Mexico - Oaxaca offers city, countryside, and sea

Oaxaca

In order to get to the south, I had to take a plane. And shortly after, I arrived in Oaxaca. A beautiful colonial city - again. And even though I'm at an altitude of about 1500m, it's incredibly hot. The city tour is a tough job again. First, I have a hearty breakfast in the restaurants around the Plaza. Then I visit the former Dominican monastery, which now houses a cultural center with a detailed historical museum. The thick walls provide some cooling. The streets are touristy with various galleries and museums of local artists. The city is also known for its good chocolate, but I don't have any appetite for hot chocolate in this temperature.

The next day, I go on a tour. The program includes one of the largest and oldest trees in the world, a mezcal factory, a carpet weaving workshop, and the mineral-rich springs 'Hierve el Agua'. So the day is well filled.

So, I still have to visit 'Monte Alban'. I'll do that with a short trip near the city the next day. I'm a bit late getting started, so I can visit the ruins in scorching heat. At least everything around is green. It seems to be rainy season, even though I don't notice much of it. I also wanted to visit the villages in the mountains around Oaxaca, but that turned out to be relatively difficult because there are no buses going to these areas. Something like this never happened to me in South America. There was always a solution or a carpool if you just waited a few minutes.

San José del Pacífico

Well, then I continue my journey towards the coast. It's about a 7-hour drive from Oaxaca to the coast through the mountains. There's a stopover halfway in a hippie mountain village called 'San José del Pacífico'. It's at an altitude of about 2600m, so it finally feels cooler. It gets really cold at night and it's also raining a lot at the moment. When it clears up, you can see the Pacific Ocean. But I'm already happy when the sun comes out a bit and I can look down on the clouds. There is still a lot of forest with fresh air around San José. The place is mainly known for its hippies and for Temazcal, which is a traditional sauna for cleansing body and mind. This suits me very well, since I've caught a cold and can't really get rid of it. Even the delicious hot chocolate in town doesn't help much, so I continue to the coast after a few days. And this time, it takes me only 3 hours to go from an altitude of about 2600m down to sea level. And accordingly, the road is winding. I'm constantly thrown from one side of my seat to the other. The drivers also see it as a race. They brake hard before every curve and then accelerate again in the hundred meters to the next curve until the whole maneuver starts all over again. In addition, there are all these speed bumps that have been randomly built into the road and also encourage full braking. Nevertheless, I arrive safely at the hot coast. From there, it's another hour to Puerto Escondido.

Coast

Puerto Escondido is a surfer hotspot in Mexico. Surfers from all over the world come here to ride the big waves. And so the hostels are also full, it's surfing season for the big waves. However, during the few days I was there, there wasn't much going on as the waves were rather calm. I still had my cold from the mountains, which wasn't very pleasant in the heat. So I took it easy during those days. The next stop was Chacahua, a hard to reach small beach town. First, a bus, then a shared taxi, then a boat, and finally on the loading area of a truck through the cactus landscapes of the coast. When I arrived there, I continued my recovery and spent two days hanging in a hammock, only getting up to swim and eat. Actually, you can see bioluminescent plankton there. But since it was full moon, it was too bright at night to see it glow. Nevertheless, it was beautiful at the beach during full moon. The last stop on the coast was Mazunte, another sleepy little town with a beautiful beach and tourist infrastructure. There's a museum with a turtle breeding station. Of course, it was closed during these days as well. So my timing was really bad! In the winter months, you can support hundreds of baby turtles on their way to the sea when they make their way after hatching, especially during a full moon. And I'm also on my way before the heat makes me completely immobile. I'm heading back towards the mountains, to Chiapas, to San Cristóbal de las Casas.