Rainy Day Women #12 & 35

After our time in Mexico City we decided to head 6 hours south to Oaxaca which is the art capital of Mexico with many Museums and Galleries throughout the City. On first impressions Oaxaxa looked more like what I thought Mexico would be with multi coloured buildings and smaller busy streets.

We managed to find an ok hostel and get a room in the courtyard. So it was off out to get something to eat and we found a nice bar called Decano (pretty dark just the way Chris likes them!). They even provided a sheet of paper and crayons for the big kids to draw with and being one of them it wasn´t long before Chris and I had filled our sheet with child like drawings. The burgers and tacos are also great in here.


Then we headed back to the hostel as the rain had started to fall, it turned out to be a thunderstorm that lasted all night so we sat in the hostel having a few beers hoping that the weather would improve the next day.

The rain had stopped the following morning, however, the sky was a bit overcast so we decided that today would be our day for seeing some museums. The first one we fancied was closed as they were changing their displays. The next one was closed that day and so on. We then had a look round the church of Santa Domingo with it's lavish gilded and coloured stucco artworks. Outside we bumped into Jeff who lives in San Antonio (Texas) who was also staying at the hostel and had a chat with him before wandering around the shops and stalls. We then had a lazy afternoon and caught up with some stuff on the internet.

That evening we headed back into Decanos for a few drinks and then the rain came on again and we decided to have a Dominos pizza on the way home (I know, I know but it's the first pizza that I've had in ages!!!). We sat chatting to a French Canadian for a while before heading to bed to listen to the rain getting heavier and heavier.

The following morning we got up and the rain had stopped and the sky had cleared a bit. We had breakfast as the hostel...forgot to mention this...consisted of torillas, black beans, eggs one day and spicy peppers and onions the next (For breakfast too!!). We had decided to walk up to the ruins at Monte Albán which took us about 2 hours zig zagging our way uphill. The site was first occupied around 500BC by the Zapotecs, but the hillside was flattened and temples were built around 200BC. In it's hey day over 25,000 people lived in the hillsides. The site has great 360 degree views. Most of the sites we visited had ball courts where the ancients used to sort out arguments by playing against each other - in this game where you had to get a bowl through a round hoop using your knees and head.


After walking back down and grabbing some lunch the rain started again!! So we headed to the Museum of Contemporary Art which had some great exhibitions on at present under the heading "Los Two Amigos" (Dr Laka and Abraham Cruzvillages). Dr Laka had sprayed many items (tv`s, plates, bikes etc ) half in pink and half in green and they where arranged over the floor in symetric patterns. Cruzvillages has taken many film and advertising posters featurning models from the 50`s and graffitied/adorned/added tattos, captions and other weird appendages. For more info on the museum click the link below.

http://www.museomaco.com/salas.html

Well we decided to go back to Decano (well they had a 2 for 1 offer on draught beer and cocktails) and the place was jumping....we had to wait a bit for a table but it wasn't too long before I spotted someone about to leave and I went over and asked if we could have their table..bonus as we wanted to eat....so after dinner we had a wee Marguerita can you believe that this was our first one!! Before we headed back to our final night in the hostel. Back at the hostel we sat in the courtyard with a few people and soon the conversation got round to American politics and Jeff who we had met the day before told us that he had to get out of the States because he couldn`t handle the place since Bush got elected for the second time (or the first time for real), it ended up with the group agreeing that the only way to solve America`s problems was revolution. We stayed up a bit longer than planned because James one of the guy`s we had been talking was about to become 21 once it went midnight.

Next day it was off to Puerto Escondido a beach resort on the bus. The bus took us through some fairly impressive hillside, but the only problem was that it was a long and winding road, so I couldn't really do much. We also seen quite a few condors gliding above us as we made our way slowly down to the coast. As we arrived in Escondido the place had perfect blue skys but within 10 minutes the heavens opened and we where lucky to get a cabin before being soaked. I`m not sure if lucky was the right term as there were more holes in the cabin than anything else and since we had decided to cook I was in the sweltering heat being attacked by mosquitos (unbeknown to me!). We sat on the balcony for dinner covered in deet with all our long clothes on....the rain was not for letting up!! And so to bed...the mosquito nets did stop us being attacked further but when I got up in the morning I had at least 30 bites from my ankles to my bottom....they seemed to love me, Chris only had a few bites and his don`t even swell up. It was still raining and as we were on the beach there was nothing much else to do - so we decided to head up to San Cristóbal. We never really liked the look of Puerto Escondido but it might be a nice place if we had seen it when it wasn`t raining or if we liked to surf. We spent most of the afternoon on the internet as the rain basically never stopped.

The bus journey was an overnight affair and the next day we woke up in San Cristóbal.
When we got out of the bus station we were offered a free taxi to a cheap family run hostal...it was only 4.50 for both of us for the night!! To be honest we didn't do much...but chill out, eat and avoid the night time rain. The only difference in this town was that after 10 mins of heavy rainfall the streets backed up and the roads became rivers with shin deep water to be ran through....we got soaked several times.



This is where we found our first real taste of what Mexican food can be like. One night we had torilla soup which was absolutely delicious and the next night in Las Margueritas we both had fajitas which were brilliant. To be honest up until then we had one or two really good (non Mexican) meals and quite a few were a mediocre fair.