I get antsy if I don't see the sea for more than a week or two so we decided to head south to Puerto Escondido on the Pacific coast. From Oaxaca we had two options: an 11 hour bus ride overnight that went around a large mountain range OR what numerous posts on TripAdvisor told us was a hectic, nausea inducing but spectacular 6 hour ride straight up and over said range in a mini-van.
After some deliberation we opted for the latter. This turned out to be an opt that I would regret. Most of the people describing the trip on the internet had complained about getting car sick but I don't really suffer from this affliction so thought it'd be fine. The real difficulty came from having to spend the entire journey clinging to my chair and trying to stop myself from flying out of the seat. The novelty of this wore off after the first 30 minutes and then it was just annoying. Even the promise of some spectacular views during the descent on the other side turned out to be over-hyped and was nothing particularly special. I'm starting to think some false or misleading information might have accidentally made it onto the internet.
It was kind fun to watch young children clambering all over each other trying to sell you coke and nuts whenever the van stopped for gas (or if the driver just randomly decided to pick up one of his mates on the side of the road). Presumably they all go to school during the week and are only doing this on the weekends to earn some extra pocket money.
I realize I'm starting to sound a bit like a whiny toruist but whatever, it sucked and as a result I arrived in Puerto Escondido incredibly sweaty and exhausted. I say "I" because apparently Audrey really enjoyed the ride and thought it was "authentic" and "fascinating". Bloody French - they're always so positive and never complain about anything!
We'd opted to stay in a hostel a little bit out from the main town since it was cheaper and the photos on hostelworld seemed really nice. It also said it was "a 5 minute cab ride" from the main town. We caught a cab and 20 minutes later arrived at our hostel. To be fair it was quite a nice place and we had our own little cabin. The surrounding neighbourhood was completely empty, save for a few stray dogs and one or two bars which were closed (this was a Saturday night after all). We asked the (American) woman working at our hostel if there was anywhere around that we could get some food and she told us no. So we caught a cab back to town (mea culpa: Audrey may or may not have suggested that we should eat as soon as we got off the bus and I may or may not have grumpily said I just wanted to get to the hostel first to take a shower and that I was sure there'd be somewhere to eat nearby). God... I am a whiny tourist. Poor Audrey.
Fortunately Puerto Escondido turned out to be really nice. Ridiculously hot, but really nice. It's really different than all the other places we'd been to in Mexico thus far. There are no colonial buildings because prior to the 1930s there wasn't really a town here. It's basically a surfing / tourist town and is home to the "Mexican Pipeline" which is supposed to be one of the top surf spots in the world (they've held the X games and various other big competitions here). While we were there the surf didn't seem all that big but apparently it gets much, much bigger (like 16m waves bigger) in November when they hold the annual surf comps. There are also plenty of more secluded spots for swimmers like us to enjoy the (ridiculously warm) water. Oh and there are some really pretty sunsets too.
I sensibly fell asleep under an umbrella but apparently umbrellas in Mexico don't work as I still managed to get sun burnt through the damn thing! You may now all feel sorry for me.
After some deliberation we opted for the latter. This turned out to be an opt that I would regret. Most of the people describing the trip on the internet had complained about getting car sick but I don't really suffer from this affliction so thought it'd be fine. The real difficulty came from having to spend the entire journey clinging to my chair and trying to stop myself from flying out of the seat. The novelty of this wore off after the first 30 minutes and then it was just annoying. Even the promise of some spectacular views during the descent on the other side turned out to be over-hyped and was nothing particularly special. I'm starting to think some false or misleading information might have accidentally made it onto the internet.
It was kind fun to watch young children clambering all over each other trying to sell you coke and nuts whenever the van stopped for gas (or if the driver just randomly decided to pick up one of his mates on the side of the road). Presumably they all go to school during the week and are only doing this on the weekends to earn some extra pocket money.
I realize I'm starting to sound a bit like a whiny toruist but whatever, it sucked and as a result I arrived in Puerto Escondido incredibly sweaty and exhausted. I say "I" because apparently Audrey really enjoyed the ride and thought it was "authentic" and "fascinating". Bloody French - they're always so positive and never complain about anything!
We'd opted to stay in a hostel a little bit out from the main town since it was cheaper and the photos on hostelworld seemed really nice. It also said it was "a 5 minute cab ride" from the main town. We caught a cab and 20 minutes later arrived at our hostel. To be fair it was quite a nice place and we had our own little cabin. The surrounding neighbourhood was completely empty, save for a few stray dogs and one or two bars which were closed (this was a Saturday night after all). We asked the (American) woman working at our hostel if there was anywhere around that we could get some food and she told us no. So we caught a cab back to town (mea culpa: Audrey may or may not have suggested that we should eat as soon as we got off the bus and I may or may not have grumpily said I just wanted to get to the hostel first to take a shower and that I was sure there'd be somewhere to eat nearby). God... I am a whiny tourist. Poor Audrey.
Fortunately Puerto Escondido turned out to be really nice. Ridiculously hot, but really nice. It's really different than all the other places we'd been to in Mexico thus far. There are no colonial buildings because prior to the 1930s there wasn't really a town here. It's basically a surfing / tourist town and is home to the "Mexican Pipeline" which is supposed to be one of the top surf spots in the world (they've held the X games and various other big competitions here). While we were there the surf didn't seem all that big but apparently it gets much, much bigger (like 16m waves bigger) in November when they hold the annual surf comps. There are also plenty of more secluded spots for swimmers like us to enjoy the (ridiculously warm) water. Oh and there are some really pretty sunsets too.
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