Don’t eat at Wahaca
I didn’t realise the reason why the Mexican-style chain in the UK was called Wahaca until someone told me Oaxaca is pronounced wa-ha-ca. If you want to know about how white people bastardise and appropriate other cultures, I guess you don’t need to look any further. Alas, this isn’t a post about how terrible some of these generic chain restaurants are, but while we’re here though, some other establishments to avoid are: Wagamamas, Nando’s, Byron, GBK, Pizza Express. My response to whatever your reaction is either “you’re welcome” or “don’t be a basic bitch”.
Anyway.
It’s my first long bus journey to Oaxaca de Juárez (or just Oaxaca for short), and the bus ticket is half the price of the ticket to Guanajuato, but is twice the distance, so I’m wondering why until I board the bus - there are no toilets, and has slightly more seating (read: tighter) than the buses I have taken thus far. This is one of the problems as a single traveller (and one that can only say some basic words of the local language), even though I’m sure there’s plenty of time for me to get out of the toilet and back into the bus at one of the three stops, there’s no one that’s going to be screaming and yelling for the driver to stop if they happen to leave without me. At least I hope my friends would do that for me. Long story short, I hold whatever liquid or solid waste in my body for about 8 hours.
Meeting new people
On the whole, I think Oaxaca is the single point where I make the most friends in Mexico. I guess for the sake of this blog, I’ll just name those that will pop up in future posts. Also, I don’t quite remember the chronology of the who I meet. One of the first guys I meet is Brayden; another Aussie guy living in “Melbourne” (if you count Frankston, or any part of the peninsula “Melbourne”). Then I meet his girlfriend, Laura, a day later. They are important names to remember, because they will pop up more than once as my trip through Mexico continues. Timo, from Germany (because there are always Germans in any backpacking hostel) will also travel to Puerto Escondido later on. Dale, from Canada, also goes to Puerto Escondido, but we have very little overlap there. There are others, and by now I’ve forgooten many of their faces and names.
Let’s rewind first a little though. After I check into the hostel in the afternoon, I message Felix (see part 1 for his origin story) to find his whereabouts; he’s on a tour with his friends and will be back in the evening. There’s a BBQ and happy hour on the roof of the hostel, so I decide to eat have dinner there for convenience sake and to check out the atmosphere of the hostel. A few drinks in, and card games later, we head out into town to meet up with Felix. We end up at a bar called Txalaparta, a lively place where a DJ is playing music on the balcony, but there are many rooms and it stretches back with a separate section upstairs. However, given that I have a full-day tour booked the next morning, I sensibly return to the hostel at a decent hour.
Prior to boarding the bus, I had booked another AirBnB experience to a couple of tourist spots. It was super-cheap compared to what others were asking for, but I still reluctantly book it as it is only running the day after I arrive with the rest of the week unavailable for booking. Normally, I like to get my wander the streets for at least a day before I spend a whole day in a van moving from place to place. Even if we’re only sitting most of the time, and can take naps along the way, it always drains the life out of me by the end.
Beware of the Spanish!
There are a couple of Spanish words that are important to know, not because they’re essential for travel, but not knowing them may get you in hot water. Quite literally. Hot is caliente, so on some taps, the tap for hot water is labelled “C”, it does not stand for “cold” (that’s “F” for frio). Similarly, some toilets label “M” for mujeres, or “women” (and H for hombres). Before boarding the bus to Oaxaca, I was checking the bus ticket and noticed that it said “MAR 10 FEB”; only reading the first part, I immediately thought I mistakenly booked for March, but realised it was fine when I saw “FEB” - Martes, or Tuesday, was shortened to “MAR”.
Oh-Wow-ca!
The tour sets off in the morning and I’m gathered with a mix of Spanish and English speakers. We are taken into one of the vans that I have become familiar with whilst touring in Morocco. Unlike in that situation though, I’m fine with taking the single seat here since most people are travelling in twosomes. Our guide for the day explains the itinerary in both languages, transitioning seamlessly between. Although, I am in no way fluent in Spanish, I have started to grasp some very basic verbs and nouns to know that she’s also translating her jokes, queuing laughs at similar times.
Our first stop is a tree. Like, a really big tree. It’s called Árbol del Tule (Tule Tree). It’s super wide and when we are just standing outside the park, about 50 metres away from the entrance, I feel quite underwhelmed. It doesn’t look particularly interesting, despite how our guide hyped it up in the van. She tells us that you can see different things in the tree; shapes of animals, people’s faces, etc., but does inform us that these are mostly imaginations of kids, and maybe as adults, we might need to squint that little more to see them. To enter, there’s a small entrance fee, apparently to fund to keep the water-thirsty tree alive, and as we we step inside the gates, we are towered over by the tree. The branches and leaves spread high and wide and hanging over us; it is much more spectacular seeing it up close than afar. Despite taking some photos, I am not particularly happy with the outcome; sometimes I just can’t get it to look like the scale that I want it do.
Next, we are driving towards the main event, Hierve el Agua, it has a waterfall without any water falling, but instead it’s a rock formation that resembles a cascade of water. The formation is created by the oversaturation of calcium carbonate in the water flowing over the cliffs (you can tell that I’ve wiki-ed this tidbit of information). There are two pools on one of the cliffs, with one sitting near the edge, both of which visitors can swim in, with a magnificent view as we relax in them. There is an option to hike down to see the waterfall up close, but as a lover of water, I change into my bathers and jump into the pool.
After an hour or so, it’s time to get changed and grab some chow! It’s a buffet, and there’s a huge array of food choices, but I gravitate to a Chinese-like pork stew, and pouring it over rice like I would with Chinese food. I also sample other offerings, but when I go back for seconds, I go for the stew again, and maybe one more time after that - it is a buffet after all, and Chinese people are taught well to take this advantage. There are also a few choices of mole, which I learnt how to make in Guanajuato, after one of the Spanish classes, more specifically, mole poblano - it’s a sauce of fruit, chilli, nuts, spices, but in this variant, dark chocolate is also added. I’m not a huge fan, but mostly because they use chicken breasts, which are prone to get dry and overcooked.
We end our day at an archaelogical site called Mitla, or maybe the whole town is called that? I don’t remember. I think it’s supposed to be quite an important place in history, but you know by now that unless it looks interesting, it really doesn’t hold my attention.
Best-laid plans
Sitting around the common dining area for breakfast, a few of us plan to go on a walking tour, and then catch a taxi, car or colectivo to Monte Albán - another archaelogical site just kilometres away from the centre. The walking tour apparently starts at 11 in the morning, but when we arrive outside the church (like many Latin American town centres), we can’t see any tour guides; we’re told that sometimes they can be late - “Mexico time”.
So we wait.
And wait.
Until about half an hour in, we decide that this isn’t happening after all, and we’ll walk around ourselves. Before then though, we see a group of men holding up signs in protest. From what I’m told, it has something to do with the miners being unhappy about the projects happening, maybe to do with safety conditions. After nosing in around with our cameras, we make our way to a nearby market, walking through a street market as we do. As usual, because I’m not in souvenir-buying mode, I just browse casually while the others peruse the stalls. And well, they are taking their time, two of the guys break off to do some street photography while I stick around with the rest.
Eventually, and I really mean eventually, we start heading closer to the actual market that we want to go to. Even then, I’m not so fussed about going there, due to the same reason above, but I just want this herd to move along. Finally arriving at Mercado Benito Juarez, we similarly break into small groups or singles to walk up, down, left, and right through the aisles of shops. I browse with the utmost indifference, only to offer some suggestions and opinions when others are searching for presents for their family back home.
By the time we exit the building that houses the market, it’s already 1 o’clock, and my stomach is aching from the lack of food. A guy suggests a restaurant a little bit of a walk from where we are, quite close to the hostel, but only 3 of us go. A couple of them exchange numbers so that we can meet up later to go to Monte Albán. When we arrive for lunch, it’s quite a fancy affair, with its fancy prices (read, expensive), but sometimes you just have to let go of your purse-strings and pamper yourself. Since it’s fancy, we get our salsas made to order in front us, customising the taste to our preferences, but we keep it mild for those who can’t take the heat. White people, you know! (Yes, that’s a massive generalisation, but it’s mostly true)
I’m not sure the serving size was quite satisfying enough for me as we leave the restaurant, given the price that I paid, but it was, in no doubt, tasty. Regardless, it’s probably around 2:30 in the afternoon now, and I can see that the plan to go to Monte Albán is rapidly fading away. When I get back to the hostel, I go up to the rooftop to laze around and as the clocks tick by, more and more people return from wherever they went that day, it’s time for the party to start.
Coasting to the coast
Way back when I was still in Mexico City, I booked a hotel right on the beach in Zipolite, it was reasonably priced and looked like rooms were getting booked. However, this left a 3-day gap between Oaxaca and Zipolite which I was still undecided whether I use the extra time to stay and relax in Oaxaca, or go to Puerto Escondido to live the beach life. After many recommendations from other backpackers, I decide to hit the coast of Mexico for the first time.
After a rather late night back in the same bar in Oaxaca with Dale and friends, my alarm wakes me up so that I can have breakfast and be in time to catch the colectivo that will take me down to Puerto Escondido. When I first met Timo, we had talked and decided to catch the same van there, but he’s nowhere to be seen. He, unlike me, did not go out, and turned in for an early night. “Odd”, thinking to myself, “Maybe he changed his mind, and decided to spend more time here”. But as I’m settled in my seat, with my backpack loaded, Timo turns up.
There are two options when travelling from Oxaca to Puerto Escondido, a 6-or-so-hour trip in a van going up and down the windy roads of the mountains, or a much longer, but more comfortable ride for 11 hours in a bus going around. I opt for the former, thinking that I’d rather get it done quicker than having to sit in a bus for nearly double the duration. It is not a pleasant trip, but despite that, I think I still prefer suffering through the sometimes-stomach-churning van ride.
I think it’s pretty close to sunset by the time we arrive at the town, and then to the hostel. While Timo goes off for a run, my stomach is rumbling for some food, so I order myself a plate of prawn pasta at a nearby restaurant. When I get back, beers are half-priced for happy hour, and I have to once again fire up my extrovert-engine to chat with all these new people while I down a bottle. But given that I had already spent a night out before, and I’m totally buggered by now, I plop onto my bunk bed quite early while others continue late into the night.
Life’s full of beaches
After a long and well-rested sleep, it seems like many people are going to have a lazy day in to recover from last night. Timo and Finn (another German, also an important name to remember) are going to the Playa Carrizalillo (playa meaning “beach” in Spanish), just a few hundred metres from the hostel, but there is a steep flight of stairs going down - which, of course, means that I will eventually have to walk back up them. But before we go to the beach, Finn wants to rent a surfboard, so Timo and I bum around while he fills in the paperworks, which involves marking scratches and dents in the board, similar to that of renting a car. There are a lot of scraps, and basically the whole diagram is covered by the end of the inspection.
As we walk down the steps, I’m welcomed by the view of the bay in which the beach resides, and it’s a wonderful sight (two photos above). The water is a beautiful shade of blue, and the temperature is just right for a swim. However, surfing isn’t so great there, as Finn informs us, and from the looks of it from afar, there is also a horde people floating around trying to catch what little waves there are. Brayden messages me that they’re moving to the same hostel as me, and will come meet me at the beach afterwards. Since there isn’t much to do at Puerto Escondido but relax by the waters, I alternate between taking a dip and catching some rays in the meantime.
Eventually, Brayden comes down to meet with us, while Laura is having a massage somewhere else. However, not long after, it’s already time for some lunch. Surrounded by the 3 much taller men, I can’t imagine them having any trouble scaling up the steps, but my short little legs can only go so fast, but I think the training I had in Guanajuato really helped. For lunch, we opt for a falafel/vegetarian restaurant, so I order a wrap and mango juice. Using “juice” to describe what I receive is a bit of an exaggeration, it’s more like mango water, or one mango mixed with some orange juice and water.
While at lunch, Finn suggests going to another beach on the other side of town, and will require a taxi ride. Since there are 5 of us now, we’ll need 2 cars, so Finn offers to go in one himself as he still has his surfboard.
So off he goes.
We head back to the hostel to do something, I don’t remember what exactly, but after some flaffing about, we head out to the main road to find a taxi. Hold up though, we spot an ice-creamery, and with this weather, it would be rude not to have some.
We keep beaching
You may have noticed that the last 3 photos have been a little sub-par, and that’s because lugging around a DSLR to the beach is a stupid idea - so what you’re seeing are some photos I took with an iPhone.
Now, let’s get back into action.
We’re now at the tail-end of Playa Zicatela, it’s a long beach that must stretch about 2-3 kilometres, and the sand is almost burning my feet when I take my flip-flops off. There isn’t much natural shade available, only those parasols with lounge chairs that you have to pay for, but there is a lifted lifeguard hut/cabin thing, so after spending some time in the waters, we retreat to the shadow it casts. It’s like 10 minutes before the surfboard rental shop closes, so we make our way to the main strip of road away from the beach. The trouble is that the taxis only come down this road if they’re bringing someone else to the beach, there aren’t any that just drive by, and when we finally get into one, the minute hand has already gone pass the hour. So unsurprisingly, I see that the shop is closed when we’re dropped off across the street. Making the matter worse, it’s Saturday, and they’re closed on Sunday, but Finn, who works at a hospital in a town in Mexico hours away, has to go back the next day. There’s not much he can do about it now, so he heads back to the first beach we visited in the morning to see if the surf has improved.
After a little rest back at the hostel, I join Finn at the beach, and there seems to be many more people than earlier in the day, but maybe because the tide has also risen, the lessened space makes it look more packed. Just before sunset, we head over to another beach to see the sun descend across the horizon.. On the way, we buy a coconut each to refresh ourselves before continuing onwards. When we arrive, there are people standing alongside the sea, some with baby turtles in hand as they get ready to release them into the waters. We can only observe from afar, but can see a couple of the turtles struggle down the sand with their tiny legs. While ideally as the water flows up, it’ll catch them and take them out to sea, but many times they’re pushed further aback. Eventually though, they all pitter-patter their way far enough for the water to take them out.
The sun sets, and while there are no steps this time round, there’s still a bit of hike going back. When we pass through a group of big rocks, I crack open the coconuts to consume the flesh inside. It was delicious and filling, but quite a chore to eat without a spoon.
Let’s dance!
While Brayden, Laura and I wait at the bar for Finn to get ready for dinner, it’s about happy hour time, and then after downing a couple of cocktails, we head out to get some shrimp tacos. It’s Mexico, and waiting for your food is part and parcel of the experience, and during that time, a group of guys enter the restaurant to play some music before going around the tables to ask for tips. This is very common, at least, very common in touristic areas of Mexico, because I will later see more of these performances in Tulum.
Since it’s my last night at the town, a group of us from the hostel got into a taxi to head to another part of Playa Zicacleta, where the street is lined with bars along it and the beach. The bar we have chosen is on the rooftop of a restaurant, but the action hasn’t started yet after we climb up the staircase, with people are still standing outside of the dancefloor drinking and chatting.
Stuff that, I say!
We order some cocktails and beers, and jump right in. More and more people start to join the dancing, and it gets chock-a-block as the hours go by. The music, mostly in Spanish, is pumping and I don’t know any of the words, and unlike Finn, who is fluent in the language and has apparently heard all these songs before, is mouthing the lyrics. Every now and then, there’ll be a song in English that I can sing to, but otherwise I’m just dancing to the beats as they come. We dance way into the night until about 3:30am when we finally decide to call it the night. Not before Brayden declares that he wants tacos, but we can’t see any in our immediate vacinity, so he has to settle for a packet of crisps from the convenience store, and I buy a couple of bottles of water. We take a taxi back, and I will bid farewell to the town and move on to the next town in the morning.
At the time of writing…
I’m writing this post in the midst of a lockdown in Colombia, the same as with all other countries, due to the spread of COVID-19. There are about 2800 confirmed cases in the country, with only 26 in the state of Magdalena where Santa Marta is. However though, I can’t discount the fact that the smaller towns may have more than reported due to lack of testing. Either way, I’ve decided to locate myself in Santa Marta and its smaller neighbouring town of Taganga, while UK and US are suffering through a concerning crisis. I hope that everyone is keeping wherever you may be.