One notable architectural feature of San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas, Mexico is the many beautiful churches that grace the city. Barry made it a personal goal to photograph each one of them within walking distance of our hotel. Here are the results of his efforts. The church above had a very pretty adjoining garden: The next church required quite a climb of switchbacked steps to reach. My quads were still sore from Palenque, so I only made it to the top once. I think Barry made the climb at least three times! As a "Carolina girl", I'm always partial to the colors on the church below! Moving in for a closer look -- so pretty. This one had so much intricate work on its face: The church below was all decorated for the celebration of the La Virgen de Guadalupe on December 12. This is the only church we went inside. When we were there, some sort of ceremony was about to begin, but Barry was able to get a few photos before it started. A carnaval with rides and food booths lined the street leading up to the church but was never open when we walked by. I think it's a night-time thing and only temporary as part of the December 12 celebrations. I expect the flags serve double-duty as decorations for both La Virgen de Guadalupe celebrations and Christmas. Stay tuned for San Cristobal at night!
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The fruit and vegetable markets in San Cristobal, Chiapas, Mexico were a feast for the senses! Although we do get some excellent fresh produce in San Pedro, the markets here have limited offerings compared to the bounty available right across the border in Mexico. We wished we could have taken advantage of the many wonderful-looking, healthy foods for sale, but without a kitchen or any form of refrigeration, we savored the colorful produce bounty with our eyes instead of our palates. Still, we thoroughly enjoyed our walks through the markets, dreaming of what we could create with these beautiful, nutrition-packed local foods. Hope you'll enjoy feasting with your eyes as well! Stay tuned for more from San Cristobal before we head back to Belize!
There are several areas in which vendors ply their colorful wares in on the street or in booths in the charming city of San Cristobal, Chipas, Mexico. Today's post features photos from the "merchandise" markets (mostly textiles) from our December trip. The fruit and vegetable markets will be featured in Part 2. I very much enjoyed strolling around these colorful markets and bought a few items at excellent prices. Even Barry seemed to enjoy himself, and he usually hates shopping. Bargaining is expected, though if the first price offered was very low, I usually just went ahead and paid it. These people surely don't live easy lives, and I feel guilty if the price is too low. These markets are just another reason to love Mexico! Some vendors simply set up along the streetside... while others have simple stands to display their wares. I bought a small zippered change purse here, and just look at this lady's smile. Priceless! Here's a view of just a small portion of one of the larger markets. I could wander around here for hours! One thing that amazed us most is that these vendors have to set up and tear down their displays every night, hauling the clothing and other merchandise home in large bundles both ways. It's a hard life, and that's one of the reasons I didn't want to haggle too much. I wish we'd had room to bring back more -- with prices so good, I would have loved to pack a bag full of these cute blouses! On our last night in San Cristobal, we finally decided we had bought enough small items over the course of our trip that we really needed a duffel bag since we were only traveling with smallish backpacks, and they were already very full when we left Belize. So we bought this one, and we did have to bargain hard for it. Compared to the other items we purchased for a lot less, we probably overpaid for this at approximately $16 US, but it was a godsend for the rest of our trip. I guess zippers drive the price up! Stay tuned for Part 2 as we explore the fruit and veggie markets of San Cristobal!
For our third and final night in San Cristobal de las Casas, Mexico, we decided to go for broke and hit happy hour before going to the restaurant we'd decided on for dinner. Woo-hoo! As we were walking around checking our options, this sign touting two for one margaritas for $70 MX (approximately $5.60 US) lured us right into Ay Dolores! for a couple of drinks and appetizers before dinner. We tried the tamarindo margaritas, which were excellent. Here's one of my favorite photos of the whole trip, which you'll recognize if we're Facebook friends. To accompany our drinks, we ordered some of their delicious guacamole, fried cheese, and quesadillas. I loved that the guac was made with red onion and lots of cilantro and have since modified my own recipe likewise. Our waiter was super friendly, and although I was sure I'd remember his name, sadly, my memory fails me now since it's been over a month. (Yes, I am getting old!) He was very proud of his English and spoke it well, which was a treat for us -- we could actually have a nice conversation, something we didn't get to do often while in this part of Mexico. He had another staff member take a photo of the three of us on his phone, and we also got one on our camera. For our dinner, we went to Entropia, a French-Mexican fusion place that is the #2 rated restaurant in San Cristobal in Tripadvisor. We got this photo earlier in the day while it was still bright and sunny out. And here's the interior in the evening. We decided to stick with margaritas, and they were also offering a two for one happy hour special. Score! Don't tell our friendly waiter at Ay Dolores!, but these tamarindo margs were even better than theirs. And the waiter was obviously French. San Cristobal is a cultural treat! Barry had a chicken dish that was served with black beans and yet more guacamole. There's no such thing as too much guac, though, right?! I had the special of the day, which was a really, really nice fish dish, potatoes, and salad. The fish looks rather plain in the photo, but it was very fresh and perfectly seasoned and cooked. I'll never know, but when I ended up with a bad stomach 36 hours later, I wondered if eating this salad was my downfall. I did eat a few other salads in Mexico with no problems, but Montezuma's revenge finally caught up with me on the way back, in Palenque. One slight negative of Entropia was the little children who came in during our dinner attempting to sell us things. It's pretty obvious that they really only want a peso or two, but they offer little trinkets for sale instead so it's not so obvious they are begging. There was a lot more begging and what I call "aggressive vending" in San Cristobal than the other places we visited in Mexico, from both children and adults. We didn't want or need anything they were selling, but I carried a few pesos in my pocket to give out to the kids. They would normally leave quickly upon getting a peso or two. It's too bad that they are living lives requiring them to do this. Barry still had a bit of appetite after dinner, so we stopped for him to have a gelato. I was too full, but it looked good. However, the flavors were unmarked, and having to ask a Spanish-speaking worker what every one was made for an interesting ordering experience! On our last morning in San Cristobal, we were disappointed to find our favorite place for breakfast, TierrAdentro, closed. We kept walking by hoping they were just opening late, but when 9 am came and went and the door was still locked, we decided we better find another place. We noticed that many restaurants in Mexico don't bother posting their days or hours of business outside; if the doors are open, they're open, and if they're closed, they're closed. Simple as that. We ended up at the Cafeteria del Centro and had a good breakfast. The atmosphere wasn't quite TierrAdentro, but it filled the bill and nourished us for our day of travel ahead. After breakfast, we bought a couple snacks for the road. Can you say chocolate? Not totally related to dining, but having heard what great coffee was grown, processed, and could be purchased, in this part of Mexico, I picked up this bag of organic coffee to bring home to Belize. It only cost me $70 MX (about $5.60 US) and was indeed a special treat. Long gone now, though! Stay tuned for more from San Cristobal before we head back through Mexico to Belize!
I had planned on a blog post on the birds of the Orquideas Moxviquil botanical garden for today, but when I looked at our "birds" photo folder, I realized that it included photos from many different sites on our trip, so I am going to wait and do a bird photos post after the other trip posts, as I have done in the past. So today, instead of birds, you get food! Our favorite restaurant in San Cristobal, Chiapas, Mexico quickly became the TierrAdentro Cultural Center and Cafe. As I was working on this blog post, I came upon an excellent article providing much information about the restaurant and the center's goals. I didn't know until I read the article that the cafe had been recommended as one of the top five places to eat in San Cristobal by the New York Times. Not bad! In addition to the cafe, there are Zapatista co-operatives selling art pieces and crafts in the same building. As an aside, I knew almost nothing about the Zapatistas until we got home from this trip and I read a little. I didn't much care for history when I was in high school or college, but I'm finding it more interesting now that I'm older. Turns out that we missed a parade of Zapatista rebels in San Cristobal just a few days right after we left. That would have been a unique travel experience. Our first meal here was a daily special dinner that came with a spicy noodle soup and bread, entree of chicken mole and rice, and fresh lime juice. Everything was simple and delicious, and the price was very reasonable at $65 MX each (approximately $5.20 USD). This did not include the wine, however! For dessert, our favorite place quickly became "Oh la la!", a small coffee and French pastry shop right down the street from our hotel (and TierrAdentro). It was very hard to choose just one goodie to take back to our hotel room, so we didn't even try. The following morning brought us right back to TierrAdentro for breakfast. Turns out they don't open until 8:30 am, so we took a walk beforehand as we were there too early. One thing about the cities we visited in Mexico, they're so hoppin' in the evenings that everything seems to start later than in the US or Belize, where I can't imagine a breakfast place not opening by 7 am. It was well worth the wait, though, as the breakfast was muy excellente! Quoting from the article I linked above, I found this interesting (after arriving home -- did not know this at the time): "The center buys its coffee directly from co-operatives within the Zapatista controlled areas. Its policy is to buy the best organically produced café arábigo, which is usually exported to Europe, so that it is available to local people. It also believes in paying the price asked by these co-operatives without bargaining. Within this frame of reference, it is able to offer a truly excellent double expresso at 17 pesos (just over 1 USD) and sell one kg of high quality coffee at 90 pesos. Starbucks charges 160 pesos for the same quantity and quality." For dinner that night, we tried a place that came highly recommended in Tripadvisor (#3 of 89 restaurants in San Cristobal): Pizzaria Napoli. This charming Italian restaurant in a colonial home seats only a few, and since we opted for an early dinner after eating only snacks for lunch, we had it entirely to ourselves. The owner took our order and was incredibly warm and welcoming -- I wish we had gotten her name. We had a table outside looking out on the courtyard. It was a little bit chilly since the sun was going down, but I had bought this pretty shawl at one of the many market stands in town (for only $70 MX or $5.60 US, such a steal I didn't even haggle). I used the shawl quite a bit in San Cristobal, as the city's altitude is over 7000 feet, making it much chillier than anything we'd experienced since leaving the US. Our pizza couldn't have been more delicious. Since the pizza was a fairly light dinner, of course we had to indulge ourselves at Oh La La! bakery again. Don't worry, we did not eat all this this evening -- we saved some for snacking on the next day. The next morning found us right back at TierrAdentro, where we both had hotcakes. We had thought we were ordering banana/blueberry hotcakes, and were excited about that since we never get blueberries in Belize. Unfortunately, the translation from our cheat sheet threw us off as the hotcakes were actually filled with bananas and dried cranberries. When we got home and looked up blueberries and cranberries in our dictionary, it appears that both can translate to arándano. Oh well, they were still quite tasty, especially since they were served with both real maple syrup and local honey. Yum! A little later, we stopped by Oh la la! so I could get another cup of coffee -- most restaurants in Mexico don't give free coffee refills. Here are some of the other treats they sell, though we never got any since we couldn't seem to resist the French pastry counter. Please stay tuned for Part 2 of San Cristobal dining. There's more good food to come!
After checking out all the gorgeous plant specimens in the Orquideas Moxviquil botanical garden, it was time to take a woodland hike. There's a 2.5 km loop trail (though it felt longer!) beginning right behind the garden and leading up to a wonderful view of San Cristobal. We had read about this hike in Tripadvisor and were looking forward to locating the trail. But first, a few photos of our initial attempt to locate the orchid garden, which I mentioned in the previous post. When we saw the first sign for the preserve, we thought we needed to hike on the trail by the sign to get to the garden. So, we enjoyed a short hike into the forest before we realized that we needed to turn back to the road and continue along a bit farther to find the garden. Now, onto the trail from the back of the orchid garden. We had it completely to ourselves and did not encounter another hiker. Perfect! We came upon this limestone sinkhole/cave near the top of the trail. Naturally Barry had to climb down for a closer look! The trail leveled out at the top and opened to a grassy meadow area, where I took a brief rest. The foliage and scenery reminded me a bit of some of our North Carolina and Virginia mountain hikes. Please stay tuned for bird photos from the orchid garden and much more from San Cristobal, as we continue exploring this beautiful city.
One of the most interesting things we did in San Cristobal, Mexico was visit the Orquideas Moxviquil botanical garden. The garden is a preserve for over 600 species of Chiapas orchids, cacti, bromeliads, ferns, and other flora. Most of the specimens were rescued from within the Chiapas state from sites that were disturbed by human activities. It was a little over a mile from our hotel as the garden is north of the city in a more rural area, but we had a beautiful day for it. We had a bit of difficulty finding the entrance and ended up hiking along a woodland trail in the Moxviquil Reserve (which the garden is part of). We finally realized that we were not in the right place, back-tracked, and went farther up the road where we saw this sign. Before we knew it, we found the gardens up the road just a bit. This place was absolutely gorgeous! The owner met us and gave us a quick tour as he had to get back to a ceremony there on the premises. We spent a good long time walking around and looking at orchids and other specimens. And after we'd seen all the plants, we spent a good amount of time bird-watching -- of course we had brought our binoculars! This sculpture demonstrates the natural erosion process of a cube. We'll have to do a separate blog post with bird photos, as well as one about the wonderful woodland hike we took in the Moxviquil Reserve behind the Orchid Garden. In the meantime, check out the Orquideas Moxviquil website for much more information on this unique and fascinating site. We would love to go back again and hope to get the chance to.
More photos from our sight-seeing walks around beautiful San Cristobal de las Casas, Mexico... Stay tuned for much more from San Cristobal!
We got a lot of walking in around the beautiful colonial city of San Cristobal de las Casas in Mexico's Chiapas state. I thought I'd share some of the many photos Barry shot as we walked around town. San Cristobal's architecture was strikingly beautiful. You'll likely notice that we (and others) are dressed more warmly than in Belize in some of these shots. It was much cooler and less humid up in the Mexican highlands than what we were used to -- and breezy as well. Morning temperatures were in the 40s, but the sun warmed things up quickly and mid-day temperatures hit the 60s and 70s. When the sun was out, it felt great, but overcast skies off and on made it feel a bit chilly. Still, no rain, bugs, or humidity made for very pleasant sight-seeing weather! There were several pedestrian-only streets, like the one above, that made walking easier and more pleasant. We climbed up this switchback staircase to a beautiful scenic overlook of the city. There's a school and church up top, and we read about a cafe on Tripadvisor, but never saw it. Stay tuned for much more from San Cristobal...
We decided to visit San Cristobal de las Casas while we were traveling around Mexico because it sounded absolutely charming. Lonely Planet describes it this way: "Set in a gorgeous highland valley surrounded by pine forest, the colonial city of San Cristóbal (cris-toh-bal) has been a popular travelers’ destination for decades. It’s a pleasure to explore San Cristóbal’s cobbled streets and markets, soaking up the unique ambience and the wonderfully clear highland light. This medium-sized city also boasts a comfortable blend of city and countryside, with restored century-old houses giving way to grazing animals and fields of corn." We were looking forward to the highland terrain with lower humidity and cooler temperatures than we've grown used to. It would be a brief taste of autumn -- and much cooler than winter in Belize! So, on December 13, we left Palenque behind on a bus bound for San Cristobal. Even though both cities are in the Chiapas state of Mexico, San Cristobal sits at an elevation of 7200 feet, while Palenque is only at 200 feet, so we would be doing quite a bit of climbing on this day. We bought our tickets the day before at the ADO station, though we would actually be taking an OCC bus to San Cristobal, as OCC serves this part of Mexico. It is equivalent to the ADO first-class bus. I think I was attracting a little attention as I used my new Galaxy Tab to read in the bus terminal (see below). There was no wi-fi, but I was reading a book using the Kindle app. This was our first trip with the tablet, and it worked out really well. We had no room for a full-size laptop in our packs, and while on previous short trips we've managed without a computer, on a sixteen-day trip, we didn't feel comfortable without some form of communication device. The tablet allowed us to check bus schedules, restaurant ratings, and even make some reservations for our return trip -- not to mention to keep up with all those pesky emails that pile up on a trip. And I didn't have to carry a book along as I had several free ones loaded on the Kindle app. Although the bus ride from Palenque to San Cristobal is only about 130 miles, it takes approximately five and a half hours due to the mountain roads. It was a beautiful drive, but Barry and I both felt quite queasy during the middle part of the trip where there were many hairpin turns and bumps. Fortunately, we didn't have to run for the rest room, but it was an icky feeling and not something we anticipated in advance. I would have liked to check out this road-side clothing stand. I just love these embroidered Mexican dresses and blouses! At last, the road straightened out, and we were both feeling fine again by the time we arrived in San Cristobal. The walk from the bus station was little less than a mile. And as anticipated, this city was very charming, though bigger than we had realized. Including the surrounding area, approximately 250,000 people call San Cristobal home. We stayed at the Hotel Diego de Mazariegos, which is spread over two old colonial buildings and is gorgeous. We would spend three nights here before beginning our journey back to Belize. The price was $69 US per night, an amazing deal, I thought. Our room was super charming with high, beamed ceiling, two beds, a table and chairs, and even a fireplace! We didn't use it, though; that seemed like too much work (and we had no matches). I felt like we were in a castle. We also had a great patio out the back of our room, though we really didn't get to use it. During the two full days we had in town, we kept so busy we were rarely in the room during the day. The hotel even provided a little shopping opportunity for me. I bought a pair of earrings and a bracelet for good price from a friendly little man who manned this booth in the evening. He was one of the few people we met in San Cristobal who spoke excellent English. Please stay tuned for much, much more from San Cristobal...this may just have been my very favorite city of the five that we visited (thought it's awfully hard to pick)!
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UPDATE!
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