25 May OAXACA (Wa ha ca)
Caught the bus after another fine buffet breakfast at the Royalty, Joan records coffee, juice, fresh fruit, potato cakes, scotch pancakes, scrambled eggs and many other things as well, watched a student group go back and back for more but the girls if was mainly just coffee.
First across a fertile plain, then two to three hours through rain starved barren mountains with cactus and spiny bushes except for the deep river canyons below where there were green trees and small patches of cultivation where a few people made their living.
Finally winding our way down to Oaxaca where we took a taxi to the zocalo except that it had to drop us sooner because the centre of town was full of tents, and make do shelter under large plastic sheets, those without shelter had slept on the pavement on cardboard cartons with blankets.
Hundreds and hundreds, men and women - some with children, with their necessities around them. There were portable toilets on the streets, small areas of tables and chairs with meetings in progress, each group marked off with names and numbers from different regions, we had noted the dispute before leaving Puebla - but nothing like the scale of this. We learned they were teachers of government schools on strike we believe for more pay.
We had decided on Antonio's Hotel but could only reach it via this jungle, but arrived to find it a calm oasis, quiet inside painted in dark blues with red tiled floors, a small restaurant in the courtyard with a great waiter.
Our room is one of five upstairs all built around the courtyard. It is colourful bright yellow with blue and white stripes with a traditional bedspread a large 6 foot bed with a lattice work headboard.
On our initial recki we found Santo Domingo was a UNESCO Heritage site. A decent place to eat, somewhat expensive, in an inner courtyard and one of those typically overdressed Madonnas in the centre of a pool.
Joan couldn't help noticing the number of children begging in the street and she records giving a little money to a girl playing accordion, thinking of our Hazel, who plays the same instrument, and how lucky our grandchildren are to have such good lives.
Wed 26 May INGLESIA SANTO DOMINGO
Beautiful as will be seen with a colouring similar to many other churches in town. Inside is a painted ceiling showing the family tree of Santa Domingo Guzman 1172-1221 who founded the Dominican order in Spain with vows of poverty, chastity, obediance and protection of Mexican indigenous people from colonist excesses. Lots of gold around the altar but not too ornate.
Outside a wonderful patio with more of those magnificent red trees.
Adjoining is the Dominican monastery which is now a museum with a beautiful stone cloister. The first four rooms are laid out with treasure, gold, silver, turquoise, jade, amber and pearls discovered in Zapotec tomb user by Mixtecs to bury their kings complete with sacrificed servants at Monte Alban in 1937 by Alfonso Casa.
Some 17th century rooms with a beautifully ornate grandfather clock made in Paris. We watched a video reproduction of the funeral of Benito Juarez and marveled at the wonder of the simple elegant ankle length dresses and leg of mutton sleeves worn by 19th century ladies with small waists and big hats with feathers.
We lunched at nearby Panini and had booked a trip around the adjoining Botanic Garden in Spanish at 5pm. Where the girl gave us leaves to taste explaining their medical uses.
We liked the Gringo tree with red and white peeling skin like bark, 'Get it'!
The huge round cactus was thought to be 1000 years star in a plantation of cacti laid out in a maze like structure.
Thurs 27 May St ALBAN
We decided to take the offer of a guide speaking English and French who boasted he had taken Randolph Churchill around the site. He was very informative but Joan thought he gilded the lily a bit.
After lunch we went around on our own to the arts we had not yet visited. Around tomb 104 there were lots of beautiful wild flowers and a view over a very arid valley of buildings with silver corrugated roofs, an area where they brew the best Mexican Mezcal (tequila like) from the Maguey plant.
A man came to chat when Joan spotted what she called her Mexican Robin with a crimson head. He observed Mexicans thought that it was a sign of good luck when they showed their red side.
He managed to sell us a terra cotta figure with a water pitcher, on his back probably a con for it would have been illegal to sell anything found on this site.
Friday 28 May, Visit OCTOLAN - Robbed again in Latin America
Joan wanted to go to their Friday market but the hotel wanting payment meant I had run out of cash. So I withdrew 3000peso from an ATM near the bus stop (about £150 giving an exchange rate of 20 peso/£). I declined to take take half back to the hotel for safe keeping and put the lot in my zipped front knee pocket.
Leaving the bus I was robbed almost immediately. Joan remains convinced I was seen withdrawing the money in Oaxaca and the observer phoned ahead by mobile phone to set up the stunt, but I remember feeling my front pocket whilst descending.
After looking briefly at a stall we walked into the crowded market following Joan when we were separated by the largest woman I have ever seen. She stopped me dead in my tracks, I thought she was so immobile as being unable to step aside and let me pass. Joan saw an equally fat man put his arms around me. The stallholder nearby gave not a murmur of warning, though he must have seen the man take the money and make off, quite possibly leaving him holding the cash. Meanwhile I was stuck, oblivious of having been been robbed by a well practiced trick, though immediately we passed her Joan asked if I was aware my pocket was unzipped.
What should have been a pleasant episode was ruined, 'the joy went out of the day' recorded Joan. Every turn seemed to confirm what a terrible place this was and that the police were little but a bunch of rogues, no friendliness even in the bar where we went for a drink. The first time we had felt unwelcome in Mexico. This is one place I would avoid.
Travellers be suspicious if you are unable to move in a crowd, the same was preliminary to the robbery by razor blade last year in Chicolayo market in Peru, and earlier in Palermo Sicily where I was held on a crowded bus, cautious of dragging passengers off whilst descending wearing my big rucksack.
We went as intended to the Morales Gallery but only a few of the paintings really pleased, though they had a selection by Frida Kahlo, one self portrait with the head of Diego Riviera protruding from her forehead, and a selection of bright coloured pottery from the Aguilar family.
We walked to two of the Aguilar potteries, the first disappointed but the second had some nice pieces since painted by her son. A factory next door had a pit kiln in the yard.
On arrival back at Oaxaca we found the tourist office and reported the robbery they were very nice and called in a police woman to type her report in Spanish in case we should want to claim on our insurance - I doubt we bothered.
Sat 29 May, visit MITLA
The catholic church was built on one of the pyramids to bury earlier culture and beliefs. Joan remarked that 'Some of the early civilisations were pretty brutal but the Catholic church wasn't much better'.
Interesting site featuring mosaic patterns on the walls. She records the wall decorations were wonderful originally covered in red stucco, and that there were frescos on the inside.
We very bavely grovelled into two open tombs, one with a huge stone pillar said to measure your life span J.E. it favoured those with large shoulders and long arms, 'as good as reading palms anyway'. In the scramble to the second tomb Brian's torch came in handy to allowing us to appreciate how the outer wall had been originally.
Back
in Oaxaca we found a queue outside the Italian Restaurant but were
waved in by Gabriel and Paula to join them on their table for four. She
spoke excellent English and she the addresses of them in Oaxaca and her
daughter in Mexico City. More in importantly she told us a lot about
Puerto Escondido on the coast and recommended the daily direct minibus
route used recently by her son and explained where to find it.
Sun 30 May, Our 25th Wedding Anniversary
Our hotel closes for breakfast on Sunday so we ate a block away, Joan records 'I will miss our friendly waiter'.
Went to the home of Rufino Tamayo an artist who died in 1991, another house with a courtyard full of flowers. He had collected an array of early Mexican artefacts, one an almost full size woman seated cross legged and full size dogs with cheeky faces in terra cotta, apparently these dogs were once kept for food.
We went for coffee at the restaurant opposite Santo Domingo and found it far better downstairs. Outside a troupe of girls dressed in traditional costumes carrying a pineapple, last night we had seen a parade of people carrying fruit and flowers with a statue and letting off rockets. We wondered if it was Harvest Festival.
For our Anniversary Dinner we went to the best hotel in town, the Hotel Catedral Oaxaca. Joan recalls 'A beautiful plate of seven fruits with a big pile of cottage cheese in the centre, a fillet steak in amarillo mole (sauce), and a desert of a rose petal and almond ice cream'. My choice was pumpkin soup, peppers filled with minced meat and chilli (not as good as yesterday in the Italian) and the same desert.
Caught the bus after another fine buffet breakfast at the Royalty, Joan records coffee, juice, fresh fruit, potato cakes, scotch pancakes, scrambled eggs and many other things as well, watched a student group go back and back for more but the girls if was mainly just coffee.
First across a fertile plain, then two to three hours through rain starved barren mountains with cactus and spiny bushes except for the deep river canyons below where there were green trees and small patches of cultivation where a few people made their living.
Finally winding our way down to Oaxaca where we took a taxi to the zocalo except that it had to drop us sooner because the centre of town was full of tents, and make do shelter under large plastic sheets, those without shelter had slept on the pavement on cardboard cartons with blankets.
We had decided on Antonio's Hotel but could only reach it via this jungle, but arrived to find it a calm oasis, quiet inside painted in dark blues with red tiled floors, a small restaurant in the courtyard with a great waiter.
 |
| ANTONIO'S DINING ROOM |
Our room is one of five upstairs all built around the courtyard. It is colourful bright yellow with blue and white stripes with a traditional bedspread a large 6 foot bed with a lattice work headboard.
 |
| THE WINDOW OF OUR BEDROOM IN ANTONIO'S |
Joan couldn't help noticing the number of children begging in the street and she records giving a little money to a girl playing accordion, thinking of our Hazel, who plays the same instrument, and how lucky our grandchildren are to have such good lives.
Wed 26 May INGLESIA SANTO DOMINGO
Beautiful as will be seen with a colouring similar to many other churches in town. Inside is a painted ceiling showing the family tree of Santa Domingo Guzman 1172-1221 who founded the Dominican order in Spain with vows of poverty, chastity, obediance and protection of Mexican indigenous people from colonist excesses. Lots of gold around the altar but not too ornate.
Adjoining is the Dominican monastery which is now a museum with a beautiful stone cloister. The first four rooms are laid out with treasure, gold, silver, turquoise, jade, amber and pearls discovered in Zapotec tomb user by Mixtecs to bury their kings complete with sacrificed servants at Monte Alban in 1937 by Alfonso Casa.
 |
| DOMINICAN MONASTERY |
Some 17th century rooms with a beautifully ornate grandfather clock made in Paris. We watched a video reproduction of the funeral of Benito Juarez and marveled at the wonder of the simple elegant ankle length dresses and leg of mutton sleeves worn by 19th century ladies with small waists and big hats with feathers.
We lunched at nearby Panini and had booked a trip around the adjoining Botanic Garden in Spanish at 5pm. Where the girl gave us leaves to taste explaining their medical uses.
We liked the Gringo tree with red and white peeling skin like bark, 'Get it'!
Thurs 27 May St ALBAN
We decided to take the offer of a guide speaking English and French who boasted he had taken Randolph Churchill around the site. He was very informative but Joan thought he gilded the lily a bit.
 |
| GUIDE TO US and RANDOLPH CHURCHILL |
After lunch we went around on our own to the arts we had not yet visited. Around tomb 104 there were lots of beautiful wild flowers and a view over a very arid valley of buildings with silver corrugated roofs, an area where they brew the best Mexican Mezcal (tequila like) from the Maguey plant.
Friday 28 May, Visit OCTOLAN - Robbed again in Latin America
Joan wanted to go to their Friday market but the hotel wanting payment meant I had run out of cash. So I withdrew 3000peso from an ATM near the bus stop (about £150 giving an exchange rate of 20 peso/£). I declined to take take half back to the hotel for safe keeping and put the lot in my zipped front knee pocket.
Leaving the bus I was robbed almost immediately. Joan remains convinced I was seen withdrawing the money in Oaxaca and the observer phoned ahead by mobile phone to set up the stunt, but I remember feeling my front pocket whilst descending.
 |
| OUTSIDE OCTOLAN'S MAIN MARKET |
What should have been a pleasant episode was ruined, 'the joy went out of the day' recorded Joan. Every turn seemed to confirm what a terrible place this was and that the police were little but a bunch of rogues, no friendliness even in the bar where we went for a drink. The first time we had felt unwelcome in Mexico. This is one place I would avoid.
Travellers be suspicious if you are unable to move in a crowd, the same was preliminary to the robbery by razor blade last year in Chicolayo market in Peru, and earlier in Palermo Sicily where I was held on a crowded bus, cautious of dragging passengers off whilst descending wearing my big rucksack.
We went as intended to the Morales Gallery but only a few of the paintings really pleased, though they had a selection by Frida Kahlo, one self portrait with the head of Diego Riviera protruding from her forehead, and a selection of bright coloured pottery from the Aguilar family.
We walked to two of the Aguilar potteries, the first disappointed but the second had some nice pieces since painted by her son. A factory next door had a pit kiln in the yard.
On arrival back at Oaxaca we found the tourist office and reported the robbery they were very nice and called in a police woman to type her report in Spanish in case we should want to claim on our insurance - I doubt we bothered.
Sat 29 May, visit MITLA
The catholic church was built on one of the pyramids to bury earlier culture and beliefs. Joan remarked that 'Some of the early civilisations were pretty brutal but the Catholic church wasn't much better'.
 |
| FOR SALE OUTSIDE MITLA SITE |
Sun 30 May, Our 25th Wedding Anniversary
Our hotel closes for breakfast on Sunday so we ate a block away, Joan records 'I will miss our friendly waiter'.
Went to the home of Rufino Tamayo an artist who died in 1991, another house with a courtyard full of flowers. He had collected an array of early Mexican artefacts, one an almost full size woman seated cross legged and full size dogs with cheeky faces in terra cotta, apparently these dogs were once kept for food.
We went for coffee at the restaurant opposite Santo Domingo and found it far better downstairs. Outside a troupe of girls dressed in traditional costumes carrying a pineapple, last night we had seen a parade of people carrying fruit and flowers with a statue and letting off rockets. We wondered if it was Harvest Festival.
For our Anniversary Dinner we went to the best hotel in town, the Hotel Catedral Oaxaca. Joan recalls 'A beautiful plate of seven fruits with a big pile of cottage cheese in the centre, a fillet steak in amarillo mole (sauce), and a desert of a rose petal and almond ice cream'. My choice was pumpkin soup, peppers filled with minced meat and chilli (not as good as yesterday in the Italian) and the same desert.
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