Blogs from Chiapas, Mexico, North America - page 7

Maria Chiara and I were captivated by what we'd heard of San Cristobal de Las Casas - even the name itself conjures up something far flung and exotic. It's a city in Chiapas in Southern Mexico, well into the tropics but high altitude as well, a colonial town with gaily painted houses, churches on every square, pleasantly mild temperatures all year round and crystalline mountain air. But the issue was getting there. We were in Quintana Roo in the North East of the Yucatan Peninsula, and were contemplating a long drive in a hire car through endless flatlands of scrubby jungle. That monotony would have finally be broken when we got to Chiapas and the mountains. Unfortunately, as well as beautiful vistas one would have to contend with potential ambushes from local bandits. We checked - ... read more

Distance driven today: 198 miles / 317 km Cumulative distance driven: 6,121 miles / 9,859km (11,000 miles to go) Today’s trip: Coatzacoalcos to San Cristóbal de las Casas, Mexico Severe traffic violation committed: 1 Bribes paid to police officer instead of traffic ticket: 1 During long riding days, I get lots of time to think through the subject of the blog post I want to write in the evening. But during todays’ ride I actually drew a blank. I couldn’t think of single thing that was worthy of writing about. Ok, so I misplaced my SPOT satellite tracking device yesterday evening at the parking of the hotel. It was inevitable that, during such a long trip, with so many gadgets that go in and out of bags, hotels, pockets and hotel rooms each and every day, ... read more

Still in San Cristóbal de las Casas. Still learning Spanish though there is only one more week of that left. Then we pack our bags and hit the road once again, aiming eastward at the Guatemalan border. June 6th marks six months since E and I, pink and naïve, climbed aboard an aeroplane at Heathrow (after they binned all the razor blades I had brought with me) and left the UK for Delhi. For half a year we have been outsiders to every city, community, and household we've visited although we frequently tried to ingratiate ourselves for the brief time we spent in a location. Nowhere is this transience better illustrated than in the number of beds or locations we have laid ourselves down on. 50. Not including the trains, planes, and buses we've spent a ... read more

After we left Anisha's place in San Sebastian Rio Hondo we spent a couple of days at Hotel Zipolite in Oaxaca city before making our way down to San Cristobal de las Casas, the "cultural capital" of Chiapas. The city was first known to me as the core site of the Zapatista inssurection in 1994, when the EZLN marched into and liberated the city from the Chiapas government. They have since relinquished their presence in the city and retreated back to the mountain villages ("caracoles", Spanish for shells) surrounding the city but their presence is still felt in the city through large numbers of pro-Zapatista posters and graffiti as well as shops selling EZLN merchandise. We arrived in San Cris for the first time on May 1st and stayed with a couchsurfing host named Emilio for ... read more

The last several days were spent in San Cristobal de Las Casas. We got there from Palenque by taking two Colectivos: one from Palenque to Ocosingo (MXN60) and hopping onto another straight away Ocosingo to San Cristobal (MXN65). Being higher in the mountains, San Cristobal was a blessedly cool place when we arrived. We hoofed it to the Iguana Hostel that we'd emailed, but never gotten a confirmation for. Thankfully they did have space for us. This turned out to be a great hostel with a mix of private rooms and dorms, totalling a max of 27 people. We spent a lot of time chilling here; in both senses of the word. Nights were downright chilly and days were pleasant to sit out in the sun. We went to the market just a couple blocks away ... read more