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Published: January 17th 2008
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It was a pretty bus ride from Palenque to San Cristobal. 5 hours of windy roads that took us from the jungle to high pine forest.
We had booked ahead with Posada Mexico which was a good thing because they had no room available otherwise. We got a big room in a pleasant complex of buildings.
It was Monday so we found museums closed but we enjoyed a walk around the town which was beautiful with a colourful red and yellow cathedral, pleasant plazas and picturesque colonial houses. We found the craft market and were impressed with the amount of hand made local tourist tat. In particular the cute felt animals. Much searching soon rewarded us with a blue elephant and we got a lovely pussy cat as well for P$70 (US$6.70). Probably could have got them for less but didn't want to risk the deal. Also found a smaller blue-eared elephant for P$20.
We went to a nearby mall, brought goodies for the evening and watched a movie. We saw 'National Treasure: Book of Secrets' with Nicolas Cage and it was very entertaining. And we enjoyed the best ever buttered popcorn. There was liquid butter you could
add yourself to the already buttery popcorn. I could feel my arteries hardening.
There was a bit of a party at the hostel for New Years. Everyone was asked to make something and the hostel would provide food also. Guessing that the kitchen would be busy we chickened out and brought chippies and nuts. But at least we provided the nibbles while everyone waited for the food. A Dutch couple, Onno and Brigitte, made oliebollen, that traditional Dutch News Years treat of deep fried dough balls. That really made Pieter's night.
Next day we went horse riding. But it wasn't nice. The horse people didn't even say hello, we were waiting with a large group of tourists for over an hour in the hot sun while they found enough horses and saddled them, they gave no instructions, didn't ask about experience, and the horses only listened to the guides who decided to flog them along because we started late. After a fire cracker was thrown at us which caused a guide to fall off his horse we decided to get off and walk back to town. We soon managed to flag a taxi. We got our money back
Closed
San Cristobal on New Years Day from the hostel where we booked and spent the day wandering the still-closed town.
Only on our last day were the museums open. Brigitte wasn't feeling so well so Onno joined us exploring the museums. It was cold and rainy as we set out. We started with Na Bolom, a pretty colonial house and hotel with a museum. It was just on 10 am and the museum was open but the ticket office wasn't. We had a cup of coffee in the courtyard while waiting. I had a small tabby cat jump up on my lap and be all cute. When finally we had tickets we browsed the museum which was about the early explorers of the region who had lived in the house. The library was really cosy with an open fire. At Santo Domingo we visited the Centro Cultural de los Altos which traced the history of the town. Then we trekked north to find the Maya Medicine Museum. We ended up in what looked like an abandoned army complex with dorms around a courtyard. We asked a guy and were sent the right direction. But we had to go through a street of concrete block and
corrugated iron shacks to get there. It looked unpleasant and cold and it was sad to see. At the museum we got hold of an english booklet and went through the museum. We learnt lots about the types of healers, how they used the animals and plants (skunk pee for rheumatism) and how different coloured candles and combinations of candles were used in churches to heal and expel bad spirits. It was fascinating to see how they had taken their old believes and merged them with the catholic religion introduced by the Spanish. Out back they were selling lots of potions.
We caught a movie with Onno and Brigitte that evening, 'The Golden Compass'. We had a bus leaving for Oaxaca at 10:45 pm so it was great to have some company until then. On the bus Pieter talked to another Dutch couple while a younger couple behind us had a huge argument. Oh how pleasant. But at least we got some sleep eventually on the 10 hour bus trip.
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