Changes in Latitudes

[I love this picture - Marius is a great photographer] [Over looking the valley with our guide, Raul] [Aguazul] We departed San Cristobal and drove east. We noticed that it was just getting warmer and warmer, but Tron would still wear jeans and a shirt. First stop on the 6 hour drive was Aguazul - a set of cascades that were lined with an endless row of stalls where locals were selling their crafts. We walked up and down the river probably about a mile each way. You could opt to take a wooden barge across the other side of the river, but it looked a bit dangerous without the option to use a life vest and the barge was right between two waterfalls. We watched from the sidelines instead. [Our breakfast stop] We drove to the town of Palenque, and stayed there for two nights. We got up before 6am to begin our drive to Yachilan, an awesome site of Mayan ruins on the boarder of Guatemala. Along the way we made a pitstop at a roadside cafe that was built int...

Now you can see how our Mexico trip progressed... [Start in Mexico City - finish in Playa del Carmen] After three days in Mexico City and the surrounding area, we flew to Tuxtla Gutierrez. The temperature increased about 20 degrees F. The airport was at a higher altitude, but over the course of the next week we would descend to near sea level. We were picked up by our new guide, Raul, a very pleasant man who was very knowledgeable on Mexican culture and history - and was particularly good at recommending restaurants and dishes. [Cañón del Cañón del Sumidero]  He drove us to Cañón del Cañón del Sumidero, where we were taken on a boat tour of the canon that he compared to the fjords in Norway. We experienced some slight racism when getting on the boat by a local who was unhappy that our guide had us wait for him on a bench toward the front of the line, and proceeded to tell us that "the boat should only have Mexican blood". The man then ran to the front of the l...

A week before Christmas I flew into Mexico City to meet Marius and his family for our nearly three week excursion through southern Mexico. We spent our first three days in Mexico City, and were led by a guide the whole trip. We began with a tour of the historical area of the city, which included the Metropolitan Cathedral, remains of ruins under the city, and the museum of archaeology for a brief history lesson of the Aztec and Mayan civilizations. [Inside the Metropolitan Cathedral] [Mexico City] We had one free day to do explore on our own, but we opted for a tour of Taxco. Taxco is known for its silver mines. We expected a guide of the silver mining process, but instead were told to put on hard hats, listen to the man tap on different cups for us to guess which was the purest silver, and ended up taking a shot of tequila. Their show room was full of salesmen and more offers of tequila. When we finally got into the town of Taxo, we felt taken back by about 50 years. Most...