Friday, December 17, 2010

Southern Mexico roadtrippin PT1

One week down in a month long road trip through the south of Mexico... So far, so good!

I'm travelling with a group of friends, Ines, the eternally happy Parisian, Raphael, the Provencal French rugby man, Alvaro, the crazy Spaniard and Miguel, the balance between everyone- calm and studious.

We rented a kangoo, a ridiculous French van, piled our backpacks, tent and reserve in the back and set off from Mexico City.
The first encounter was the Guadalupeans, as we´ve affectionally named them. These Guadalupeans embark on a pilgrimage to the Basilica of Guadalupe in Mexico City around the 12 of December from all parts of Mexico. They travel in big trucks and each person takes a turn carrying the torch along the highway all the way to Mexico City and back. and there were thousands of groups of them!

Mexico is a country of extremes, from the rich, US-styled Monterrey we arrived in the poor colonial town of Oaxaca. We slept in a freezing campsite and vistied the beautiful colourful Zocalo. The Mayan ruins of Monte Alban were impressive, as was the fiesta offering all sorts of Oaxacan delicacies such as banana tamales, balls of Oaxaca cheese and tarts. Delicious.

Next stop was Mazunte, a chilled out beach village. We got there very late so that only place we found to pitch the tent was in a the driveway of a lovely but crazy family. With hundreds of roosters going all night long!! Safe to say we didn't get much sleep that night. The next day we found a slightly more legit campsite called La Isla for 40 pesos each, set only 10 metres from the beach. We spent the day in the waves and the afternoon in the bar.

We changed it up a bit the next day and camped at Zipolite, an even more hippy relaxed campsite set on the beach. We spent a relaxing afternoon at the beach and the night in the bar. What a tough life!

We drove the next afternoon until dark and camped in the carpark of a roadside hotel for 100pesos in total. No the most comfortable night, but we were used to it.

We drove the next morning until San Cristobal de las Casas, and arrived in the freezing cold. After months in the steaming heat of Mexico we were in for a bit of a shock when night fell and the temperature dropped to freezing.

San Cristobal is a picturesque village, large but not overwhelming. It's surrounded by many tiny indigenous villages, thus you can buy local indigenous crafts and clothing everywhere and the local market is one of the most interesting in Mexico. The indigenous women and children still wear traditional clothing, very bright and colourful that begs to be photographed but they are very camera shy so its not welcomed. Ines tried to photograph one woman in the market and got a banana peel thrown her way.

We visited a Zapatista village (who demand democracy for all!) where we had to gain permission to enter, the village of Chamula with an odd church with pine needles on the floor and offerings of soda, eggs and chickens. Very eerie but incredible. We were swarmed by local children asking for money, food anything really, and Raph bought some fireworks which they seemed very pleased with. It was gorgeous!

After San Cristobal we returned to the heat of Pelanque.

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