Oaxaca is a great city with excellent restaurants and lots to see and do but it´s a twelve hour bus trip from my beach town and I don't go too often. This time I needed shoes.
I found an affordable hotel right away, not too far from the bus stop. Oh look. It's the UMAR Oaxaca campus. I wonder if I've walked by it before without noticing.
This the Hotel Real Santo Domingo. I love the old colonial buildings. Stairway leading to the roof. Watch your step. There are a few dangling wires and cables. It's a long way down. Watch your head. The exit on to the roof is quite low and I gave my head a hard crack on the bar. Views from the rooftop. Shopping gets boring quickly. I found new shoes and sneakers and put them to work right away with a walk around the town.
One less tree in the downtown zocalo since my last visit.
I don't know what people were writing but the invitation to scrawl on the temporary wall was popular.
With all of the excellent restaurants in Oaxaca, I chose to have one meal at Burger King. We don't have any fast food chains in Huatulco. That's where I ran into one of our UMAR students, preparing the finishing touches of his makeup in the bathroom. His name is Jahweh (my spelling is probably wrong) and he is hilarious. He didn't seem to repeat himself at all, just kept improvising and reacting to every little circumstance. Even in the rain, his audience stayed there in the middle of the street, to see what he would do next.
We had an impressive rainfall on the last week before vacation. Those of us who hadn’t packed a change of clothes spent a wet afternoon in the office. I hadn’t realized how intense it could be. The walkway from my apartment to the parking lot was deeper than my shoes.
It was beautiful and sunny again by next morning, only two days remaining before vacation. As is too often the case, I left for work at the last possible minute, a bad habit I picked up not long after buying the Italika. It’s always an exciting race against the clock, full speed ahead, maneuvering strategically into the fastest lanes, passing all the sensible drivers; butterflies and other insects pinging and pocking off my visor. Thank God I bought that helmet. I didn’t get far.
The rain had ripped open enormous potholes everywhere. The one that sprang out at the lip of a hill and ended my ride might as well have been an open manhole. I hit it hard at 70 kmh. I wasn’t thrown off the bike but the rear tire went kaboom. Pushing that machine off the road was a struggle. In my head I was still racing the clock. I could grab a taxi and return for it at lunch hour. Reality sank in when I glanced at my watch. I was officially late and a day’s pay was gone. There were no classes. If I had to miss a day, I couldn’t have chosen a more convenient time for me and everyone else.
The scooter had been overdue for a tune-up for at least a month. I kept putting it off because I ride that scooter every day and I never like being without it even for a short while, especially since the same (presumably) thieves who took the front wheel of my bike came back and took the seat. That problem has since been solved by putting a lock on a metal gate but closing the barn door after the fact has left me without backup transport.
Damages to local roads have been so extensive that repairs are still underway and probably will be for quite some time. Remember that when driving around Huatulco and surrounding areas. Keep your eyes open.
Just outside of Huatulco is a little place called Rio Copalita that features an iguanarium for tourists. I’ve considered stopping in some time to have a splash in their cool little river on the way to Barra de la Cruz but, as for the iguanarium, I often feel I work in one. They are everywhere on campus. Behind our language lab, this preening cactus is ready for a close-up. They really take care of students and staff here at UMAR. I’ve been too busy to hear anything about the swine flu vaccination being available already and I probably wouldn’t have had time to line up at the hospital for my shot anyways. I stepped out of my class a few weeks ago and there it was, waiting for me. They brought the flu vaccination to us.
Nobody likes needles but everyone stepped up. Neglecting the shot isn’t just a matter of personal risk. If you catch the flu, you can pass it on to others. My trick is to just look away. If I watch, my arm will stiffen.
It’s a friendly cooperative atmosphere. Theresa, one of our English teachers, got a flat on her lunch break. Within minutes, she found herself surrounded by helpful and willing assistants.
It’s a small community here. I finally found a little rock ‘n’ roll cafe, La Impudenta Patata Cafe, I’ve been looking for. Surprise, there is one of my best students working on a slow night. It’s a groovy little place in Sector J, near Infonavit. It was just me and Alexis on the school night but by Friday, people were spilling on to the street and it was standing room only for latecomers. This last pic is relatively early on a Friday night. I had no idea Teacher’s Day was last week but a hard working student didn’t forget. Nice surprise. It was a nice coffee mug filled with chocolate.
Life is full of surprises here. Most of them are good and some are even delicious.
Some teachers at UNSIS in Miahuatlan applied for tenure recently and three teachers from UMAR Huatulco were invited to observe their classes and review their essays. This is the place where my English teaching career began and I jumped at the chance to see the old place again.
On the day of departure, there were a few snags; nothing seasoned travellers like Caryl, William and I couldn’t handle. Thanks to Mike, we found a new –to-us suburban van service, Huatulco 2000, leaving directly from Crucecita to Oaxaca. They have about ten departures every day. The luxury bus from ADO has one 12 hour late night route once a day and taking that would have meant getting from Oaxaca early in the morning to Miahuatlan without any breakfast.
The Huatulco 2000 route is just as fast as leaving from Pochutla, one hour away. The van leaves the highway at Santa Maria Huatulco, cuts through town and climbs the scariest road I have ever been on. Teachers who use the American Headway texts are all familiar with that picture of the man walking the world’s most dangerous trail. It was a bit like that but in a van. There were places where an entire lane had collapsed from the steep mountain cliff, leaving just enough space for one vehicle and the crumbly edge remaining wasn’t reassuring at all. I doubt it would have been physically possible for a full-sized bus. William asked me to stop talking about it so I cut out commentary like “Wow. It looks like the whole section just dropped down all at once.” Instead, I reminded him that, since I had the breathtaking window seat, I would cushion his fall. Not that it would have saved him. He’d only die slower. No one gets out of a fall like that alive.
The entire trip took no more than 4 hours. We were in Miahuatlan, where UNSIS had arranged for us to stay in the best place in town, Hotel Diamante, long before nightfall. William and I had a double room with a fantastic view of Cerro Gordo. We could even see my old apartment. It’s the tall orange building behind the back of my head. I used to have a panoramic view of the town and the mountains beyond. In rainy season, I could kick my feet up on the balcony and watch distant lightning storms on the horizon every night.
One of the few changes was the decor of La Loma, our favorite restaurant. It used to be open air and some times chilly at night. They've built a glass wall around everything. It's quite cozy now. I went to bed half-wishing someone would have a birthday so fireworks would go off at 5 AM, just for the nostalgia. I was only feeling sentimental. It was a stupid wish. Well before dawn I was wishing for peace and quiet and a decent night’s sleep. Big trucks dragging heavy mufflers roared up and down the street. Pigs screamed in horror as they faced the void at the hands of a moonlighting butcher. I might have had two hours sleep total.
Luckily we scored coffee almost immediately in the morning. It was pre-sweetened but it did the trick and we had enought time left to take a quick walk through town. UNSIS provided the best hospitality. They sent a driver to pick us up at the hotel and Will and I were back at the old school where we first met. There's my old office, the first window to the right of the door. It was good to see our students were in good hands with the teachers that came after us. It's a great school and the students deserve the best. It was all over in no time. We sat in on some classes, wrote some comments, signed a few documents, made some new friends and it was time to go.
We made it back to Huatulco in time for showers and bed. It felt so good to be back here with our beautiful beaches and modern conveniences. It's so quiet at night too. Best of luck to all students and teachers from UNSIS. I enjoyed seeing the old place so much.
Everything changes. Road work has begun to facilitate construction of a new hotel zone near Cacaluta. This means some of the directions to Playa Organo from the previous post ( http://alackofcleardirection.blogspot.com/2009/10/playa-organo-and-how-to-get-there.html ) are now out-dated. But those former landmarks were huge potholes. Just watch out for the topes. They are legion.
This is my new preferred entry way to the arroyo. I can drive the scooter right up to the last bushes before the beach. The arroyo can be soft and sandy so moving too fast is a guaranteed wipe-out. I’d also recommend keeping your feet well within the scooter. A bush left a clean gash across my right foot. Scooters aren’t much fun when you have to push them home. My accelerator was stiff ever since the Puerto Escondido run. That’s why I didn’t make any big detours on the way home. I was afraid it would quit working entirely. But I continued to ride all around Huatulco. It was just a matter of getting used to the new feel. But Friday, on my way back from Organo, I didn’t get past the second dusty tope before the accelerator died. It was almost like running out of gas except that the engine continued to turn.
It could have been so much worse. That would have been tough pushing it through the soft arroyo. Or worse. I might have been stranded between here and Puerto Escondido. There are some very lonely stretches on that highway and, when you come across the occasional puebla, there is no guarantee there’s going to be a mechanic in town. So I pushed it up a couple of hills and coasted down the other side. Eventually I made it to the mechanic but he was locked up until Monday. It wasn’t that much further home. The trip took the wind out of me. One and a half litres of water seems like plenty when you’re splashing at the beach but it goes pretty fast when you get home the hard way. I use old plastic bottles filled with frozen tap water for my cooler. I was so glad to have them for the trip, stopping every now and then to roll them all over my body. By the time I got home, they were mostly water again and I emptied them over myself and hit the couch for a hard nap. It has been a hot week so I’ve been watching a lot of mainstream movies at the local cinema to enjoy the air conditioning. Life is short. Take warning . “The Book of Eli” is not worth your time unless you need to escape the heat. “Alice in Wonderland” has ten more minutes of cool and it must be spectacular in 3D. Sadly we only get 2D in Huatulco. Too bad they tried to give it a conventional story line so it resembles just about every other big budget children’s lit fantasy flick for the past 8 years. I give the air conditioner 5 stars, 4 for the special effects and 3 for the writing.
It seems to have been a day for breaking things. I smelled smoke when I returned. It wasn't too strong, like a piece of paper smouldering in an ashtray. My timing could have been worse but it could have been a whole lot better. I had started a pot of Jamaica and forgotten it immediately.
Just a few shots of Playa Principal early in the morning before heading back to Huatulco.
I had never seen the seawall walkway before. Looks like it may extend all the way to Puerto Angelito. Parts of it looked treacherous. I didn't go too far. I left before the crowds arrived, drove straight back home in 3 hours flat. Passed the wreck of a less attentive or just unlucky driver on the way. Spotted this intriguing sign between Pochutla and the airport. Might be worth checking out some other day.
