Gemma's Mini-Mexican Blog

As I write about Mexico I have a sour taste in my mouth and I worry that this bitterness may come across in my writing, rather like I'm sucking on a lemon, or should that be one of the many limes that are served with everything here?

It is a tale of stunning scenery, idyllic landscapes, broken promises and cunning crime. Right now, I can feel the tears forming although I know I won't let them flow, not because I'm sad to leave - quite the opposite - more from frustration. It is such a contrast from when we arrived in this beautiful country.

Mexico was the start of my part of the trip and somehow, instinctively, l knew it. The hostel in Mazatlan was my favourite so far and with a beautiful beach just 3 minutes away with beach bars selling delicious tacos and cold Corona, I was in heaven. When I found out that Mazatlan also claimed to be the shrimp capital of the world I knew that when Mother Nature was creating this place she was thinking of me. 

I was sad to leave, even though we had stayed an extra night because it was so lovely. Also, the thought of going to Mexico City daunted me, and I felt certain we were going to be robbed.

I was wrong. Mexico City was great, with beautiful parks and lots of interesting things to do. But it also spralled on for ever, with street after street looking exactly the same - a little bit unloved. Our hostel wasn't that nice though, which can really alter your perception of a place so we were glad to move on. One thing that did surprise me was how amazed people were that we had been to Mazatlan. Apparently it has a dangerous reputation as one of the biggest Cartels operate there. It is funny how I felt so at home there, but was scared of the much safer Mexico City.

From there, a short 6 hour bus ride took us to Oaxaca (pronounced wah-ha-ka, something I still can't say!) a beautiful city in a mountain valley bursting with charm and culture. Sitting in the main square sipping the local hot chocolate was a great way to soak up the atmosphere and catch up on some people watching. One thing we have noticed is how small but yet fully grown the Mexican people are. Darren nearly trod on one as she skirted around his kneecaps! 

But then it all went wrong.

I wish we had never arrived in Palenque. Quite a statement considering how stunning the Mayan ruins are as they sit so aptly in the misty jungle. Exploring them was a real treat. Sheltered by the trees, we hardly saw any other tourists and it felt like we had stumbled across them, like the first people to find them after 700 years of dormancy. It was an experience that will stay with me for a long time and I am very grateful for that.

However, the hostel was a dive, dirty, incompetent, unfriendly and there were constant efforts to extort money from us such as putting us in a cheaper room than we had paid for, charging an extra 10% service charge for food but not writing it on the bill so we would tip again and trying to sell us a tour of the ruins for 240 Pesos when the local buses charged just 10 Pesos each way and went from the end of the road.

On the first night in Palenque two locals stayed in our dorm. We thought this was a bit weird and I felt a sense of unease. They turned out to be the owners son and his friend but they arrived late, well after we had gone to sleep, had no bags and spoke no English so we didn't trust them. However, in the morning they were friendly and happily joked together before they had their showers and left.

So the following afternoon when another bagless local turned up the alarm bells didn't ring as much as they should have. He stayed the night, robbed us while we were sleeping and left early the next morning.

That meant that our last day in Mexico was spent in the Police Station rather than relaxing ahead of a taxing journey to Guatemala the next day. Initially, we were very pleased with the help we got. The police seemed very thorough, and even enlisted the help of a local translator. However, we were fed a line and paid a 400 pesos (£20) investigation tax, or corruption charge as I now like to call it. So by lunchtime we had been robbed twice, but there was more to come.

As it turned out, the translator was more help than we could have hoped for. We had made a small mistake when crossing the border into Mexico and did not have the correct visa documents. We were open and honest about this at the Police Station and said that we had planned to go to the immigration office that day and asked if that was the best thing to do. The translator assured us that we could easily sort it out on the border (he used to work for immigration) and in fact he now organises trips and could arrange transport and speak to immigration on our behalf. The only way to travel this leg of the journey was to pay around 300 Pesos for an organised trip, so knowing this, we felt a lot safer with a guide who was trusted by the police, spoke fluent English and assured is that he would come all the way to the Guatemalan border with us - something we checked and double checked before handing over the higher price of 460 pesos each, which included all costs and breakfast. (Robbery number three).

The next day we were collected from our hostel and began to make our way in a car, not the agreed bus, with no explanation of why. Already, something didn't feel right.

After an hour we stopped for breakfast which was where the translator left us, still two hours from the Mexican border, saying that he had to return to the hotel. He loaded us onto an already full minibus with other tourists (all Spanish speaking) and a Spanish speaking driver.

I am still sat on the bus, desperate to leave Mexico but worried about what lies ahead at the border - no doubt robbery number four as our white skins and lack of language skills will demand a high bribe to be let through. I can almost hear the cha-ching of dollar signs behind their eyes as they watch us approach the border. But I still haven't cried!

The happy ending

When we arrived at the border we were not surprized to be charged US$50 to cross. We moaned a bit and told everyone that we had been robbed. The men at the border patrol must have taken pity on us because when they discovered that we hadn't been stamped into the country they didn't stamp us out either and actually gave us our money back!

15 minutes later we were in a wooden canoe zooming up the river towards Guatemala. It was such a lovely way to travel with the breeze blowing through my hair and the sun beaming down through the clouds. My spirits rose as we got closer to a new country and having an open mind again, only hopefully a little bit wiser!

Northern Mexico: Arriba!

Crossing the border between America and Mexico was a farce, but not in the way I had expected. Supposedly the busiest border in the world, but we didn't see a single American official. Instead our Greyhound bus just drove straight through to the Mexican officials, who waved us through. Normally I'd be relieved, crossing land borders around the world can be a real pain, and waste valuable time. But on this occasion we needed to hand in our entry forms to someone in US uniform (we'd been explicitly warned we'd have trouble getting back in to the country if we didn't hand them over). So we gave a Mexican baggage handler $10 to take our forms back to the Americans, and just have to hope he is as good as his word.

We arrived in Tijuana just a few minutes after crossing into Mexico. Having been there once before, I convinced Gemma we didn't want to spend any time in Tijuana, and recent news reports of illegal activity simply confirmed my thinking, so we stayed on the bus to it's final stop, Tijuana Central Bus Terminal (which is actually about 6km out of town). We didn't have long to wait for our connection, just enough time to enjoy a salad and spend a penny (or more accurately, 4 pesos). We were asked a number of questions as we bought our tickets, questions we couldn't answer because we didn't understand, which confirmed the need for us to pick up some working Spanish very quickly.

Nevertheless, through a combination of hand signals, grunts and much pointing we established the time and number of our bus, and at 3.20pm we boarded the TAP Comfort Service to Mazatlan. And I have to say, the bus was pretty impressive, considering we spent 26 hours onboard. The toilets were clean, the seats were large and comfortable, and the passengers friendly. And we were both given a goody bag containing a sandwich, cola, water, tea and coffee, chocolate and crisps. The bus stopped several times so we were able to get off to stretch our legs when we fancied it.

During the day several screens showed movies, obviously in badly dubbed Spanish, ranging from animations like Madagascar through to some horrors. The noise of which was quite disturbing as the evening got darker. However we amused ourselves by trying to spot holes or suitable places to climb over the border fence which separates American from Mexico, and snakes through the mountains like a miniature version of the great wall of China.

During the night we also hit one of many police checkpoints which seem to litter the route. Usually they target traffic heading north (presumably for the drugs trade) but for forms sake we were made to disembark at midnight, and carry our luggage through a brightly lit room. Every person had to press a button, those who generated a green light didn't get searched, but woe betide anyone with a red light! Fortunately we both got the green light, but we had to wait outside as one of our fellow passengers had their entire luggage thoroughly searched. By the time we got back on we were exhausted and fell asleep pretty soon afterwards, helped by the fact that the driver finally turned the movies off.

The following day continued much as the previous afternoon, we didn't get to see a huge amount of scenery from the road although there were a stunning amount of birds of prey to be seen circling overhead. Twice during the day the bus stopped, we were asked to get off, and then the bus was taken away for cleaning. Going from an air conditioned coach into the stifling Mexican heat was quite an experience, the temperature reaching over 30 degrees during the day.

In the late afternoon we finally reached Mazatlan, so we jumped into a taxi and made our way to our new hostel. The owner greeted us with the news that he was going away for a few days so he would be leaving his mum in charge, which worked out well for us. The hostel itself was absolutely lovely, not really a hostel in the true sense, we had a suite to ourselves, with air conditioning and ceiling fan, a well equipped kitchen including a fridge, and a seating area with TV. All for about $25 a night. There was also a large shaded atrium, and a computer/reading room. And it was just 3 blocks from the beach.

We asked the owner for a restaurant recommendation as we were starving and he suggested a seafood cafe on the waterfront 5 minutes away, so we dropped our heavy bags down and without even stopping for a shower we walked out into the night to find our dinner. The recommendation was a good one, and for about $10 we had shrimp tacos, nachos with salsa, and beer. Not without reason does Mazatlan claim to be the shrimp capital of the Mexico.

The following day we visited the local aquarium, a curious mix of local fish and more exotic exhibits. Whilst the tanks and museum (containing several complete skeletons of wales, seals and marlin) were interesting, we more curious about some of the displays in the aquariums gardens. One giant sea lion seemed intent on making a break for freedom, and had clambered on top of a flight of stairs used by the staff. They didn't seem too concerned, so we wandered in the opposite direction.

Gemma attempted to feed a sting ray, but may have been put off by my screaming "look out he's coming for you" and dropped the food. In fairness one of them did for Steve Irwin, proving that they have no respect for reputations, so I congratulated myself on saving my girlfriends life through my heroic early warning. I am still awaiting my commendation and invitation to meet Prince Charles, but I suspect it shouldn't be far away.

Elsewhere the gardens contained a couple of crocodile enclosures, an aviary and a disturbingly small cage with two of the most forlorn, depressed looking racoons I have ever seen, which rather took the edge of our enjoyment. Up until then we had been reasonably impressed with the state of the care these creatures had been kept in. The aviary wasn't much better, although we did see a large parrot manage to open a hole in the wire cage with his beak so he could fit through. But not for him a break for freedom, he was trying to get back inside. Maybe he'd been out on day release.

The following day we ventured to the old town. Catching a bus from our hostel, we paid a few pence to be driven at breakneck speed through the traffic towards our destination. Unfortunately there was no indication of where we wanted to go (to the cathedral) and my rudimentary attempts to ask directions failed to yield results. Given how close the word cathedral is in English and Spanish, and that my later attempts to say where is such and such (donde es) worked fine, I'm still a little aggrieved at not getting anywhere. So instead we found a nice little square and sat down in the shade as the midday sun tried to burn us to a crisp.

However, we did discover a baseball game being played in town. We both felt disappointed at not being able to catch one in the US, so we decided to make up for that. We walked across town as darkness fell, the humidity sapping our strength somewhat, but eventually found the stadium. We paid a little over £4 to get into the best section in the house and sat down with a cold drink to enjoy our first ever baseball game, Mexican style.

Mazatlan is apparently an indigenous word meaning "place of the deer", so the local side were named appropriately the Mazatlan Venados. But these guys weren't the meek little bambi variety, they were vicious stags, and they trampled all over their opponents, the Los Mochis Parrots. After the first innings (there were 9 in all) the score was 5-1 to the Venados, and despite a small fightback in the middle of the game the home side ran away with the game, finishing 13-5.

During the game we tried to work out some of the rules. The basics were fairly simple, but we didn't quite manage to figure out some of the finer points. But despite that we both had an enjoyable evening, watching a new sport, sampling some local cuisine (a strange chorizo that is diced up and smothered in lime juice and three different sauces, that all fight for your attention by stripping your tastebuds) and I even ended up with a new t-shirt adorned with the Venados logo. So despite sending several items of clothing home from California I've ended up refilling my bag.

The following day we returned to the coach station for overnight journey to Mexico City. Our hostel owners mother, furious that the taxi driver had charged us £3 to get to hostel, kindly drove us there instead. We said our farewells and hastily went to check in, desperate to get inside the air conditioned terminal. Unfortunately we found that our bus was delayed by 3 hours, so we made ourselves comfortable and picked up our books. At 8pm we went outside to check on the progress, but there was no sign of the bus. It finally turned up at 9pm, 4 hours late.

The journey was fairly uneventful, there were few stops and as the bus was more empty than full we spread out, reclined our seats back and fell asleep. Until the horror movie came on. Minutes passed in silence (the film was mercifully short of dialogue), suddenly punctuated by horrific blood curdling screams. I muttered a curse in the general direction of Hollywood, stuck my headphones in and fell asleep to the rather more pleasant sounds of Rodrigo y Gabriella, a pair of Mexican acoustic guitarists.

In the morning we made an unscheduled stop in the middle of the countryside so the driver could grab a coffee. There were a number of shabby children hanging around the stop, their parents selling used old clothing or bags of nuts. Gemma followed the other passengers lead, making a gift of some spare biscuits we had. We reboarded and eventually arrived in Mexico City only 3 hours behind schedule, so credit to the driver for making up a whole hour.