MAZUNTE - Mexico

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Wednesday 15th September

We arrived via overnight bus at Pochulta which is only 15 miles from Mazunte (pop 702) which is in the Oaxaca region. Considering we've just been on a bus for nearly 11 hours we are feeling fine and its not long before we hire the 15 minute taxi to Mazunte.

On arrival we are greeted by Marianna, a Uraguayan who run's Casa Pan de meil on the Mazunte Coast. The round shaped eating area overlooks the infinty pool and the views looking out from here are breathtaking. Large rocks reaching out of the beutiful blue sea are constantly being pounded by large white waves.

We are treated to a free continental breakfast of tea, toast, yogurt and granola which is served to us by maids who are super friendly but speak no English. The actual owner of Casa is an elderly french woman and she was fine and she told us to not feed nor spoil her two dogs one of which was a large bull mastif. She also explained that we just help ourselves to anything we want in the kitchen as long as we mark it down on our room sheet for payment on departure. A very laid back attitude indeed.

Wow, this place is really nice, nicer than the pictures gave it credit for. we are taken to our suite which was a short walk around the front of the hotel. We have a clifftop suite which overlooks the beach and looks out t the South Pacific sea. We have luxury in abundance as we have a very spacious room with excellent aircon and free wifi. A little kitchen and fridge with free water stocked each day is situated next to our large shower area. Triple french doors on the side and front of the room which lead onto to an equally large private balcony with hammocks and wicker chairs. We are feeling spoilt now!!
The sound of the waves are the only thing to be heard and its not long before we are in our swimming gear and heading for the infinty pool to chill for the rest of day.

In the evening we headed into Mazunte to grab some dinner. Casa dem does not provide meals only breakfast so we are told to head for one of two places down the road. We must take torches as the road has no lighting and it can be risky with cars going about in the pitch dark not to mention motorbikes with dull headlamps. We got some pasta at the first place down the hill and it was owned by an italian couple who were really nice and made us feel welcome. There was a little bit of traffic going about as the celebrations of independence were coming to an end and people were returning from the bigger cities looking pretty worn out. It was a nice walk home as the fireflys were out in their thousands and they shone the way home for us!! 😊 The room was nice and chilled when we got back and we watched sky tv for a bit while it started to rain outside heavily.

Thursday 16th September

Well last nights weather has carried on today as there are 3 hurricanes passing over Mexico just now and we are stuck in the middle of one of them apparently. Its monsoon season!! Its pouring it down so heavy that the water is gushing over the drainpipes and the water is rushing past us in all directions. Its quite cool to watch actually as we are on a cliff top and the water is cascading down the hill and over the cliff almost waterfall like. Well not much getting done today except read books and watch telly. I did grab a brolly and walk to the shop for some noodles which i knocked up in the kitchen. Showing our true colours now. 😊 Thunder and lighting all day and night. Hope it eases up tomorrow as our plans for sunbathing our looking slimmer by the minute. When Jill was asleep i managed to catch a crab that was scuttling about our balcony and i resisted temptation of putting it the shower cubicle as a wee surprise for Jill in the morning. My insurance doesn't cover death by girlfriend so i left him outside. 😊

Friday 17th September

Well the weather has improved significantly so we are going to make up for lost time and head for the local turtle reserve which is situated not far from here. As we looked out the balcony we saw that we had a bat hanging from our ceiling net. Cute little thing aswell.
We had breakfast and headed off into Mazunte.

Mazunte is a small village wedged between a wide, one km long beach and the Sierra Madre del Sur. Parallel to the beach is the Avenida Paseo del Mazunte, the main street, which connects the village with others nearby. The area has mostly deciduous trees as well as a large variety of cactus and mangroves.
Mazunte is a tiny little village indeed and it hardly has any activity in the three streets that make up the town.

We arrived at the turtle reserve and it was basically a preservation home for rescued turtles. This used to be the processing plant for turtles. Before the mid 20th century Mazunte had nearly no population, but that changed when the market for sea turtle meat and eggs developed due to the many turtles that come to Mazunte to lay eggs, by the 1970s, Mazunte was the center of sea turtle hunting in Mexico, with its own slaughterhouse (now the turtle reserve).

Concern over the declining number of sea turtles eventually led to an absolute ban on turtle meat and eggs in Mexico, and deprived most families in Mazunte of their main source of income. To replace it, ecotourism based on the conservation of turtles and natural cosmetics developed. The body shop used to finance the workshop here and there are lots of natural body lotions, oils, hand cream and cosmetics available to buy here.

There are lots of rescued turtles here from really old to newborn ones. We walked round the site in about 15 minutes and it was cool to get up close to some of the turtles and tortoises.

We got back before dark hoping to catch our little bat waking up and flying off. As it just about got pitch black we watched him have a wee stretch then open his eye's and fly off. I dont blame him, after a twelve hour sleep, seeing us staring at him through the window is enough to scare anybody off!

Later on in the evening we walked to the other restaurant here with our torches and arrived at a very nice restaurant called La Termita which was renowned for its stonebaked pizza. I must say the pizza's we had were out of this world. Not only did we watch in amazement at the chef flipping and throwing our pizza base about, the fact that we could watch as the pizza was carefully put in a large open stone furnace just yards away from our table was dramatic indeed. 4 cokes and 2 large pizza's cost 14 pounds and was worth every penny.

We struggled to walk back to our room as our bellies were full to say the least. We gingerly packed our bags to save us doing it in the morning and its not long before we are snoring and farting in our sleep, well, i know Jill was!! x

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