Mexico City

Tuesday 7 November 2017 A stroll around the historic centre of Mexico City

After a somewhat stressful start - nw cards not doing what they are supposed to do - we eventually got out and strolled through a very pleasant park, past the Palicido de Bellas Artes, an incredibly beautiful building. The inside is equally beautiful and well worth a visit.

Palicido de Bellas Artes

The Palacio National that we see today is a reconstruction that was completed in 1693, replacing the previous two that burnt down in 1659 and 1692. Taking up the entire east side of the plaz, it was built on the site of Moctezuma's palace when the Aztecs were  annihilated by the Conquistadors.

The palace is free to enter provided you can leave a passport or ID card - both of ours were back at the apartment.  Then Jorge introduced himself to us saying that  if we hired him as a guide, his ID would be enough to get us in. We knew that it was now or never.

He gave us the history of the complex but the most interesting part was the murals, painted by Diego Rivera between 1929 and 1935. The entire staircase and all around the first floor is a grand sweep of the history of the Mexicans. From the belief that the ancients were taught astronomy by the Vikings through the fact that most ordinary people welcomed the Conquistadors because of the fondness that the Aztecs had for human sacrifice and the much later American invasion stole over a third of Mexican territory. 

We had a look at the ruins of the Aztec palace, but it really is just a lump of stones held together with mortar. There is quite a lot of information dotted around the fenced off structure, in both Spanish and English, some of it suggesting that the rest of it was used in the construction of the cathedral right next door.


Luckily there are a couple of really good models of the complex in its heyday.

These temples are often depicted with blood running out of the opening and down the steps to portray the daily sacrifices carried out by the Aztecs - something about keeping the sun fuelled, I believe.

Wednesday 8 November

Chapultepec Park

We had quite an adventure getting here. The nearest metro stop to our apartment turned out to be out to be a metro-bus stop - a two carriage, modern bus - but we had to 'pay' to get on the platform. So we stood back and watched a couple of locals go through, while also translating the instructions between us when a young lady offered to help. Not only did she help us buy a travel card but she happened to be going in the same direction, so she led us three stops on the bus before changing to the metro and telling us where to get off.

Public transport in the city is reliable, comfortable and cheap.

The bridge crossing the eight-lane highway from the metro station  is dotted with the current exhibition - photographs enlarging the minute, and lead to the entrance of the park

Six pillars at the entrance - Bosque de Chapultepec - Monumento a Los Niños Hèroes celebrates the bravery of the last cadet standing after the Americans had slaughtered all the others.

The art gallery - Meuso de Arte Monderno

The Castle - museo Naional de Historia

The Antropología Museo

Thursday 9 November

Teotihuacan - Pirámide de la Luna

La Paz

Saturday 11th November
Snorkeling with whale sharks is something both of us have wanted to do since we first saw someone do it on the telly.

We were pitched along the Malacon for a cost of 700 pesos each. For an extra 100 peaos the took us back, in the boat, to La Concha, amd pitched up on the beach to pick up swimming costumes.

As luck had it,  we had the boat and crew to ourselves. The guide stood up at the bow looking for ahead for shadows.  When she spots her target she jumps in, and if all is well and good, signals to us and we jump in.

I not sure that I believed I was actually going to see anything, but once I got myself sorted and looked down there was this massive creature coming straight at me. It us really difficult to express just how awesome it is to be that close.

Eventually, it swam on past us and we got back in the boat. Our guide took up het vigil immediately and was soon telling us to eady ourselves again.

The second time,  we came across a mother and baby.  The baby's mouth was big enough to accommodate an adult human. We could of had a party in mum's mouth.

They are truly magnificent, huge, majestic. And we were were close enough to touch.  They weren't bothered by us at all.

Sunday 12th November
Snorkeling with sea lions is another lifelong wish and we had a whole day at sea for the same price (plus 100 pax mxn commission).

There were  10 of us and two crew. The boat takes us to the south of La Paz, past some secluded sandy beaches, over the channel and up the side of the islands just off La Paz.

We saw the largest Frigate bird colony in the world, he drove us through a sea eroded arch and showed us another rock that has eroded into a mask. Then onto the sealuon colony, first sowing us yhe nursery and then lettting us snorkel in the water with the slightly older and bigger sea lions

One of the crew stayed on board,  the other led the rest of us.

Really seemed care about the environment.

Monday 13th November

Hired a car and drove around the tip of the peninsula south of la paz.

We stopped at Todos Santos, a very small but colourful town full of little artisan outlets selling expensive but quality jewellery, leather goods and other tourist souvenirs.

Our next stop was at ******* for our first sight of The Pacific and watched ad fishermen beached thier boats.

The time eas not in our side.   The guide book made it out to be less than 250 kms. We actually drove 458. 70 of which was an unmade/sand road between San Jose de Cabo and La Paz which followed the coast and gave access to beautiful beaches. 

Sadly, we did most of it in the dark and unable to see any but the first few, and it was a grueling part.

Sadly,  we also didn't see anything of the mountains we had to drive over ro complete our journey.

To be honest, we should stayed one night in San Jose de Cabo and made a day of the last part of the trip.

Mexico - here we come

Sunday 8th October, 2017

We were just talking about going on another trip. I suggested Mexico.

Paul fished out some issues of Wanderlust and the nest thing we knew, we were booking two return flights.

Then Paul checked the foreign office -  There's drug related violence, political related violence, not to mention the recent devastating earthquakes! Someone else told us that Mexico was the only place her mother, who had backpacked around most of the world, had been mugged.

But the Mexican's, it would seem, have been badly treated. Here is a quick resume:

1519  Cortex lands in Veracruz on the Gulf of Mexico.
1521  Mexico city built on the ruins of the Aztec city of Tenochtitlan to become the capital city of                New Spain.
1525  Most of the pre-invasion population have been slaughtered by sword or desease.
1524  Chritianity arrives in the guise of Franciscan monks.
1546 The Spanish discover silver.
1560-90  Chichimeca war.
1551  Spanish Conquistadors take the Yucatan peninsular.
1810 Mexican War of Independence
1846 Mexican/US war provoked by the US ended 2 years later with Mexico conceding almost half of her territory to the US
1912 Mexican Revolution finally gets rid of the idiot that lost the territory.
1917 Mexican constitution
1997 North American free trade agreement - Canada, US and Mexico.

Googlemaps

We're off to India

It's cold and dark and windy in good old Bognor - but we only have 19 days until we start our new adventure.

This is a practice post from my Android.

El Clalafate

We had intended to visit El Chalten, then come back to El Calafate and then cross over to Chile at the nearest point to here.  However, as we were researching, we changed our plans and will be going north to Los Antiguos (a 12 hour bus journey) for three nights, and on to Esquel (and another 12 hours bus journey).  A lot of this journey will be on the Ruta 40, which not tarmacked all of the way.

The bus picked us up at in El Chalten about 9:45 and we finally got to our hotel in El Calafate at about 13:00.  The scenery didn’t seem to be quite to awe inspiring as it did on the way to El Chalten; the golden sun-down hour can make such a difference.  El Calafate is named after the fruit, similar to a blueberry, which grows in the region.  (It is amazing that anything can grow in Patagonia, Argentinian’s steppe, because the is little rain and a great deal of wind).

We chose our hotel, the Koi Aiken, because of its view of Lago de Angentino.  Its other main benefit (also its main set-back) is that the centre of town is a thirty minute walk away.  After arriving, we had to go into town to replenish cash and investigate excursions to the Glacier Perito Moreno and car hire.  The cash was sorted quickly, but these machines will only let you have AR$1000.00 a time, that’s about £100, which doesn’t go very far but makes sure they get plenty of commission/fees.  Early December is the beginning of the main summer season and we were surprised to find that one of the hire companies had no vehicles left and another had only 4X4 monsters at AR$2400.00 (£240.00) per day with a maximum of 200 kms.  200 kms is nothing in this area.  It is 88kms to get to the glacier - and 88kms back.  And you would, no doubt, have to pay for petrol on top of that.

Our room, on the ground floor, does have a restricted view but at the top of the hotel there is a guest lounge with incredible views of the lake and the bordering wetland (that boasts over 150 different species of bird) together with views of the entire town.  We brought our second cup of breakfast coffee up here and we had the place to ourselves.  It is now 11:30 and we still have the place to ourselves.  Paul is doing his pilates and I am enjoying the rest, and the view.

The excursion we chose to go on was with XL Tours, a one-man outfit, owned and run by Juan Angulo with his fourteen seat mini-bus.  At AR$280.00 per person, Juan takes his passengers along the old road to the Glacier Perito Moreno.  The old road is far less travelled these days because it is not tarmacked, making progress a slower.  The bumpy ride was worth it though.  We stopped along the way for photo opportunities, Condors and other raptors, as well as a brief stop to a ranch café.  Manuel, dressed as if ready to jump on his horse and round up the livestock made us all feel welcome, even though none of us actually spent any money there.  Apart from Manuel and the view, the other most interesting photo opportunity for me was the orphaned fox cub living in the fire-grate, whose best buddy, also called Manuel, a small ginger kitten.

Moving on to the glacier, the National Park charges an entry fee of AR$130.00 per person.  A bit steep, but worth it for the spectacular views.  This glacier is unusual in that it is topped up with the same amount of snow at the back as it loses from the front.  And coming up to the southern hemisphere’s mid-summer, there are constantly ‘bits’ falling off.  First you hear the ice cracking, like thunder in the distance, and all heads turn.  Then, as the ice hits the water, from a height of thirty or forty meters, the thunder reverberates like you are in the heart of the storm and the resulting excitement of ‘ooos’ and ‘ars’ would not be out of place at a firework display.

Those wishing to take the boat trip to the edge of the glacier, an additional AR$120 pax, were ferried to the port and the rest of us used the extra hour willing huge chunks of ice to detach and start new lives as icebergs.  The three and a half hours we had there went very quickly and all too soon we were piling into the minibus to head back to town and the other element that makes Juan’s XL Tour better than any of the bigger companies, is a visit to a local hostelry for a glass of local beer and a hot empanada.   It was when we sat down for the refreshments that we met and chatted to the other English speakers - Australia and US and a young German girl who spoke good English, while the natural Spanish speakers sat at another table. The XL Tour was only AR$40 (or £4) more than the others and I am so glad to have come across it before taking the first one, recommended by the guide book.

Today is Tuesday 10^th December.  We had to book an extra night’s accommodation because the bus we need to take only goes every other day.  Unbelievable, we have this loft space all to ourselves again.  It has to be 10 X 5 meters and is surrounded on three sides by windows.  The sun is shining but the wind is howling.  The only thing missing is a kettle to make a decent cup of coffee.

  

Puerta Madryn

The Welsh were the first Europeans to inhabit this area of Patagonia and consequently, many of the family names and road names are Williams, Jones and Roberts, although the Argentinians don’t pronounce them the same way as the English, or Welsh for that matter, do, as we found out on the taxi rides we took to get to the apartment.

The reason most people, us included, come here is for the wildlife.  The Southern Right Whale uses the deep bays to give birth and mate before travelling all the way up north, following the food.  There are also breeding colonies of Sea-lions, Elephant Seals and Magellan Penguins.  These areas are well protected so that the eco tourist can see the wildlife but cannot get near enough to interfere or worry the creatures.  There are also miles of sandy beach for human recreation.  The main roads are paved but many of the side roads are not, giving it a feel of a frontier town.  If you can find a spot in the sun and out of the wind it is really hot, but the wind (it always seem to be windy here) can have a really cold bite.

We arrived here bang on schedule at 09:05.  The double-decker bus was very comfortable with deep padded leather seats that reclined to 45 degrees, and a good amount of leg room, but after 20 hours we were more than happy to get off.  They fed us three times during the twenty hours and I have to say the food was worse than aeroplane tucker.    We did have an amazing view of scenery that was much the same the whole way – flat scrubland.

Our apartment is on the south side of town; about a 30 min walk along the beach to get to the centre.  At the north end, the town has a museum about Man and the Sea which, it just so happens, has free entry on Tuesdays.  It’s a lovely little building on four floors with a tower at the top giving views over the whole town.  We enjoyed the hour it took to go round and when we came out we sat on a rock in the garden to eat an apple and have a smoke.  Very soon after sitting down a black dog came sniffing around.  At first we were a bit wary (rabies), but gradually this dog befriended us and we were both stroking it.  Before we had finished he was laying at my feet as if he’d lived with us all his life.  When we got up to go he started barking at us as if to say I’m with you guys, OK. And he was.  He’d walk a bit in front then stop and look round at us, trot back to touch base, then trot on again as if we were taking him for a walk.  He kept with us as we walked through the town, crossing the road whenever we did.

The buses here run on the same basis as in BA, ie: cards or coins and Paul and I stopped off at a shop to buy a card, when we came out the dog was gone and we breathed a sigh of relief.  But just after we had crossed the next road, the dog came bounding up behind us and as he reached my side his nose nudged my hand.  The dog had clearly adopted us and we both felt really bad.  We couldn’t look after him for very obvious reasons.  He also had a very bad habit of chasing cars and I cringed every time he nearly caught one – this being the middle of town, there were a lot of cars to chase.  As we waited at the bus stop he was particularly active in the chase, but eventually he came to rest, again at our feet.  As I got on the bus I have mixed feelings of guilt – I had abandoned him, and relief – he can’t follow us back to the apartment.  Since that first day, we have come across quite a few stray dogs, luckily all seemed friendly and well behaved.  One joined us on the terrace of a restaurant one evening so I fed him our leftovers.

We spent most of Wednesday walking south along the beach to another museum, again very small but well worth a visit.  It is also about the marine life of this area and there are a couple of rooms dedicated to the whale.  In one there are six TV screens that are like portholes and are designed to make it look like whales are just swimming past.  To get to the next room you have to walk through a tunnel of suspended ropes, giving the impression of being a piece of krill going into the whale’s mouth.  On the other side, the room is dark and filled with whale song – a weird but interesting experience.

Thursday we hired bikes and rode seventeen gruelling kms (10 on them over unpaved roads – mostly up-hill with the wind in our faces)  to see the colony of sea-lions.  Luckily we both had a monocular because the nearest the humans get to them is the top of the cliff, but there was one particular male who kept us very entertained.  Paul noticed him first, a huge great male on top of a tiny female.  Every now and then his pelvic thrusts indicated copulation.  But then they would shuffle around on the shingle with the females head barely showing between his front flippers and the pelvic thrusts would start again.  Paul hypothesized that as this was the beginning of the season he could well be a youngster that hasn’t quite go the hang of it yet.  If that is the case he will have to be a better fighter than a lover if he is to keep his spot on the beach and the harem that goes with it.  As well as the first viewing platform there is a walkway that takes you out to a bit of a point.  When we followed this path, as we got to the end, I saw something that looked suspiciously like a dorsal fin break the surface of the waves.  After a bit of patient searching we got a better view.  It was not a dorsal fin but a mother and baby Southern Right Whale.  So all the pain was worth it – although I’m still a bit saddle-sore three days later.

Raymondo, our host and owner of Edymar Apartments, a very cheerful and helpful person, offered on the first day to arrange an excursion to the Peninsular National Park and a boat trip into the bay to see the whales.  Each time we saw him he kept saying that the forecast said the bay would be too windy for the boats to go out and it was Friday before we actually got to go.  The mini-bus picked us up at 07:50 then trawled the town hotels to pick up the rest of the tour group.  The tour guide, Sebastian, and the driver, Ricardo, where both clearly as interested in the wildlife as the rest of the group.  Sebastian was very knowledgeable and Ricardo was good at spotting.  Every time he saw something the bus would stop, sometime reversing back, and Sebastian would explain the significance and habits of the creature.  I should have taken notes.  We saw the largest rodent in the world , commonly known as the Patagonian Hare (because it looks like  a very large hare but it is nothing to do with that family) but is actually a Maras.  We saw burrowing owls, a perriguin falcon feeding on carrion (most unusual, apparently), we saw a long-haired armadillo, emu type birds called Rhea’s (?), and Guancos – Llama type creatures that come from the camel family and lots of raptors.

We finally got to go out in the boat at about 3pm.  Southern Right Wales are known for coming up to the boats and initiating contact with the humans on board.  Not so today.  We saw about six mothers with their calfs but generally they wanted to move away from the boat and be left alone.  The boats are captained by responsible eco aware people and so the whales are not ‘harassed’ but it left us with mixed feelings as to whether we should be disturbing them at all – particularly now that I’ve ‘done that’!

Saturday and Sunday we chilled and sunbathed.  Today, Monday, we are heading further south to El Calafete to see the glaciers.  The weather will feel like we are back in England.

At last - we are off again

And so another adventure begins. We fly to Buenos Aires on the 18th November and we fly back from Lima on the 28th February.