This morning we finished packing up our stuff and said goodbye to our host at the Bed and Breakfast Mexico City. It was a bittersweet departure, but mostly we were excited to move on to Oaxaca (which we anticipated would be less crazy and less smelly). We took the metro to the bus station 'TAPO' and bought tickets for 11:00am, unfortunately we couldn't get two seats together but we bought them anyway. We ate in the food court and headed off to Oaxaca within an hour. The bus was very comfortable though a little cold. There were three movies: "Conversations with God", some anime film, and Spiderman 3. The drive was beautiful, through breathtaking mountains. We also encountered a crazy torrential rainstorm and feared for our lives a bit (especially since we had seen a flipped over double 18-wheeler earlier along the road). The bus stopped at a place with some food vendors and we got delicious tortas (mexican sandwiches).
After a little more than six hours, we arrived in Oaxaca City. We took a taxi from the bus station to the Zocalo and had our most successful conversation in Spanish yet! The taxi driver even commented about how much spanish we seemed to know (we gave him a good tip). Then we got pesos from the ATM and walked through town to our hostel, the Mezkalito, which is beautiful. Like many of the buildings in Mexico, it is actually a complex of buildings around an open courtyard and painted with bright colors. We got a huge room with a private bathroom and even our own miniature courtyard. After getting settled and dropping our stuff off we went back to the Zocalo and encountered much festiviy. Due to the huge Oaxacan cultural festival this month, there are performances every day here, and quite a crowd to enjoy them. We had dinner at one of the restaurant-bars that line the Zocalo, walked around, and then had dessert at another of the cafes in order to wait out the rain that had begun to pour. Unfortunately, it continued to rain longer than we wanted to continue ordering food and drink, so eventually we gave in and bought little ponchos from one of the vendors posted along the cafes and suffered a wet journey home.
This morning we finished packing up our stuff and said goodbye to our host at the Bed and Breakfast Mexico City. It was a bittersweet departure, but mostly we were excited to move on to Oaxaca (which we anticipated would be less crazy and less smelly). We took the metro to the bus station 'TAPO' and bought tickets for 11:00am, unfortunately we couldn't get two seats together but we bought them anyway. We ate in the food court and headed off to Oaxaca within an hour. The bus was very comfortable though a little cold. There were three movies: "Conversations with God", some anime film, and Spiderman 3. The drive was beautiful, through breathtaking mountains. We also encountered a crazy torrential rainstorm and feared for our lives a bit (especially since we had seen a flipped over double 18-wheeler earlier along the road). The bus stopped at a place with some food vendors and we got delicious tortas (mexican sandwiches).
