We have been collecting a series of desktop pictures for our computers in order to remember the trip. We thought we’d share 24 of the best ones, so that you can enjoy Mexico on your desktop. Clicking on the images leads to a high resolution widescreen version of the image that you can drag to your computer to use as a background.

Mexico City is so many things that I’m having a hard time putting it all into words. Let’s start with what it’s NOT: it is not the dirty, poor and asthma-inducing smogpot that you hear about a lot. It’s also not the dangerous and scary murderville that some people might have you believe. It certainly is huge in size, full of people everywhere and the noise level never really dims. But if you’ve been to Los Angeles or Sao Paulo then in reality Mexico City isn’t such a stretch.

We stayed at the wonderful B&B “Condesa Haus” in one of the artsy neighbourhoods – Condesa – that’s home to the young and hip or those who wish they were. There are at least 3 restaurants or bars on each block and any space that’s not taken up by food or drink is given over to clothing or art. In other words, a great place to walk around and soak up the atmosphere. (Yes, you can perfectly well walk around, even after dark. Even when drunk, as we found out later…)

The first day was a bit grey and rainy so we postponed our planned tourist bus tour and instead headed south to see the Frida/Diego trinity: the Museo Dolores Olmedo, the Museo Frida Kahlo and the Museo Diego Rivera. The museo Dolores Olmedo is the furthest away from the city so that’s where we started. Dolores Olmedo was the patron and alleged lover of Diego Rivera and because she had such a close relationship with both Diego and Frida, a lot of their artwork can be found in her hacienda. There are also a lot of photographs of Dolores herself, mainly meeting famous people from around the world or sitting with her children, but it’s still worth a look. And the hacienda is in a beautiful garden, almost a park, full of peacocks and ducks. There are also supposed to be some Xoloitzcuintle dogs around but they weren’t out in the garden that day. (This might or might not have had something to do with the weather – the Xoloitzcuintle is hairless and has a high body temperature, so they might not like the rain…)
Having whetted our appetite for Frida, we took the light train up to Coyoacan to see the Frida Kahlo museum housed in the electric-blue house where she and Diego Rivera lived for many years.

It is filled with their clothing, furniture and work utensils as well as a few sketches and paintings but not nearly as many as you might expect. Because day of the dead is fast approaching, everything was nicely decorated with skulls and skeletons, swathed in rivers of marygolds.

Our entrance to the museum included a free entrance to the Diego Rivera Anahuacalli museum, so we headed there next. This time we caught a ‘pesetero’ – a small city bus – because it was only a short trip and taxis, unless phoned for, have a bad reputation. And good that we did that because the pesetero was a whole experience in itself: think of an old, rickety, tiny bus, probably built in the 60s and not serviced since then. There were two switches on the dashboard, both had an option for ‘On’ and ‘Off’ but neither one seemed to have any function whatsoever (luckily the one with the skull and cross bone sticker next to it was set to ‘Off’). The driver had a little wooden box next to him where he kept the pesos handed over by passengers. Surprisingly, the trip was a little more expensive than taking the metro but there was a lot more folklore included. While we were waiting at red lights, the ubiquitous sales people that roam the streets would step up into the bus to sell their wares: chocolate, cigarettes, newspapers, laptop cradles (I’m not kidding, you can buy anything at a Mexico City stop light). Passengers got on and off at random intervals, stubbornly ignoring any official bus stop signs. But the breakneck speed at which the driver wove through traffic made up for any time lost on the many unscheduled stops.

We made it to Anahuacalli just in time for the last tour of the day (the museum can only be visited with a guided tour). The building was errected on plans drawn up by Diego Rivera himself, based on ancient mesoamerican pyramids. It was built of black volcanic stone that was quarried from the exact 4 km square area where the museum is standing today, not far from one of the active volcanoes that surrounds the city. From the outside the building looks forbidding and ugly; from the inside it’s dark and slightly claustrophobic. But the artifacts exhibited rival those on display at the giant Museum of Anthropology, possibly one of the finest in the world, so Diego obviously knew what he was doing. In fact, there are only around 2500 pieces on display at the museum while in reality he owned 59,430.

Heading back to the metro station we caught another pesetero only this time we got the party bus. The driver had turned off all the lights, inside and out, and was blasting techno-pop at full volume. No one in the bus seemed to care or even notice, except one or two teenage boys who bobbed their heads in unison to the beat. Since bus stops are more of a decoration than a guideline, we were having some trouble figuring out where exactly we were supposed to get off but it turned out that most people were headed to the same metro stop so we just followed the crowds.

The metro, when it’s not rush-hour, is a great way to get around the city because it’s clean, runs often and is incredibly cheap. One ticket costs MXN $2. That’s about 10 EUR cents. What’s genius about the metro though is the signage. Each metro line has a distinct color and each stop has a unique image such as a pot or an animal or a house so that people who can’t read or tourists who might have trouble reading some of the names, can still navigate the map easily. It’s so much easier to remember that you get on at the bee and then get off at the pot instead of getting on at Chilpancingo and getting off at Tacubaya, isn’t it? Mostly the symbols match the name of the stop, making it even easier to remember.

Unfortunately, for the medical center they used the winged staff with two serpents, representing commerce, theft, deception and death. Instead of a non-winged staff with a single serpent that is the symbol of Hippocrates and hence medicine. This confusion isn’t the Mexicans fault though but began with the United States army a century earlier. (They’ve got their fingers everywhere…)

A quaint, pretty place with not much to do. I don’t mean to sound harsh but besides shopping and ambling around the streets to look for more shops there’s not much happening in San Miguel de Allende. Of course that makes it a great place to spend a relaxing weekend. We did a lot of ambling, a little shopping and ate our way through town the rest of the time. The place is full of expats and wealthy Mexicans who can afford to live outside of DF and recently *gasp* they even opened the first Starbucks. (At least one enraged denizen moved in protest to a ‘purer’ area 40 km away. Of course, he was from the US.) The highlight of the weekend for me was meeting up with an old friend from school whom I hadn’t seen in 18 years. The world is small indeed… But there isn’t much else to say about the place, so here are some pictures instead:

A quinzañera leaving church (quinzañera is the 15th birthday, a very big deal for girls here)

Outside she's serenaded by Mariachis

And then she's driven to her party in this stunning vehicle

So you can get a real feel for the event, here’s a little video:

On our last night in Oaxaca we had to kill some time before our bus left just before midnight. (Another night bus trip, nooo… But fortunately our last!) Our host René had told us that in the late afternoon the Panamericana rally would arrive in the city; the first stop of the 7-day race that goes all across Mexico. (You might think it should really be called the Panmexicana but the original race was conceived to celebrate the newly completed Mexican section of the Pan-American Highway. So there you go.) We had no idea what the Panamericana even was but René seemed pretty excited about it so we decided to amble on down to the Zócalo – the main square – to watch the finish line.

Attendance was definitely not overwhelming but people did seem interested enough to stop for a bit and see what all the hubbub was about. They were rewarded soon with a steady stream of over 60 cars that rolled through at various speeds.

The original race started in the 50s but was canceled after only 5 years for being ‘too dangerous’. Then it was resurrected in the 1980s as a classic road rally, much like the Mille Miglia that runs through Panzano every year. This means of course that there are some really great cars to be seen:

(This couple was incredibly annoying because they kept jumping into our shots...)

We thought these two Finnish gentlemen were simply sponsored by the Leningrad Cowboys but then we found out that they actually WERE Leningrad Cowboys!

See? How cool is that?!

And then, because Conor is cool like that and can charm the pants of anyone, we suddenly had 5 German drivers sitting at our table, buying us beers and telling us all about the first leg of their race. Kids stopped by to have their t-shirts signed by them! And we got to sit there and pretend like we were all old friends! Ah, what fun…

The race is still going on – they arrived in Querétaro tonight – but of course we wish the German teams all the best!!! And thanks for all the beer Walther.

Yes, it’s the city with the funny name that sounds like a sneeze once you know how to pronounce it (say: wah-HA-ka). We’ve been here for four days now and are loving every minute. The food is excellent, our bed & breakfast is wonderful, there are nice museums and a great botanical garden and because día de muertos (day of the dead) is coming up, many parts of the city are beautifully decorated already, like our posada:

At the local library we also saw those funny little verses shown in the header image. They were all written by kids during a Día de muertos activity so of course they are all about death: “The skull was waiting for Señor Toñito to let him know his time was up.” “The teacher Lem(?) was making a skull when death came by and said: What’s happening güera? (güera = slang for ‘white girl’)” and my favourite “Death was sitting on a barrel waiting to take the Kindergarten.” Obviously, if kids would write this anywhere outside of Mexico, parents, psychiatrists and possibly police would be called and suspensions would be handed out left and right. Here, it’s a fun afternoon spent at the library. I love it!

Yesterday we took a cooking class with the sister of our host. (They are 6 siblings and 4 of them run B&Bs here in Oaxaca – one includes a thermal bath/spa and the other one a cooking school and restaurant. Very enterprising family…) Anyway, we went to Casa de los sabores to meet with our chef Pilar. She took us to the local market to buy ingredients and give us a little tour and then back home to cook: Quesadilla con huitlacoche (a fungus that grows on corn, tastes better than it sounds), Sopa de flor de calabaza, Mole amarillo con espinazo (pigs spine, also much tastier than you might imagine) and Arroz con leche. We also made guacamole and two types of salsa to accompany the food.

The food was delicious, especially the guacamole and salsas. We were so wrapped up in our cooking and eating that we forgot to take pictures of our masterpieces unfortunately. Interestingly the food didn’t taste like any Mexican food you get in Europe or the States. But I guess that’s true of many cuisines.

Another afternoon we took a tour of the Ethnobotanical Garden. Because it is not quite finished yet, you have to take a guided tour to see it. This makes it all the more interesting though since our guide told us not only about the different plants growing in the garden but also about the history of the site and Oaxaca in general. The garden collects rain water and is self sufficient for the long dry season. Even more interesting is the water is circulated over old canals that add atmosphere to the garden but more importantly keep the water fresh and fungus free during the long storage period. The site of the garden was formerly a monastery but was abandoned and taken over by the Mexican army for many years. As you might imagine, much was destroyed when the army lived there and the gardens were mainly cemented over to make way for basketball courts and swimming pools.

When the army left, the entire plot, including the ex-monastery, was supposed to be sold to a leisure center developmer to build a mall, 5-star hotel and parking lots. Luckily, a famous Mexican artist, Francisco Toledo decided that this was not going to do his hometown any good and petitioned to develop the monastery and surrounding area as a cultural center instead. Out of this grew the ethnobotanical garden as well as the Centro Cultural which houses an extensive exhibition of Oaxaca’s history.

The most exciting thing about San Cristobal de las Casas was probably the weather. We arrived from hot and humid Palenque (on a long and windy mountain pass which I’d rather forget about) where it had been over 30C and just walking to lunch made you sweat like a fat plumber. Now we suddenly found ourselves at over 2000m altitude and the temperature dropped by at least 15C. We actually had to take out our jackets and put on shoes! With socks! This was a treat really, a relaxation for our bodies if you will. Although on the third morning, when it was almost too cold to get out of bed and our fingers were getting cold typing on the keyboard, that whole cold weather love turned a bit sour and we started to look forward to our next destination.

What else happend in San Cristobal though you ask? To be honest, not much. Besides our little excursion to Chamula we didn’t do a whole lot. Mainly because there isn’t all that much to do… We walked up the hills that flank the city to admire the view and see the churches, we visited the amber museum, walked around Na Bolom (the house and now museum of the Danish archeologist Frans Blom) and did a lot of strolling around town in general. One night we went to see a documentary about the Zapatistas in a movie theater the size of a living room but the movie wasn’t very well done. Lunch at the Zapatista-run café was much better. (Food is always a good way to get people on your side. Much easier than guns too…)

All in all, San Cristobal de las Casas is a very nice place but just a little too quaint and non-happening. We got pretty pictures though!

Since our stay in San Cristobal de las Casas included a Sunday we decided to go and visit the market in San Juan Chamula, a small township in the surrounding hills. We’d read about the place in our guidebook where it was praised as a stronghold of indigenous culture and that especially on Sundays it was well worth a visit to see the market. The owner of the Argentinean restaurant where we had dinner the night before also highly recommended the trip. But he warned us, just like the guidebook did, that we should NOT attempt to take pictures anywhere in the village and especially not in the church. The Tzotzil people are highly independent and proud – in fact Chamula enjoys an autonomous status in Mexico and has its own police force – and they do not like having their picture taken. According to the restaurateur, beatings are a common response.

Of course that sounded quite exciting and deliciously foreign. So Sunday morning we snubbed our noses at the clouds and drizzle, grabbed a ‘colectivo’ bus, where we looked ridiculously out of place thanks to our skin color and height, and headed into the hills. The bus ride took about 15 minutes and was filled with constant repeats of 80s pop – every song had to be played at least twice, preferably three times in a row – and an overwhelming smell of cologne, underlined with a strong note of piss. But then again we paid MX$9 each, about EUR 0.45, so you can’t really ask for more.

Once we got to Chamula the rain had turned to a steady drizzle which turned the cobbled dusty streets to mud and steeped everything into a brown-grey monochrome. Even the colorful blouses and skirts of the Tzotzil women were hidden by fuzzy, black, wooly capes and sweaters. I wish I could say that the market was full of delights and interesting tidbits but I’d be lying. A lot of metal cooking pots were being sold, alongside dreary looking vegetables and cheap plastic toys. Maybe it was the weather together with the ‘danger’ of not being allowed to take pictures but Chamula did not make a very favourable impression.

The one really interesting spot was the church in the middle of the main square. Of course, once again photography was highly forbidden (even though I saw some Russian lady taking a picture outside of the church without even trying to hide; and she was definitely not beaten up!) but you can find pictures online quite easily. Here is one of the church and another one of the market on a sunny day.

In any case, the church is truly worth visiting simply because it is unlike anything you have ever seen. We entered into a dark and smokey nave filled with the smell of incense and pine needles. There are a few dusty windows up high on one wall but most of the light comes from the hundreds and hundreds of candles that are lit all over the church – on the floor, on little stools and on the tables that run along the walls. There are no pews but the floor is covered in a thick layer of green pine needles which get swept aside by worshippers who need space to stick their candles to the floor. The candles come in all different sizes but are exclusively white. For prayer, different numbers of candles are lit in various formations. I’m not sure if these have to do with the type of prayer or if it’s personal preference. Most of the worshippers make their space in the middle of the nave (when they can find a spot not occupied by a gaping tourist) and light a row of 5-6 long thick candles and start chanting/praying/talking. More rows of progressively shorter and skinnier candles are added as the prayer goes on until the last row directly in front of the person looks like little burning pencils are stuck to the floor.

Some worshippers turn directly to one of the many saints lined up on top of the tables that run the side of the church walls. Each colorful saint is kept in his/her own glass case, adorned with flowers and mirrors to ward of evil. In front of one wooden saint, the Virgin of Guadaloupe(?), a whole family complete with leathery grandmother and sleeping newborn had marked their space, lit dozens of candles and laid out offerings of Coca Cola, Sprite and candy. There was also a dead chicken next to one of the kids. I have a feeling that the poor bird met its demise only a few minutes earlier…

Towards the far end of the church, where the altar was covered in flowers and more saintly imagery, a woman had hired a shaman to pray for her (or guide her in prayer?). Once again, offerings of soda and candles galore were lined up. There was also a chicken present but this was one was still alive, nervously clucking in its purple nylon net and suspiciously eyeing the woman who was holding it down. We didn’t stick around to see what would happen later but I’d like to imagine that they were blessing the chicken for laying so many fine eggs.

Besides the woman who took a picture outside of church, we did not see a single camera in Chamula and we really didn’t want to test the limitations of the ‘no photography’ policy so kept our camera firmly inside the bag. But for your enjoyment I did find one picture online that someone more valiant or stupid than us took inside the church.

Today we spent the whole morning scrabbling around the ruins of Palenque which, if you ever find yourself in Mexico, are not to be missed. In our humble opinion, they are even more impressive and worth the visit than the much touted Chichen Itza. Might also have to do with the fact that in Palenque you’re allowed to climb most of the temples whereas in Chichen Itza you’re only allowed to gaze up the temples’ stairs in awe. (A woman from California fell to her death a few years ago so climbing is off the menu now.) But I guess no one has died at Palenque yet so climb on up!

We got to the site early as usual to avoid the crowds and the heat. This time we also decided to go with a guide instead of on our own and boy did that make a difference. Raul told us so many interesting facts and stories about the ruins that I wish I’d had a tape recorder with me to be able to remember it all! He is really in love with his job even though he wheezes like a teapot when he climbs up the steps.

Let’s see how much I can remember:

This is the templo de las inscripciones or temple of the inscriptions. The ruler Pakal built it to house his tomb at the very bottom of the temple. Palak was ruler of Palenque from 615 to 683 AD and is responsible for many of the temples and structures built in Palenque. His tomb is one of the best preserved and richest found in all of the Americas. Unfortunately the tomb itself is closed to visitors because the condensation from people’s breath and sweat was wreaking havoc on the limestone walls but the lid of the tomb as well as some of the offerings from inside (mainly made of jade) are displayed in the nearby museum.

Palak also used the temple to announce the birth of his son, K’inich Kan B’ahlam, by putting up several stelae with inscriptions and reliefs. They are the 6 column-like slabs at the top of the temple. When the son was older, Palak instructed him to build his own temple on the exact spot where the sun beams hit after passing through the top of the temple of inscriptions. (And you thought you had it hard when your parents told you to clean your room…)

Unfortunately the temple of the inscriptions can’t be climbed so you cannot see the stelae on top but the museum has some very well preserved stelae on display. Here’s one example where you can see especially the deformed heads with the splendid head-dress (all members of the noble cast had their skulls deformed as babies) as well as some glyphs on the left side.

There were a lot of glyphs found at Palenque and about 70-80% have been translated so far.

The temple that K’inich Kan B’ahlam eventually built after Palak died is known as the templo de la cruz or temple of the cross.

There are about a bazillion steps leading up to it (no really, I counted!) and climbing it requires some serious muscle and will power. Unless you have a scantily clad Russian girl in hot pants climbing in front of you, or so I am told…
The view from the top makes it all worth it though. You can see the other temples on the site as well as the plains of Chiapas in one marvelous sweeping vista.

And just to show that I wasn’t kidding about the steps, behold our faces dripping with sweat!

Here are some more interesting tidbits:

Because the Mayans didn’t want to upset the god of the winds when they put up walls, they added vents in the form of a T into the walls which can also be interpreted as someone standing with their arms wide open in a welcoming embrace.

Also notice the small part of the painted decoration remaining on the façade. The whole palace used to be painted bright red and decorated with designs all over. Apparently they found over 9 different layers of paint; every few decades the walls were whitewashed and painted over with a new design. Just like putting up new wallpaper!

Here’s a nice example from the museum of what the colors looked like painted on the reliefs.

After we went diving on the world’s second largest reef the day before, we spent the next day at Tulum’s archaeological site and then went for some more diving. This time in one of the fresh water caves that are dotted all over the Yucatan peninsula called cenotes. These are caves and caverns created by the erosion of the soft limestone that Yucatan is made out of. In the last millenia they have been submerged and are now water caves.

Tulum holds the ruins of an old Mayan city right on the Riviera Maya. The site is small but its proximity to the beach makes it one of the more spectacular ruins. We arrived early in Tulum in order to get some nice pictures without crowds, not to mention to avoid the noon heat (which starts around 10am).

Then to cool off it was on to our cenote dive. With a number of cenotes available for diving we picked the one recommeneded by Greg, the dive shop owner in Sarasota. It’s called Dos Ojos thanks to its two large cave openings that give access to the cave system at opposite ends. We booked a guide and equipment from Hidden Worlds and were driven over to the secret bat cave entrance in a vehicle that should really get a spot on this blog.

Because Hidden Worlds has an agreement with the national parks, they are the only ones with access directly to this entrance. Other cave vistors snorkel or dive to the bat cave.

After lowering our gear into the cave via a pulley system and admiring the bats that flitted around the cave, we got into the crystaline water. Due to the pure nature of the water the visibility is perfect and at times it feels like your dive buddy is floating inside the cave and not actually underwater. Cavern diving requires that you stay relative close to surface access. Because there where only three possible points (the dos ojos and the bat cave) we went in small loops around the cave system for approximately one hour. Although the distance travelled was minimum, the darkness and myriad route possibilities create disorientation and at least a sense of seeing new areas all the time.

The cave contains a few small fishes and a deep section at 10 meters where the salt water mixes with the clear water causing a haze and blur, like a strong heat haze off a highway. We also enjoyed swimming around stalagmites and hiding our flash lights to view the sun light coming in through the cave openings. A few expert cave divers, with two tanks, headed deep into the cave system that is full of possibilities as it runs for over 60 km.

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia

Afterwards we went for lunch at one of the mega resorts along the Riviera Maya, Puerto Aventura, which is really not our style but we heard that you could watch dolphins being trained right next to the restaurants. And they had excellent enchilladas and quesadillas!

For those not into the underwater world, rejoice because we’re now taking a break from diving for a few weeks and will head deeper into the jungle to look for pyramids.

We finally made it to Mexico after a little delay in Miami due to missing our plane (woops!) but that way we got to have lunch at Bulldog barbeque with Fer and Ido and taste the best ribs in South Florida before taking off.
Now we are staying in a beautiful hotel right by the beach, south of Cancun. Because this is hurricane season the prices are low and the hotel is practically empty so we even got an upgrade for our room. It has a little terrace with a hammock and day bed, overlooking the pool onto the beach and ocean beyond. If it wasn’t so hot outside we could fall asleep to the sound of the waves crashing instead of the hum of the a/c and fan.

This morning we received our breakfast through the butler door (an ingenious little concoction by which the staff can slide trays into your closet without coming into the room) and then went to find the dive master of this swanky establishment.

Enrique turned out to be a very friendly Mexican who lived in Chicago for 25 years, is married to a lady from Kentucky and thinks it’s great that we’re taking this time out “antes de los chavos” (Mexican for “before kids”). We told him that we really wanted to dive a cenote, preferably Dos Ojos, but he was a bit hesitant about our lack of experience. Instead he offered to take us out onto the reef in front of Puerto Morelos. (Of course this had nothing to do with the fact that he doesn’t do tours to Dos Ojos and would have had to refer us to another dive shop… In any case, we agreed and showed up an hour later to get briefed for our dive.

Apparently he had changed his mind about our experience level in the meantime because the dive he proposed was a bit out of our league – technically Open Water divers like us are only supposed to go down to 60ft (18m) but the wreck that he planned on taking us to went down to 90ft! It’s an old navy ship called C-56 that was sunk nine years ago specifically for diving purposes. By now corral has grown all over it and there are lots and lots of fishes and sea creatures living in and around the wreck.

We saw rays buried in the sand waiting for their lunch, an eagle ray worthy of its name gliding past, a lobster carcass completely intact including antennas and feet (they grow out of their shells every so often and leave behind their former selves, very cool) and a barracuda surrounded by a writhing ball of sardines. They were shielding it like a giant globe of bodyguards but I think their purpose was more self-preserving than that – not many fish will attack a barracuda, hence they won’t get close to the sardines around it either.

On our second tank dive we went to an area called ‘El Jardin’ (the garden) which is aptly named because it looks like someone planted a large vegetable patch at about 40ft under water, using corrals and sponges, liberally sprinkled with electric blue and yellow fish. Since I had lost my breakfast on the ride over from the first dive site (damn waves) and was still feeling a bit queasy, I thought this wasn’t going to be a fun dive but once we hit the water (getting out of a moving boat, learned lots of new things today) the queasiness flowed away with the current and we drifted through the garden for another half hour before returning to the hotel and lunch – what else but ceviche?! Conor tried the Acapulco style shrimps and I had Peruvian.

In the afternoon we took a walk along the beach to see Puerto Morelos and its leaning lighthouse.

Take that Pisa!

The beach is almost white and the sand is so fine it feels like walking over powdered sugar.

Saw lots of lanchas (little boats) on the way, including these two gems: Zebra and Jaguar.

On the pier in town locals were fishing with nets, kids were playing in the water and everyone seemed to enjoy the calm before the storm – we hurried home when the sky started to turn a very angry shade of grey and would have made it too before the rain began if we hadn’t stopped to buy some beer on the way. But there’s always time for beer and what’s a little rain when it’s 32C degrees?

Tomorrow we’re off to see the ruins in Tulum and with Enrique’s blessing to dive the Dos Ojos cenote!