Blogs from Chiapas, Mexico, North America - page 63

Having been informed that the security situation and openess to visitors can be a little suspect in the villages surrounding San Cristobal, I booked on a tour. First up, was Zinacantan, and a indigenous house where one women was weaving away and our guide expained how their clothes, traditionally with limited colours due to the natural dyes available and later with more colours from synthetics, were made. They also showed as the traditional way of making tortillas (much the same as you see in town) and the local drink alcholic drink Posh (normally forbided for outsiders to drink, but with money exceptions always seem to be made to traditions). However I was more interested in the politics and situations amongst the different cultures, so after an explanation of all the above I relentlessly quizzed the guide ... read more

Today we went on a horse riding trip to the village of San Juan de Chamula which is famous for it's church which combines Catholic and Mayan practices. We got up at 9am for a quick trip in a collectivo out of town to the stables. We went on the trip with 3 Italian guys who spoke a bizarre mix of Spanish and Italian all day, except to myself who didn't understand a word anyway. We rode for about an hour through the beautiful countryside, the weather was lovely and warm. When I say 'we rode' what I mean is the horses led us, it was like being on a fairground ride connected to a rail, the horses knew exactly where they were going! Louisa felt like a cowgirl or a conquistador or just a cool ... read more

Today we left Palenque and took a tour to the waterfall Misol-Ha, the lake Agua Clara, and the waterfalls of Agua Azul. They are all very spectacular and it was a gorgeous day. At around 3pm we got the coach to San Cristobal De Las Casas, the journey was really bad, very twisty and we were both feeling quite nauseous. A guy met us at the coach station and just happened to be from the hostel that Louisa's brother, Rob, had recommended to us, the Posada 5. We had pizza for dinner and then went to a local bar for some cool live music from a crusty old american guy and washed down some overpriced tourist drinks. We actually met some other English tourists for the first time in days. In fact San Cristobal was full ... read more

At 8am the bus arrived in Palenque, a small touristy town located in the jungle area of Chiapas in the south east of the country. After such a long 14 hour journey we were feeling a bit crap and in need of rest, but thanks to the 'totally useless' Rough Guide to Mexico which is full of inaccuracies and downright lies we couldn't find the hostel we were going to stay at, indeed, we couldn't find anything using this useless loo roll of a book. Don't get me wrong, I like the Rough Guide series and have used them successfully elsewhere but this book is a big fat lemon and needs burning, so many times this book let us down, the authors need shooting and replacing with proper researchers with new information, anyway, enough of my ... read more

San Cristobal is another typical Mexican town, all churches and squares. It was religious week when we were there and the town was alive with processions, floats and fireworks to celebrate the occasion. People were just letting bangers off in the middle of the crowd, so much for Latin American safety standards! Whilst there we took the opportunity to sample Cactus for dinner and actually quite enjoyed it, although it didn't taste of much in particular.... read more