Mexico: Day 7

by Kathy 9. May 2009 14:46

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Driving to Huatulco

We bid “Hasta luego!” to Oaxaca this morning and headed off on our journey over the mountains, to the Pacific coastal town of Santa Cruz de Hualtulco. Our first stop along the way was to revisit the wood carving town of San Martin Tilcajete, to see Jacobo Angeles. We followed the hand-drawn map that we had been given after our last visit to the town. Our interpretation of the map, however, had us wandering out on a small dirt road that eventually dead ended. Ooops! We back-tracked and started asking people for directions; we continued to follow in the general direction that people were pointing, and we eventually zig-zagged our way to the door of Jacobo’s home/studio.

Almost there . . .

. . . on the right street . . .

. . . finally at Jacobo's entrance!

Jacobo was kind enough to give us a tour of his studio, introducing us to the painters and carvers, who are all members of his family—his wife, nieces, nephews, children, and other relatives. He also showed us how the animals are carved and how the paint colors are made from natural ingredients (bark, lemon juice, etc.). Here is Jacobo with some of the colors that that he mixed together for us.

After leaving Jacobo’s studio we began our long ascent into the mountain range that divides Oaxaca from the Pacific Coast. The children were continually fascinated by the people who ride in the back of pick up trucks. Much of the public transportation between towns consisted of pick-ups with space in the back for people to stand or sit on chairs.

Genevieve was very envious of the perceived freedom involved in riding in the back of a truck (especially after we told her that both Ben and I used to ride in the back of trucks as children because the prohibitive safety laws had not yet been passed.)

A short way past the city of Ejutla, we found a small restaurant for lunch--Los Laureles.

We were the only customers there. The tacos were delicious!

The drive took about 7 hours (not including the times we stopped for a rest). We passed the time in many ways, including describing the shapes that we saw in the clouds. Ben was the first to spot this side view of a man’s face with poufy hair on top (to the left of the tree):

We saw a lot of burros, like this one:

And we liked to look at the different types of houses that people live in:

As we climbed higher, we drove through lots of forested areas.

We stopped at a small snack shop that had a bathroom.

The bathroom looked like it had recently been built, and the door hinges were very interesting—pieces of thick leather with one side nailed to the door and one side to the outer wall.

We were driving on a very curvy road. Genevieve has always had issues with car-sickness, so we had given her ½ of a dramamine tablet after lunch. In the late afternoon, we discovered that Sebastian can also get car-sick; I looked back to find that his face was a pale shade of yellowish-green. We pulled over and let him sit in the fresh air for a bit (and also gave him a tiny bit of dramamine).

While we were resting, an older man named Leopaldo came out of his house and started talking to us. Although he spoke Spanish very quickly, we could understand a lot of what he said (or at least we like to think that we did)—and he seemed to understand our halting Spanish just fine (or at least he pretended to). We had a fairly long conversation about the changes that he has seen take place in his community, his frustration over the clear-cutting of trees without permission, and the impact of the new toll road that is being built from Oaxaca to Puerto Escondido.

While we were stopped, we watched some of the local women carrying wood on their heads:

After Sebastian started feeling better, we continued driving.

A couple of miles down the road, however, were some people with a rope across the road:

The woman approached our car with a can for collecting money. She spoke quickly, and we could not understand her words; however, she pointed to a makeshift altar with a picture of a religious figure on it by the side of the road, and she shook the can at us. We smiled and graciously declined, rolling the car window up and looking straight ahead like we were ready to move on. (We didn't want to be rude, but we didn't want to donate any money . . . and we had read many stories about shakedowns and demands for money along roads.) After a brief moment, the people lowered the rope and allowed us to drive forward. When the same thing happened about 10 minutes later with another rope across the road and an altar nearby, we just shook our heads and smiled and kept our windows rolled up, and we were allowed to pass.

We were dropping quickly in altitude, toward the Pacific Ocean, and the vegetation was thick, with many banana trees and other tropical plants.

We drove on and on, and we finally reached Santa Cruz de Huatulco around 7:30 p.m. It was a long day, and we were all tired.

We all perked up when we saw the apartment that we were renting for 3 nights (found through www.vrbo.com)—it was spacious and beautifully decorated, with a great location and a small view of the bay; moreover, it had a large clean pool, as well as a jumbo-sized washer and dryer so that I could do all of our laundry (we only travel with a week’s worth of clothes). We were delighted! Actually, I was ecstatically happy; the place had a wonderful energy about it, very peaceful!

We walked to one of the beach-front restaurants for a relaxing meal. Here we are, waiting for our dinners to arrive: