Mexico -Day 38

Derrick and Deidre left the hotel at 4am to go to the airport and arrived safely in Oaxaca at 8:30am. When Pogo and I went downstairs to have breakfast at 8:30am, we noticed that all the furniture had been moved. We asked the girl at the front desk if they were having an event. She said they were having a wedding and that they have weddings every weekend. That explained the mariachis and the partying until late last night. We had breakfast and called an Uber to bring us to the bus station for our 10:30am bus ride to Nuevo Vallarta. Our 4 hours ride ended up being 4h30 because of bumper to bumper traffic going up the mountain after Sayulita and a roadblock by the National Guard. We saw lots of agave field when driving by Tequila. We also took the only completed 14 miles of the new highway that one day will connect Puerto Vallarta to Guadalajara which will make the drive only 2 hours. The bus stopped really close to where we live so after a short cab ride, we arrived at the condo at 4pm.

I was happy to finally have good Wifi but we ended up with none…grrrr. It took a few hours for it to come back.

We did a little balconville just to take advantage of the warmth.

We had dinner at La Isla since we had no fresh food in the fridge, not that we needed an excuse to go there. We enjoyed watching the sunset on the ocean for the first time in one week.

A few observations from our week away:

First It was really cold at nights and early mornings in Guadalajara and in the mountain towns, like around 40F. It warmed up to the low 70s everyday. You have to start your day with pants and a sweater and change around lunch time and change again for dinner. We didn’t bring enough warm clothes. It made us appreciate the weather of Puerto Vallarta even more.

Second, I loved San Miguel, Guanajuato and Tlaquepaque! Guadalajara not as much, mainly because it just felt like a nondescript big city. Now I think we should have researched all destinations before going instead of walking endlessly in hope of seeing something nice. We did see a lot of nice streets and alleys, beautiful buildings and artwork, we ate at incredible restaurants and met tons of friendly people. I just think we could have seen and learned a lot more if we had been more aware of where to go, especially in Guadalajara.

Lastly, stairs are overrated…and I need to incorporate aerobics in my life again.