Our first event of 2013 was to visit the Mayan ruins of Uxmal.

So far, all the ruins we’ve seen were laid out by different peoples over different times, well, pre-Hispanic times before the Spanish came and made history as we know it. Just a quick recap, Teotihuacan = many peoples, Tenochitlan = Mexica, Monte Alban = Zapotecs, and so this would be our first view into Mayan architecture.

The site is extremely well furnished, and there are even several resorts located right next to the ruins. Very strange. The ruins itself is situated within a forest, and contains more ‘buildings’ similar to Monte Alban? The pyramids definitely look different though, and the main building is the Governor’s Building, which is rectangular in shape and with very distinctive ‘Mayan’ facades. It’s hard to pinpoint the differences without technical architectural knowledge, but the whole place definitely “feels” different! The layout, the carvings, the columns and the jungle-like setting all add to the allure of this spectacular site. Well worth a visit!

We returned to Merida, and we really wanted some variety in our dining options but unfortunately there isn’t much to choose from in this town. In the end, we had dinner at a Chinese buffet, which as you can imagine, had pretty poor tastes but was rather cheap. The owner was nice and chatted with us a bit, even providing us with free ‘juice’, or what was most likely just Mexican Kool-aid. After dinner, we realized that the mosquitoes in there also went on a feast of their own, as Alan was bitten well over 10 times, leaving his leg dotted with red bumps. Gross!

Not quite sure what it was, but somehow the buses in Mexico are great, but the rides are always horrible and you just feel like crap afterwards. The overnight bus was a bit delayed, but this is better for us because we got to town at 8:45am instead of the scheduled 6:30am! Don’t think my B&B owner would be happy with two red-eyed guests knocking on the door that early in the morning.

The streets of Merida instantly feels much different than the previous cities we’ve been to, with much less ‘colonial’ architecture and with many more buildings in ruins, it’s a stark reminder that although Mexico has a vibrant economy, there still are many places where life isn’t as colourful as the shades of pastel painted on throughout the exterior walls.

The rest of the day was spent resting, as during the night bus one of us experienced some signs of food poisoning. May have been the fruit, we’re not sure!! Either way, even the supermarkets in this town are much smaller and less widely stocked. Grabbing some fruits and crackers, we spent the day dozing in and out of consciousness and living of fruits and water.

Aaahhh, the hazards of traveling!

The day was as uneventful as you can get while traveling. One of those quiet days, where you’re content with what’s going on and just want to laze around reading a book.

Waking up, we got ready and booked our itinerary for the next couple of days. Thinking we should spend the New Year’s around a more popular destination, we thought about heading over to the beach side town of Playa del Carmen. Well, looks like we are too late in booking anything, and whatever is left is about 100x (no joke) what we’re used to paying now!! So we called off the idea and planned a couple of days elsewhere.

With a few more hours to wander the city, we weren’t content with the food we’ve had so far since it’s such a far cry from the delicious stuff we’ve had the past week, we decided to look up TripAdvisor for the #1 rated restaurant in town…. turns out it was a Thai place! Haha, well no problem we could use a bit of Thai. We got there too early for lunch, so we grabbed a light snack at a coffeeshop before heading over. The hot chocolate here is DELICIOUS, and they must have coffee production somewhere close by, as there are several shops that even roast their own coffee beans, sending the lush aromas out into the streets.

The Thai restaurant, is a bit off the beaten track in a less popular area, and is in a small shop that can seat only 10 people or so. You can smell the aromas once you walk inside, but that was the only bright side of this place. The menu consisted of 3 items of the most standard Thai fare: Tom Yum soup, Pad Thai and a Curry. Oh, and they had a Thai iced tea, which was the only decent thing on the menu. They had 5 people working in the kitchen, but considering the small number of tables they had to serve and the simplicity of the menu, they took about 50minutes to get our order out. We were patiently waiting, as you can see the chefs working pretty hard, thinking they may be making a lot of this fresh, and hence the long wait. Well, when the food arrived, we were pretty amazed. We’re not quite sure how 150 people gave this place such a high rating…. just rather strange considering the STRANGE flavours we’re getting with this. We left the restaurant, slightly hungry and even more confused at this city and how it can have such weird tastes for food, in addition to the bohemian-style people that overrun the streets.

Our bus leaves at 6pm, and knowing the way the road is going to turn, we opted for not eating dinner, but instead headed over to the market to stock up on fruits. We bought 3 boxes of fruit, weighing in at about 2.5lbs for a whopping 30Ps, or a little less more than $2CAD!! The craziest part was, the fruit stand at the market was worked by children probably less than 12 years old, and we asked for a watermelon box, which they didn’t have, so she grabbed an empty plastic box, cut up one massive slice of watermelon to fill the box. We were thinking, wow, that’s quite a bit for 10Ps, but then out of nowhere, she started to pile more and more onto the box. For a while there I wanted to yell at her saying “Stop! What are you doing? You have a business to run!”. So we left with our hands full of fruit, and lazed around in the hostel lounge eating fruits for the rest of the day.

Another 12hr bus ride up ahead…ain’t going to be fun.

Checking into our hostel at 8:30am, we were greeted with a warm welcome and thankfully, someone who spoke English! So we freshened up, and headed out into town. San Cristobal de Las Casas is another small, colonial town in the province of Chiapas, and like Guanojuanto and Oaxaca, they’ve made it pretty darn comfortable for tourists to come.

Several pedestrian streets are once again, you guessed it, lined with coffee shops, bars and shops selling artisanal handicrafts. Starting to see a trend here, aren’t we? This place is described by our guidebook as a backpacker’s hub, and we didn’t understand until now. The streets were brimming with young people, looking disheveled and unkempt. There were more more people with dreadlocks than people without. Our hostel owner told us that she came here, loved it and started up a hostel and never left. So we had some high hopes for this place to stand out from the crowd, but strangely enough it was just another place that brings in the crowds.

The streets, the sights and the churches were all familiar sights, so to us it may have lost that initial excitement we’ve had, but it doesn’t take away from the fact that this is a very beautiful town. We wandered the streets once again, getting lost many times in the progress. One thing we did notice that excited us though, was that the fruits here are DELICIOUS. Fruit stands and juice carts are everywhere, and we were thinking it would be overpriced tourist traps until we couldn’t resist the urge and bought a large box of pineapples. It costed 10Ps. That’s like, $0.85USD!!!!! For a fresh, juicy, mouth-watering pineapple cut up for you. They also have the fruity paletas popsicles, and we could eat those all day if we saw that store more often!

One thing that does stand out though, is that the food here is nowhere as good as the rest of our trip. Grabbing lunch at the local market and dinner a popular Chiapas dinner, both were nowhere near as good as the foods we’ve had since we’ve arrived in Mexico. We are so disappointed! Or maybe we’ve just been too spoiled and our expectations too high?

The worst part, is that the town has numerous museums, but they’re all ‘fronts’ for shops selling amber, jade or others. And trying to get away from all this, we headed up to a mirador, a lookout point of the town at around dusk to get a nice panoramic view of the city. After a steep climb up to the hill, constantly being pestered by little kids asking for candy (we set a rule not to give anything to kids, as to avoid them walking down the road of relying on tourists’ generosity as their well being. Seems cruel…) and avoiding broken beer bottles, and by the time we reached the top….. ALL THE VIEWS WERE BLOCKED OFF BY TREES? W T F?

With that in mind, we’ll be heading out tomorrow at 6pm, taking another 12hr dizzying drive down the mountains and into the Yucatan peninsula for our final leg of our Mexico journey.

It’s Christmas! All the good things that we’ve been accustomed about Christmas such as: sipping toffee/chocolatey hot drinks while it’s gently snowing out, eating massive amounts of food at family dinners, and the gifts! Well, when you’re traveling, you really don’t have any of that! And the biggest problem is, everything is closed for the holidays….

So making the best of our day, we made it a transportation day. Meaning, we woke up at 5:45am and started our 800km bus tour from Guanjuato → Mexico City → Oaxaca, and finally arrived at our hostel at about 9pm.

Remember a few days back we were so psyched about taking buses in Mexico? Well, apparently it is only for that one specific company, Primera Plus. They only operate in certain regions, and now mostly we’ll have to use another company, ADO. The ride from Mexico City → Oaxaca was similar in distance and time, but the costs were not only higher, the service was substantially worst! The seats weren’t as comfy, they didn’t provide snacks/beverages, and worst of all, the toilets gave off this wretched stench every time someone opened the door!! To top it all off, the bus was constantly wobbling for some reason, making it feel like you’re sitting in a boat, and motion sickness set in for both of us. And they won’t sell us student tickets, so it’s like…. worst off from every which way you look at it! Horrible!

Arriving in Oaxaca and getting to our hostel which is located next to a large park, a free concert was playing funky tunes outside while the hostel itself is great and extremely well run. Off to bed early tonight!