After arriving back in San Jose we decided to take advantage of our last few moments in Costa Rica and booked a rafting trip in the Pacuare River! We literally had the time of our lives! [as always] We paddled our hearts out for 4 hours down the level III and level IV rapids. It was thrilling to get past every set. When we reached a calm part of the river we got to jump in for a swim. During our swim we got the chance to look up and around us and it was beautiful!! The river is at the bottom of a canyon set in the middle of the jungle, with birds and butterflies flying from every direction and a good share of small, but beautiful, waterfallls along the way. When we hopped back on the raft it was go time again. We never fell out, but our guide did purposely send us rapid surfing in a whirlpool, where our team battled our way back out to keep going. The next day we were quite sore, but it was well worth it!!!
After closing up our Costa Rican adventures we set out for a whole new kind of adventure...... crossing 5 borders in two days! Fear not! The only bad part was that if we had spent one more minute on that bus we would have completely lost our butts! Other than that, it's more difficult to cross into a theme park!
Because we were so sick of busses and had just about three weeks left of traveling, [it would've taken about 30 hours of bus traveling to make the trip to Cancun and back!!! Apparently Mexico is way bigger than we thought!] we decided to skip Cancun. Despite how sick of busses we were, as soon as we filled our bellies with over priced terminal tacos [worth it only because we had been waiting two months to have Mexican food again!] we hopped on our next bus. Thirteen hours later we were in Palenque, Chiapas. We reserved a well deserved night in a beautiful little cabaña nessled in the rainforest with a nice big pool that we could swimin and lounge around in between eating wonderful food and exploring our next sight! After a great night sleep where we were able to lay down [!!!!!!!!!!] , we ventured into the Palenque ruins in the middle of the jungle. These Maya ruins, we were told by a nice man who explained qute a bit of the Palenque history to us, are right up there with Teotihuacan and Chichen Itza in importance! They were absolutely impressive, and we even got a little bit of wild life observing. We saw a huge iguana sun bathing at the top of one of the temples, a butterfly caught a free ride up and down the ruins on my sholder for the day, and we were thanked for our visit by the sounds of howler monkeys in the beautiful rain forest!!!!
More yummy food and a few ice cream bars later we were off again. By morining time we had reached the city of Oaxaca and were welcomed by a bright and warm sun! We were ready to explore soon after arriving only because all of our big breakfasts [filled with hot chocolate, chilaquiles, huevos divorciados, huevos rancheros.... and the list goes on] made up for our long bus rides! And we had mole, 4 tacos for a dollar, tortas, tostadas and more waiting for us for lunch and dinner!!! [We were quite excited for the food!!] By noon we were watching a band play a combination of instuments,including the marumba to make beautiful traditional Oaxacan music! We then explores the old colonial city, surprisingly enough it has been hit with quite a few earthquakes that are not noticible at all! The city was not only filled with history, but also with colors! From the beautiful old buildings, to the tile, decorations, to the street vendors and their carts, baloons, food, and artisan work. And the parks! The plazas and zocalos are equivalent to a Main Sqaure. They are one of my favorite things about latin american cities and the one in Oaxaca was wonderful. It was filled with trees and all sides were closed to traffic, it was bordered by a buitiful colonial church and benches surrounded the kiosks where we filled our bellies with wonderful afternoon traditional Mexican treats!! Tired from our long strolls through the city and the markets, we headed home through the crowds of people watching street performers, and Mariachi bands serrenating couples!
The beach bums that we are, it didn't take us long to crave the pacific ocean again and we quickly bought a one way ticket to Puerto Escondido! Puerto Escondido means hidden port and it lives up to its name. It took us almost 8 hours to get over the hills and through the jungles only about 60 miles away! But once we were there it was just what we wanted! We stayed in Zicatela, which is this great little surf area part of town right by the beach. The beach was filled with palapa restaurants waiting for us to eat there and then relax on their hammocks or lounge chairs! We did all three! After the night came and the sun rose again we were ready for some surfing! We rented two boards from a nice local man that had just moved back home after living in Santa Cruz for more than 20 years!! Anyway we took our boards and quickly headed to Carrisalillo. When we arrived we had to carry our boards dowa steep set of satirs, nothing foreign to us since it's the samecase in SC, but this time there were tropical plants blocking our view of this beautiful coves with turquoise water waiting for us to paddle out to sea! We did just that, but it was pretty flat out so we spent most of the morning playing in the middle ofthe ocean and paddleing around on our surf boards! We later made our way in and rented some snorkel masks that helped us see the shell filled ocean floor and at least 4 different kinds of colorful fish. After snorkeling it seemed like the waves had picked up a bit and we paddled back out! Mike and I both got great rides and stoaked on life we made it back to town after about 10 hours of sun and surf!!!!!!
Next in line was Zipolite! It "only" took us about an hour and a half and the sunshine welcomed us once more. This beautiful little paradise was again filled with vegetation and the water was clear and gorgeous! After a deliscious breakfast we spent some time relaxing in our hammocks overlooking the ocean from our lovely balcony! This beach trip seemed to be like a little vacation in the middle of our big vacation! After maybe to much sun, full bellies and sand between our toes the day was over. We planned on some snorkeling for the next day but the morning wasn't as sunny as we'd hoped....For the first time since Brazil the weather let us down a little bit and we never got our snorkeling trip. The views from our hammocks were still beautiful, the air still warm, and the crashing waves still relaxing, but on the second rainy morning we left the beach. We went back to Oaxaca for the the night so that we could head to Mexico City in the morning! The next morning we learned that towns were getting washed out with over 100 familes losingtheir homes and rivers were overflowing.... we hope that the familes are doing well, but happy that we left the rain behind.
We're now in Mexico City [again welcomed with sunshine!] and once again the city is filled with centuries of history, so much life, beautiful colors and of course wonderful food and wonderful people!!
We love you all and miss you too!!
