3. Mexico - Over the hills and Faraway

covering 10 January - 18 January 2020

two photos from our hotel - so you can see what I mean about the landscape.
probably not what immediately springs to mind when you imagine what Mexico is like

From Oaxaca’s 4,800 feet we rose through the lusciously green forested hills to about 7,000 feet.  Nights are cool at this altitude and on both evenings we’re here someone appears and lights the wood fire in our room.  The landscape is green and has the appearance of a giant and extremely rumpled green blanket as far as the eye can see.  Close up, green, then paler green changing imperceptibly to blues of varying hues and finally the greys as the hills fade away in the far distance.  You can probably guess that I’m impressed.  Our room at the lodge is a detached wooden building with a roofed verandah facing onto a steep slope looking straight out at the green hills to the west.  A trip in the wrong place would lead to a tumble down a couple of hundred feet of undergrowth which would definitely be uninviting if you were crashing through it at speed.  We must keep off the Mezcal, the local distilled booze, a sort of upper class Tequila.  We learned that Mezcal is distilled from the heart of the Agave, a spiky leaved succulent which is harvested just before it flowers.  Agave is one of those plant oddities that die after flowering just the once.

our cabina

a scratch meal in front of the fire

The restaurant at the hotel is as unimpressive as the view is impressive and after a few spoons of soup, dinner was finished for us.  The following morning we walk to the village, San Jose del Pacifico which lies a few hundred yards up the main, though not very busy road.  The village is really no more than a refuelling stop but we were able to buy some meagre supplies for our dinner by the fire that evening.

 

Last year in Australia I finally gave up the pretence of backpacking by handing in my faithful ten year old pack for recycling at Kathmandu Outdoor Supplies and buying a case with wheels and hidden backpack type straps for if wheeling is difficult.  Heather had come to the same conclusion a couple of years back.  The following day we wheeled rather than carried our bags up to the village for our minibus trip to the coast four hours away.  This was an unpleasant ride.  Starting at 7,000 we rose to just on 9,000 feet before dropping to almost sea level.  The road swept through innumerable bends on what seemed to be almost the whole route.  Not hairpins which would have made the driver slow down but bends more the shape of the lower corner of a coat hanger.  We both ended up quite queasy and think the driver has probably topped the leader board for the fastest handicapped descent of the year.  His handicap included eating a sandwich, drinking a can of something and making a few phone calls.  Just like many drivers here, he didn’t bother with a seat belt, relying for safety measures on a collection of crucifixes hanging from the top of the windscreen.

looks pretty calm in the early morning

and this is from the same spot at the same time just looking in the opposite direction

Down at sea level it was hotter and stickier as we expected with temperatures in the high eighties to mid nineties F.  The Pacific was throwing up breakers as big as I’ve seen crashing very loudly on the beach just in front of our hotel room.  It was sand from our door to the sea and this bit of beach was for strong swimmers and surfers only.  Wimps got to go in a couple of hundred yards away.  We went in a couple of hundred yards away.  I’d thought this part of the coast was facing west but no, it’s facing due south so the next land to be met was the Antarctic if you cared to go far enough. 

our hotel is in there somewhere

feeling too hot so enjoying the Pacific view with the fan over the bed full on

unusual decoration at the hotel but it worked here

All four of us had met up again by this time and this was expected to be a slowish relaxing time.  It certainly was for me because I was out of energy and suffering in the heat.  I thought I might be getting less tolerant to humidity as I get older.   We met a couple from Minnesota who after a couple of days left for home where it was in single figures F, so somewhere around -15C.  Mind you they told us they go camping when it’s down to 15F so they’re obviously used to it.   In a place like this which is really just for visitors, there’s not really much chance to see locals except as waiters or in shops, so stories including Mexicans are difficult to find.   We do see buskers coming past every restaurant but they could be any nationality.  My blood tends to run cold when wandering minstrels appear especially if they decide to serenade my table.  Fortunately they usually stand at a distance, some not a great enough distance.  One young woman appeared one night with an accordian and she was very good, playing and singing in French.  Good enough to be rewarded by our table with applause and money.  The accordion is the butt of one of those musician jokes “a gentleman is a man who can play the accordion but doesn’t”.  At the other end of the scale to the accordionist (is that a word ?) were the two young women on another evening who were dreadful.  One strummed a guitar poorly and without looking round it sounded as if the other was strangling a cat (she wasn’t).  Fortunately the food on both occasions was fine.

sunsets were particularly fine so I've included several photos. 
Popocatepetl, a big volcano outside Mexico City had erupted so
there may have been dust in the air adding to the dramatic effect

Sadly for us, Bonnie and Newt were going back to Massachusetts at the end of this beach section with the real draw not being the snow but a freshly arrived grandson to Bonnie's daughter Anna and her husband Joe.

no not a skirt - a Sarong !

Heather and I got on very well with part of the Mexican population here but unfortunately it was the mosquito population which had a good feed at our expense.  So, on a day when I didn’t feel up to anything I laid on my bed with the mossie nets down, the fan going full blast watching the most wonderful view of the ocean with the pelicans gliding up and down.   Heather, Bonnie and Newt went on a very successful whale watching trip.  Humpbacks breaching individually and as a pair, dolphins, mating turtles plus the opportunity to swim with the dolphins.  Unfortunately they swam quicker than Heather was able to get ready so it was a lost opportunity although I don’t suppose anybody ever thinks to ask the dolphins if they actually want to swim with humans.

the dramatic effect was true for early morning too. 
these three shots are pre-dawn and taken over a period of only three minutes