My News...

So, after Ian pointed out that I actually haven´t mentioned what we´ve been doing at all, I decided to update on actual news. Time for my favourite part of the day, ´My News´.

Day 1 - Go to Mexico
Very uneventful, mostly full of airports and jumbo jets (Ian was obviously exicted about the jumbo jet). Some time spent queing in the wrong queue, but very little really.

Actual Day 1 - Mexico City
My how stories of danger on the metro and dirty city is over exaggerated in the case of Mexico. Its actually very clean, the metro is pretty safe and its a ridicuously friendly city. The amount of times we got lost and people helped us. On one occasion, I just stood and looked lost and a nice man pointed us in the right direction. What a lovely place.

So when we arrived in Mexico city we went off to see the Archeological museum, which has the world´s largest single weight supporting pillar in the world or so I´m told.  Its actually very cool, we pretty much spent the day walking around the city, visiting markets and all kinds of stuff. I wanted to take pictures of the markets they were so bright and colourful, but they frown on that sort of thing so no dice. Everything from the pinatas to the flowers were brilliant. Althought, the meat market was actually a little intimidating, we ate vegetarian that night.

Day two we went out to the main square to watch MExico vs. South Africa, what a match! Well, more like what a crowd. The world´s second largest sqaure (after Moscow) was packed to absolute capacity to watch the match on a very very big screen. Everytime Mexico scored (which technically was once, but there were two goals disallowed) there were huge blasts of confetti all over the place! It was mental craic.

Day three, we made our way out to Teotichuam, (which if I ever get the pictures up on Picassa or anything you´ll see how cool it is). Its absolutely breathtaking. Really impressive, huge, brilliant and many more positive adjectives. Its particularly good doing it on your own on public transport (about 13 quid in total) as opposed to doing a tour to see it, which would have been more like 30.

Day after Teotichuan we went off to Oaxaca, what a nice town! We were wrecked by the time we got in, it was a 6 hour bus and the journey was class. It went through everything from Mexico city´s slums through really green areas, through mountains. At some point, I thoguht we were in a spaghetti western. It was brilliant.

Our first day in Oaxaca we did some modest exploring of the city and went off to Monte Alban. Which is really good. On the top of a very high mountain (its about 63m above the town which is about 2000m above sea level - warning this last bit may not be accurate or true). Nevertheless, Monte Alban was very impressive.

We then decided that we should leave Oaxaca because we really really really wanted to go to the beach. So after talking to some people, (very few really) we picked Mozunte. So we got a night bus here. Its 264km from Oaxaca and took about 9 hours on a night bus. The drive was pretty much hairpin bends the whole way. Also, the general rule of thumb seems to be that if there´s something in front of you, you should overtake it. This rule doesn´t change if you´re a bus coming up to a corner. I was kind of glad that it was dark.

So now we´re in Monzunte, tine seaside town that´s just beautiful. Its been lashing rain, but its still really warm. The sea is the temperature of a warm bath, its about when you know you should get out because it will get cold, but its still warm. Its amazing! The hostel is costing us about 3.50 each a night and we have a bed, garden furniture, concrete floor. I´m a little worried about turning lights ona nd off as the wiring looks well dodge. No running water in the toilets, and shower is a hose. Standard really. But its on the beach, and we walk right into the sea.  Oh and in the sea, the waves are at least a foot taller than Ian, these generate what we like to call, the washing machine effect. You get absolutely creamed. Its brilliant!

Unfortunately there´s no ATM here so strict budget and we have to leave tomorrow. We´re planning on heading to San Cristobel for 2 nights then Palenque for 3 nights and we´ll hopefully be spending next weekend in Tulum and diving the Cenotes there.

And thats it so far.

Some Things We´ve Learned in Mexico So Far...

1. Garlic tablets don´t stop or slow mosquitos from biting you, deet and mosquito nets do.
2. That Mystery Green sauce is NOT Guacamole, its spicey to fuck!
3. Mexico City is not the den of thieves its made out to be, they really like their streets clean and their metro cheap.
4. Football is a big deal.
5. No one speaks English, we don´t speak Spanish. (I like to try to learn a phrase a day).
6. Deet is God´s gift to man.
7. Metro doors stay open for total of 3 seconds. If you miss them, you must wait.
8. Traffic lights are guidelines, lanes are optional. (This optional also applies to one way streets, just because its supposed to be a one way street, your bus driver may feel its a quicker route and go down it the wrong way.)
9. Best way to find the local bus stop, look for the mass of people waiting. Best way to find which direction you´re looking for, have a strict policy of asking every bus driver if he´s going your way.
10. Mexico only opens after 11am.

Monte Alban, Very Cool.

Last Supper

When you take the plunge and decide to upheave yourself by quitting jobs, masters and all that to go travelling, you think 'Brilliant!' The phrase 'year long holiday' gets thrown about and you start to think about a year of Summer ahead.

Then its time to go and you go to say bye to everyone. Up till this point you've forgotten that there are people you'll miss and it gets a little sad. Its probably just a fly in your eye, you're definately not crying.

Then you remind yourself of the year long Summer ahead and you cheer up as you go to board your plane.

Right now, excited and nervous. Wish us luck.

(If anybody wants to get in on the 'How long will they last before someone gets murded' pool, talk to my mum.)