Xalapa, Vera Cruz, Mexio<\/p>\n
It\u00b4s been a while since I really felt like spending an hour of my vacation updating this page from Mexico. A lot has happened since San Cristobal, and we have travelled some 35 hours by bus since then. <\/p>\n
After leaving San Cristobal, and the clear, cool mountain air behind, we went to Palenque. Site of Mexico\u00b4s most visited tourist attraction, the Mayan ruins, Palenque is an expensive and overrun, as well as extremely hot and humid town in the middle of the Selva (Jungle). Arriving in the evening (not wanting to travel through the at times slightly violent Chiapas region by night) we had hell finding a hotel there. At last (after asking about 8 different places we found an expensive and, alas, not very nice hotel for the night. Well it was only one night \ud83d\ude42 The next day we spent about 3 hours at the ruins, wandering off into the jungle, finding almost deserted ruins in the area, that weren\u00b4t overrun by talians, mexicans and french…. The industrial holiday had begun in southern europe as well as here in mexico, overfilling the hotels and hot-spots. <\/p>\n
The ruins were nice, but returning early to the town, there was absolutely nothing to do, but sit down in an expensive cafe, drinking expensive beer, and having a good sweat at the same time. Fortunately we had been forseeing enough to book a room for 4 in a nicer hotel next to the plaza. yes 4, we were expecting visitors you see. and right on time, simon and johan, 2 friends of signes from university showed up after a days journey from Guatemala. We had a nice evening, and a great following day, at Misol Ha, a waterfall, with nice cool pools to swim in. And since we were probabaly the only people to spend any tima at Misol Ha (the tourist tours stop only for 30 min. on the way to Agua Azul, we found a secluded river pool and went for a nice swim….. Palenque ended up being a nice experience anyway \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n
Well, as some of you know, the jungle never was my natural habitat. There are 2 things in this world i have a really hard time with, extrme humid heat, and oversized insects, spiders, centipedes etc. and both those are found in abundance in that darn jungle… so we got on a bus for a 12 hour trip from the deep jungle to the snow-white sands and tourqouise beaches of the caribbean. Playa del Carmen was our next stop, and if i though Palenque overpriced and overrun by tourists, Playa was far worse. But all the Ibiza-atmosphere of the place, cannot for a second hide the beauty of the beaches, and amazing clarity of the water. What a place.
\nAfter a lot of waiting on the beautiful beach, and fearing that the rainy season would eliminate the snorkelling trip we wanted to take, and after changing our bus-ticket out of town to get an extra day of hope, we found a snorkel trip. A boat ride away on the island of Cozumel, the beaches were protected, and the waves that made snorkelling in playa a problem, were non-existant, so we took a 3 hour boat trip, including 3 different reefs for snorkelling. wow is all i have to say…..<\/p>\n
Well, snorkelling and beach-relaxing, and an expensive 3 days over with, we again continued the trip, via Caribbean pearl and tourist destination numero uno, Cancun, and a 18 hour bus trip to Vera Cruz, Port City on the Golf of Mexico, looking for white water rafting trips, with no luck…. Vera Cruz is another large, noisy city, and not to our taste, al though the evening on the plaza was amusing, mostly for the (and i\u00b4m not exaggerating) 7-8 different bands with a total of about 20 people, making their way in an out of the tables of a single cafe, playing all sorts of music, from single guitarist, sopranos and flutists, to entire orchestras of marimbas, drums, saxophone, trumpets and percussion…. A cacaphony of sound, a chaotic, but festive environment, lots of beers, locals dancing and such a hectic air over it all, that it couldn\u00b4t help but bring a smile onto our lips .<\/p>\n
well, ever n search of adventure, and in this case rafting experiences, and having given up hope of finding nything in Vera Cruz, as well as having called 5 or 6 agencies with no luck, we decided to had a little into the mountains, to the Capital of Vera Cruz State, Xalapa (also spelled Jalapa) and home of the fiery Chillies Jalapenos.
\nHere we are now, having spent a morning familiarizing ourselves with the city, finding a map, a tourist agency (and yes we\u00b4re going rafting tomorrow) and taking a quick look through the impressive Anthropological museum…..<\/p>\n
So tomorrow, after having spent entirely too much money for probably the 25th time in the past few weeks, we are off on a 2 day rafting trip, through the mouintainous forrests of Vera Cruz State…. Wish us luck \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Xalapa, Vera Cruz, Mexio It\u00b4s been a while since I really felt like spending an hour of my vacation updating this page from Mexico. A lot has happened since San Cristobal, and we have travelled some 35 hours by bus since then. After leaving San Cristobal, and the clear, cool mountain air behind, we went […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[7,1],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n