very different to our idea of Mexican food. For a start, there´s hardly any cheese, and the cheese you do get is crumbly goats cheese. Most dishes involve a small amount of slightly dodgy meat, tortillas and mole. Some of the mole we´ve had has been great, and some pretty tasteless. It´s not spicy either, but usually there´s spicy salsa on the table for you to add. Both our tummy´s are feeling slightly upset by the food!
In Emiliano´s, we had tacos. There were lots to choose from. On our table there was 2 different salsas, a mole, limes and onion & corriander. When the tacos came, it was meat sizzling on a plate accompanied by lots of soft tortillas. It´s very hard to know what you are going to get, but that was pretty good!

Yesterday morning we caught a bus to Palenque. A shorter ride this time through some very verdant scenery, quite surprisingly so as this
is Mexico´s dry season. Our guide book reckons that all Palenque has to offer is it´s ruins, and it´s not wrong! The town seems very polluted, and there´s not much to see really so we got some dinner and then watched some tv in our room.

Today we caught a collectivo (a vw van) to the Mayan ruins of Palenque. They are set in amongst the jungle, so it was very hot and humid walking around them, but it did make it all look very cool. Talking of temperature, it has been pretty hot and dry in the day up unitl now but then with very cold nights. In Oaxaca, I stood with a blanket around me! Since we got to Palenque it has been hot all of the time, it´ll probably stay that way for the rest of time here as we´re mostly staying at sea-level.

Anyway, the ruins looked very cool, and it would have been spectacular in all it´s glory. The attached museum had intersting artefacts that they found in the tombs, including jade death masks.

Tomorrow we are getting another bus, this one´s headed for Campeche in the Yucatan.

Some other things that we have forgotten to mention about Mexico - there are a lot of VW Beetles. In Mexico City, about every 4th car was one. Also we are surprised by the small number of people who can speak English, and are pleased that we took some lessons in Spanish before we came here.