Aug 7 - Puerto Escondido

The OCC bus was cheaper and less "lujo" than the previous overnight bus, and it was more annoying because we made a bunch of stops throughout the night. I think I slept about 3 hours. The bus finally pulled into the 1st class station in Puerto around 11:30am, where a taxi took us to the Hotel Mayflower for 20 pesos. The building was just off the main commercial road, called the Adoquin, a couple blocks from the main beach. We were given the nicest room in the hotel - a king-size bed with private bath on the top floor - for only $35 per night! There was even a baby grand piano just outside the room (which the owner encouraged me to play, but it was... let's just say it had 'character'). The host warned us about food sickness that was going around recently and mentioned a couple restaurants to avoid. We thanked her and, having taken shower #1 of the day, we settled on a beach front restaurant and ordered fillet "al ajo" - with garlic.

As we began to walk along the sand, Lauren jumped for joy when we found coconuts. We walked to the end of the "playa principal," climbed over some rocks, and passed into Zicatela beach, apparently one of the best surfing spots in the world. Of course it is too dangerous for swimming. Midway along the beach the heat got the best of us, so we rented out one of the many umbrella shaded lounge chairs to wait out the blistering early afternoon sun. The rental cost 50 pesos in addition to the quesadillas and fruit smoothie we ordered. While sitting here we were approached by a young guy, Jesus, who offered to take us on a fishing lancha the morning after next for a few hours to see turtles and dolphins for 600 pesos. We told him to meet us as the hotel in a few hours and we'd decide then.

Returning to the room and taking shower #2, we gave Jesus a 100 peso deposit. I slept for a few hours while Lauren read. Then we were hungry again, so our next destination would be the Galleria, a nice Italian restaurant on the Adoquin, where our scrumptious meal included garlic and basil pizza and veggie lasagna. Following a walk down the street, we took shower #3 (it's really hard to feel clean here) and slept more.