Oaxaca

The kids had two weeks off at the beginning of April for Semana Santa, so we used that time to go to Oaxaca and Puerto Escondido. It was a relatively easy all-day bus ride from Morelia and a wonderful destination.

 


Villa Maria
We stayed at a lovely hotel (or really a set of furnished apartments) called the Villa Maria.  It was a very comfortable place to base ourselves, and it was wonderful to have a whole apartmenet (2 br, kitchen, living room, etc) where we could spread out, especially since we were there for 9 days.

 

 

 

 


A couple of views of town.


 

   
 


The church of Santo Domingo was one of the most impressive in town, with its ornate gold interior.
 

 

 




   



Another very interesting place is the Oaxaca regional museum.  At various times it´s been a monastery, an army baracks and now museum.
     
 


And we enjoyed a tour of the excellent Botanical garden one (hot) morning.

 

   

  
  




There was music on the Zocalo many afternoons while we were there.
 
 

After a hot day of walking in the sun, we ducked into a shady            Margaret got her shoes shined for $2.
courtyard to find a wonderful little restaurant (we were the
only ones there).  Little gems like this were quite memorable.
 

This is the dry season and many people have water                           
pumped into the tanks at their houses.
 


Chapulines!  One of the local delicacies is roasted grasshoppers, which you could buy in most markets, either with or without chile.  We tried them, but never really developed a hunger  for more . . .


The other great local food was chocolate.  There were several stores that would grind beans while you watched and let you choose your desired mix of chocolate, almonds,  cinnamon and sugar.  You could smell the chocolate from the street outside.  Margaret and Sarah particularly enjoyed the free tastes of each different mix.

 

 

 

One result is that  we got spoiled by having fresh hot chocolate every morning, and big dollops of chocoloate in our coffee as well. What a life!




More interesting foods: a display of fresh fruit at the market,  corn on a stick (with mayonaise, cheese, and chile powder)
 

"tuna" ice (from cactus fruits) and "tejate", a drink made from a mixture of corn, cacao, mamey, and a special kind of flower (which I can't remember the name) among other things.  It is always mixed by hand, so you often see ladies elbow-deep in big bowls of tejate at the markets.