Mazunte and San Agustinillo

Just 40 minute drive from Puerto Escondido is the adorable village of Mazunte. Along this stretch of the Oaxaca coast are three fantastic beach towns, San Agustinillo, Mazunte and Zipolite, all in close proximity to each other. San Agustinillo, the smallist, is just a fifteen minute walk from Mazunte and Zipolite, the largest, is just twenty minute truck ride.

 We initially picked Mazunte as it seemed to promise the best WiFi which Jonny would need to work and WiFi was becoming increasingly sparse as we ventured further from the Yucatan. If you had time and no WiFi commitments, spending time in each of these towns would be highly recommended.

Mazunte is how I had expected Tulum to be, small, full of hippies, beautiful beaches, dirt roads, no English and scorching sun. It was also as if covid didn't exist, we didn't see a mask or hand sanitiser during our time there. Mazunte is the type of place you can't sanitise. Everything was organic, the buildings were wooden with palm thatched roofs. The electricity would sometimes flick off and on at night time. International hippies had made it there home but spoke Spanish to one another, never wore shoes and played drums, flutes, violins or accordions in the streets to try and raise money from passing tourists, others made hand made jewellery, or offered reki or tarot reading.

Mazunte felt timeless, it could easily pass for 1960 if it weren't for the odd truck, though even they weren't so modern.

The locals were as laid back as the hippies who had invaded, seemingly accepting of their presence and not phased by the fact their drinking rituals started at 10am outside the local corner stores.

I loved everything about Mazunte. It had a magical and peaceful atmosphere and it felt a million miles away from the rest of the world and all its problems.

Jonny, however, could not stand the hippies. His unexplainable hatred would case him to curse them under his breath in the street and privately verbalise his distain to me but could never fully explain what it was exactly about them that brought about his very real fury. It became an ongoing source of amusement during our stay.

Our Mexican routine kicked in, I found a language school behind the village up some dirt roads on a hill, where I would attend spanish lessons every morning while Jonny worked. The school offered a cheaper rate if you agreed to be paired with another student, so I did. I can only hope they made the pairings based on convenience rather than ability. I was paired with a Californian called Keith. He was tall with long unwashed hair and sometimes with a distinct fragrance of body odour. He had been going to the classes for nearly a month and seemed reluctant to utter even a sentence in spanish, or to even attempt it, much to the teachers and my frustrations. 'Just try!' she would plead in spanish, always refusing to speak English with him, but her pleads were usually to no avail.

Our teacher was as hippy as Muzante itself. She had visited from her native Mexico City seven years ago and never left. A story that was a common one for the village. She had a husky voice as though she'd smoked far too much, but was impossible to age. Like everyone in Oaxaca she was short, at 5 foot 1 I had become tall. I liked her, she was enthusiastic but our classes were a struggle because of Keith's unwillingness.

On my first day during our break I asked him about himself, in english. He was traveling with his girlfriend Natalie, who from what I could gather, could already speak Spanish. He'd been in Mexico and Mazunte for 3 months. They had no return flights but he spoke of returning for a job. 'Oh what's the job?' I asked.

He planned on growing and selling weed in California.

 'oh because its legal there now?'  I tentatively asked.

'No, no, illegally, you get more money that way'.

He told me he liked Irish people because he had lived and travelled in his van in the past with an Irish couple from Donegal.

For the afternoons Jonny and I would go to the main beach. It was a beautiful inlet surrounded by cliffs. In the distance you could see whales and dolphins out at sea which was incredible to watch with an evening beer. Mazunte also offered some amazing sunsets. Crowds would gather at Punta Comata, up on the cliff for the occasions, and hippies gathered to play drums and sing as the sun went down. Clever locals would come with gallons of home made Pulpe or Mescal to sell. The sunset and sound of the waves crashing on the cliffs below made the experience truly magical.

Nightlife was fairly tame in Mazunte, day drinking was more the hippies vibe, but there are plenty of incredible restaurants. As well as traditional Mexican, there was an amazing pizza restaurant, run by Italians and a Chinese restaurant run by a Mexican who'd spent years studying in China.

One night which was not so tame was after an afternoon trip to Zipolite. We took a twenty minute ride on the back to a taxi truck (Mazuntes version of a collectivo). Zipolite beach is the only nudist beach in all of Mexico. It is long open and expansive, but not as pretty as the beaches of Mazunte. The town is bigger with more of an evening buzz. We happened to stumble upon an Irish bar called 'The Bar'. We decided to go in for 'just the one'. How wrong we were. The pub was small and dark with a lone tall ginger pale deadlocked man behind the bar, who was unmistakenly Irish. Not only was he Irish, he was from Swinford in Co. Mayo, twenty minute from my hometown. He was beyond thrilled to have two Irish people, and even more thrilled to hear I was from Mayo. I was the first Mayo person he'd had in the bar. He was excited to introduced us to his Mexican girlfriends mother who was working across the road. A bottle of Jameson was taken out, shots poured and we knew were in for a long night. Also perched on the bar was a Danish man, who was an enormous fan of Irish Trad music, to the point that he knew the lyrics to every Irish Trad song we put on, some songs I'd never heard of. The bar filled with people as the night wore on and we had some sing alongs which any pub at home would be jealous of. It was an interesting mix of people, some local expats, one from Australia who claimed to be a retired 'spook' (spy) for the Australian government. He had been working in Turkey after 9/11. Apparently the Turks were very accomodating to the Australians given they had beaten the Australians during WW1. The information he gathered was then passed onto the American government. It's impossible to know if his stories were true but he was very convincing and either way it was entertaining.

 Paul, our mayo barman, at one point decided he didn't want anymore customers because they were only distracting from our conversation and closed the shutters. As people left we were able to find more out about Paul's life in Mexico. He'd been in South America for 8 years, starting in Argentina and had set up the bar three years ago. He wasn't much older than us, his parents had died and he had one sister who lived in the UK. He told us how hard it had been when tourists stopped coming when the pandemic first hit. We asked him why Mexicans seems so unphased by the pandemic, 'because they die every day here, they're used to death'. 

He told us there was no covid in Zipolite. 'Nobody gets it here, of course not!' 

We asked him if he had to pay money to the cartel. No, because they like him, he said. But everyone else did. 

At two in the morning it seemed it might be time to try and get home, something which turned out to be a problem given we were twenty minute drive away. Paul went out to look for a taxi but none could be found. So he said he'd have to drive us. He had had more that a few whiskeys but left with the prospect of sleeping on the bar floor it seemed the best option. Luckily there was no one else on the windy dark road between Zipolite and Mazunte and we made it in one piece. 

While staying Mazunte we decided it best to extend our trip again and changed our flights once more. We kept a keen eye on news at home and in Europe about air travel, there had been announcements about hotel quarantine in Ireland being brought in but was a long, long way off from becoming reality. More disturbing was an unexpected announcement from the French president that flights from outside the EU would no longer be allowed into France. Our return flight transited through Paris. After a weekend of panic, it turned out to me little more than political showboating, flights would not be cancelled, planes would still fly, we would just need to fill out a new form. Which I'm sure was good news for the thousands of french tourists in Mexico.

 With our extra time we decided for more time in Mazunte. However, our hotel was booked out so for a change of scenery we went ten minutes down the road to stay in San Agustinillo. We spent three nights in a fabulous Cabaña on a steep hill which overlooked the sea. San Agustinillo is a slightly fancier Mazunte. We were shocked when one restaurant told us we needed a reservation to dine there and turned us away, despite being half empty. Reservations were unheard of in Mazunte.

 The beaches in San August were fantastic, and much quieter than Mazunte. My favourite thing about the Oaxacan beaches was the late afternoon food sellers. Little old ladies would walk the beach with baskets and bags full of mysterious treats. From Pescititos (mackerel tacos) to chocolate flan for a minimal price. I still think about the chocolate flan we had on San August beach.

We also did a boat tour from San August to see the whales and dolphins which was incredible. We got amazingly close to a humpback whale, so close his giant tail almost hit the front of our boat. Next were the dolphins which swam all around us, one jumped out of the water right beside us to say hi. It was an unbelievable experience. We also saw plenty of Turtles who come to the surface to warm up,  birds often land on the shells for a rest. 

After two incredible weeks on the scorching Oaxacan coast it was time to leave for the state of Chapias.

Puerto Escondido

From Oaxaca City we took a night bus around the mountains to the coastal town of Puerto Escondido (which translates 'Secret Port'). 

Its one of the larger beach towns in Oaxaca, the main beach Zicatela stretching 4km. Unlike the carribean coast this beach has waves and is famed for its surf. However Zicatela beach has a strong current and strong rip and is not recommended for beginners so we gave it a miss. 

Our hotel was nicely situated close to Carrizallio Beach, a beautiful inlet ideal for lounging and swimming.

Although Puerto Escondido is a touristic town it is far less developed than any of the places we visited in Yucatan and as a result was far more pleasant, and cheap. There is more of a laid back vibe, the kind of atmosphere that backpackers and surfers bring. This is not a town that attracts wealthy Americans. Puerto is also hotter than the carribean coast, days hitting up to 34 degrees Celsius while we were there. The sea however was colder but very refreshing given the heat. The coldness of the Irish sea had become unimaginable! Being on the west coast we were now in the perfect position to watch Mexico's stunning sunsets from the beach. 

We only spent five days in Puerto and did very little other than eat swim and learn some Spanish. My teacher was a multi lingual, bubbly Mexican, would wear her mask on the walk to class but take it off for our classes. She warned me that masks had just become obligatory in the town in public places, just for the month. We mused over the pandemic, she found Europe's approach baffling and laughed at how paranoid and depressed the lockdowns were making people in Europe. 'My friends and I think it's because of your climate, if you had sun you would be happier!'

There was a sense of pride amongst her and her friends that people were fleeing to Mexico to escape lockdowns in their own countries. 

'Mexicans know that life is too short!' she told me. 

On Playa Bacocho you can visit a turtle reserve where you can release a baby turtle into sea. Although most will get eaten once they make it to the sea it's incredibly adorable to watch them wriggle their way across the sand.

On our last day in Puerto we also did a day tour to Chacahua. We boated through mangroves and were left for several hours in what can only be described as a shanty town close to Chacahua. We could see Chacahua's beautiful stretch of beach dotted with surfers and it certainly looked amazing. Once night fell we took a boat back through the mangroves in search of bioluminesants but unfortunately due to the almost full moon they weren't visible.

To compensate for the disappointing tour, we had an evening of mescalritas and live Jazz! The thrill of live music still hadn't gotten old! 

Oaxaca City

After Holbox we made our way to Cancun for a brief overnight stay in the unglamorous downtown area, next to the bus station so we could make our escape the next morning to Cancun airport. From there we were able to fly to the city of Oaxaca (WHA-hackaa) .

Oaxaca city is in the state of Oaxaca and is a 2 hour plane ride west of Cancun. Before leaving for Mexico plenty of friends had told me Oaxaca was their favourite city in Mexico, and it was easy to see why.

The city is surrounded by stunning scenery, with mountains everywhere you look. The buildings in Oaxaca are low, one or two story and colonial in style. There are fabulous churches and cathedral dotted around the city as well and beautiful open parks and leafy trees line the streets. Some streets are cobblestoned, there are no street signs and traffic lights are difficult to spot as they've been thoughtfully assimilated into the streetscape. Given its height it is cooler than the coast. The weather while we were there in mid January was similar to an Irish summer, in the low twenties.

On our first day Jonny was already talking about extending our stay he loved it so much, saying it was the first time he felt he was really in Mexico. The people were far more laid back than the Yucatan, nobody hassles you to buy anything which makes for a fair more enjoyable visit. 

Oaxaca city is famous for two things, its food and its street art. Originally artist of the city used it as a form of protest, and still do, but also general social commentary. Unlike other cities, Oaxaceño artists mostly use posters of blown up lino prints to decorate the walls of the city. The city is full of printmaking workshops and galleries where you can view or buy original art.

Oaxacas food also famed to be the best in Mexico, and it certainly was fair superior to the general fair we got in Quintana Roo. There speciality is mole sauce, of which there are seven types. It is a thick brown sauce used as a marinade or a compliment to dishes. They also have a Oaxacan goats cheese, which is rubbery but tasty.

There are many fantastic restaurants to dine in Oaxaca, but almost every evening we frequented them we were practically the only ones there. Oaxaca was quiet, very quiet. It is usually a very popular tourist destination but for some reason has been the quietest destination we've been to in Mexico so far. 

Oaxaca was in Orange for Covid restrictions but we were learning Orange means very different things for each city and town. In Oaxaca this meant alcohol only bars had to close at 6pm and all museums and the botanic gardens were closed, which was very disappointing as Oaxaca is famed for its museums and art.

Now that the honeymoon phase of our trip was over, we decided to adopt more of a 'living' in Mexico approach. We rented a gorgeous airbnb in the city which centered around an open courtyard. We would stay for 10 days and settled into a nice routine. Jonny would get up early and work till the afternoon and I would head off to spanish classes at Becari Language school.

I loved my classes and my two teachers gave me a fascinating insight into life in Oaxaca. Eloy thought me for an hour in the morning, he was an energic, slightly camp, outgoing Oaxeño who loved telling me about his dates and love interests in Oaxaca and around the world. But his heart at the time was taken by a mexican man in Mérida who was currently in another relationship. He said he loved our classes because I was so intelligent, so naturally with praise like that we hit it off.

One day in class Eloy got a phone call from one of his cousins looking for money. He told me his cousin had married young and now had two children they couldn't afford. His cousin was 20 and his wife was just 13 when they married. He told me young marriages were a big problem in Oaxaca state, particularly in the Pueblos (villages) around the city. In Mexico 1 in 4 women marry under the age of 16.

At 26 Eloys family couldn't understand why he didn't have a girlfriend. He laughed light heartedly 'they don't know that I'm the one who's a girlfriend!'.

Alix was an adorable young soft spoken man who on his introduction let me know he goes by the pronoun 'he/him' and was keen to not cause offense during our conversation. He was incredibly sweet and surprised me by telling me at the end of our first class it was his first time teaching in the school. He was an incredible teacher who made up games, played his favourite Spanish songs for me and short cartoons and wouldn't entertain any English in our classes. He was incredibly sweet and told me he was closer to his mother than his father, who was a very traditional violent man. 

In the afternoons Jonny and I would explore the city. Oaxaca is a beautiful city to simply walk around in, the street art makes it a living gallery. There are plenty of small 'Mescalrias' where you can stop to sip a mescal. There's also a great Mirador up what feels like a million steps which overlooks the whole city and is a beautiful view for sunset. 

While up there one evening we got chatting to another group of tourists after Sharif, a lively American offered us a beer. The group included 3 Americans, an English girl, a Welsh girl and a guy from Galway. Philip had only been in Mexico 4 days and already incredibly happy with his decision. He was a smily sweet guy in his early 20's and we compared notes on the horrors of lockdown in Ireland. A photo of him and some friends made front page in his small towns local newspaper when they were celebrating a win for the town in the GAA club finals. The team and some fans, including Philip, had caught covid from the celebrations. His family also ended up catching it but fortunately nobody was particularly sick. 

He brought us and the whole group to a famous street food stand which specialised in another Oaxaca delicacy, the Tlayuda. A Tlayuda is a large tortilla wrap filled with meat, cheese, cream, refried beans, avacado and tortilla is folded once and then charcoal grilled on the outside and is absolutely delish. 

Another popular tourist activity around Oaxaca city is to hike between the Pueblos. However during our stay this wasn't possible because of covid. Understandably these remote and isolated mountain villages decided welcoming tourists in at this time was a bad idea. Instead we did one day hike with a Belgian man who runs a hiking business in the region and local villager who led the way. The hike itself wasn't very interesting, it began promisingly with beautiful views of the mountains but we went down and up the same route, the highlight being our Mexican guides cows which reside at the bottom of the mountain beside a stream.    Stories about previous hiking disasters were however highly entertaining. He'd point out plants to avoid, one which could cause a severe reaction if it brushed against your skin. He gleefully told us of a girl who had a fit during a hike after an encounter. 'What do you do when something like that happens during a hike?!' I asked. 

'Yes, it's not good!' is all he responded and then went onto tell us about a couple he had hiked with on a couple of occasions in Mexico. They had returned to find somewhere to settle in Mexico and he had taken them to the Pacific Coast of Oaxaca (where we would continue onto next). The couple fell in love with the area and were having a lovely trip until the mans heart stopped while out for a swim in the ocean. 'But he died with a smile on his face!' our guide told us. 

But then the circus that is rural Mexico kicked in. By the time they managed to retrieve the mans body from the ocean it had, in our guides words, 'fermented' because of the heat. They then needed a doctor to call the death and make the relivant paper work. It was a small village with only one doctor and nobody knew were the doctor was. Our guide began asking around and eventually someone brought him to the local nighclub where he found the doctor who was very drunk. After some money was exchanged the doctor reluctantly agreed to call the death and sign the paperwork. 

Luckily the deadman had wanted to be cremated, but they would need an undertaker to take care of the body until it could be brought back to Oaxaca City for the cremation. And so a fight broke out between the two Undertakers in the village as to who would get to take the man's body. Of course it being a white dead body they would be able to charge more. The verbal fight quickly turned into a fist fight in the streets!

The winning undertaker assured our guide and the new widow that he had a fridge to store the body in. He would take the body and store it until they could get it to Oaxaca. So he took the body and stored it, but much to the horror of our guide when he brought the new widow to say her final fairwells, the fridge wasn't really a fridge at all. The man's body was put in a lidded box and simple surrounded by a couple of ice cubes. The body had began to decompose and the smell and appearance of the man was quite the horror show. Luckily our Guide discovered this before the wife and stopped her from seeing him one last time.

'Once we got him to Oaxaca it all plain sailing, but I advice you not to die in rural Mexico!' our Guide chuckled to himself.

We also visited the Zapotec ruins of Monte Alban. The ruins are completely breath taking and the most impressive ruins yet, set on top of a mountain to the west of Oaxaca City. Monte Albán is one of the oldest civilisations built in the Meso-Americas and was impressively built no where near a water source so its inhabitants relied on a water reservar in built in the cities center. It is thought that it filled by the seasonal rains but at times people climbed down and up the mountain bringing water from the river below.

 It connected with other civilizations through paved trading routes such as Teotihuacan close to Mexico City. 

Luckily Monte Albán remained undiscovered by the Spanish Conquestadors and so it's remains were well preserved.

After a peaceful few days in the spendid Oaxaca it was time to head for the west coast of Mexico where the country meets the Pacific Ocean. 

Playa Del Carmen

Our aim after Bacalar was to go to Isla Holbox, and island north of Cancun. But there was no direct bus route so we decided to stop in the famous Playa Del Carmen for two nights to break up the journey.

Playa Del Carmen, like Cancun, is not Mexico. Other than the souvenirs, you could easily mistake it for a coast in America. 

The famous tourist road is even called '5th Avenue'. The only 'Avenue' I've come across in all of Mexico. Along this street you'll find every imaginable American chain and franchise, American Eagle, IHOP, Forever 21, Burger King, you name it, Playa has it. It's a long street and outside every shop/restaurant/bar and nightclub someone is shouting at you trying to get you to come in.

The beach in Playa Del Carmen however its beautiful and no doubt what first attracted tourists before it became an over developed playground for unadventurous Americans seeking adventure abroad.

We decided to do the only thing that Playa Del Carmen was good at. Party.

We met up with Kevin, who we'd met in Mérida, he happened to arrive the same day as us. We had a few drinks and recounted our adventurous journey back from the flamingos.

We then went onto Tequilla Bar, which promised girls dancing on table tops. There we bumped into an Irish guy called Sam and his Polish friend Natalie who we'd met briefly in Tulum on News Years night, when Sam approached us looking for his bank card he'd lost. In Playa he told us the next morning he woke to remember he hadn't taken it out with him at all, it had been in his hostel the whole time!

We all ended up in a Nightclub, dancing to terrible but recognisable pop songs, a rarity in Mexico. It was beyond fun, for the simple joy of being able to dance with others. Soon our dance circle had grown to include strangers and locals.

Once that nightclub ended, one of our new local friends took us to another roof top club, where we danced and chatted until the small hours of the morning.

The next day delivered the greatest hangover so far in Mexico. Our plan to visit Isla Cozumel for the day (apparently a very nice island off the coast of Playa) were abandoned.

And that would be enough of Playa Del Carmen! 

Isla Mujeres

We flew from Mexico City to Cancun. Mexico City Airport was buzzing with people, long snaking queues everywhere, people running to catch flights and us trying to figure out where to go. After joining the wrong snaking queue we were kindly jumped to a priority queue to check in our bag.

The flight, once again, was sold out. There's plenty of air travel happening in the vast México, on the CDMX to Cancun route alone there's up to 27 direct flights day.

We would briefly travel through Cancun to get to the boat to Isla Mujeres, but first we'd need to get ferry terminal. There's no 'official' taxis at the airport and uber is blocked, so you are forced to negotiate with private companies, all costing at least three times what we paid for similar taxis in Mexico City. Cancun already felt like a cartel run city.

And then our Taxi took us to a port that had no ferries, he would only take us to the next port if we paid an additional fee!

After a brief negotiation, and me, wrongly, believing maybe it was an honest mistake in our drivers part, we finally found out way to the boat to Isla Mujeres.

Isla is a small island about a half an hour boat trip from Cancun. Its 10km long and at the north tip, where we were staying, less than 1 km wide. The North beach has the most perfect fine white Caribbean sand and crystal clear blue/green waters. We dumped our baggage at the hotel and made our way to the beach to catch the last hour of sun on our arrival. It was a humid 29 degrees at 5pm and we jumped into the water just in time for a rain shower! Trust the Irish to bring the rain to the carribean!

We drank and danced at the fun beach club Green Demon, and made friends with our Argentinan waiter, who drank tequila with us to celebrate our honeymoon. They had a fantastic live band followed by dancers, fire poi, Isis winged dancers. Our waiter told us Sunday is the day for the locals to come party, and that they did, dancing on the sand till the early hours of the morning. It was bliss.

We spent a few days on Isla, and given its tiny size there's not a whole lot to do on the island other than lounging on the pristine North Beach, eating and drinking. But when your escaping an Irish winter, it's just perfect. It's pretty touristy, which is hardly a surprise given its proximity to Cancun. Walking through the main streets is like running a gauntlet with literally every shop assistant calling you and trying to get you into the shop. I found the approach a bit overly aggressive and it reminded me of walking the souks of marrakesh, right down to the same cat calling of 'Barbie' and 'Blondy' (which only happened when I went out without Jonny).

Other than the sellers, it was a very laid back affair on Isla and this applied to covid regulations to. To be honest I'm not sure there were any, other than wearing masks inside, sometimes, and there were plenty of live bands and entertainment. One restaurant owner told us the island had been closed to tourists for seven months and only opened in October. To date there had only been 219 cases on the island. The closure had devasted the island, who's only economy was tourism. Many businesses closed, never to reopen. I wondered if that was why the shop assistants were so keen.

We spent one day diving with a group from our hotel, visiting a pretty impressive underwater museum and then a coral reef site where we saw a turtle, lobsters and plenty of amazing colourful fish. The visibility under the sea is superb.

We rented a scooter to explore the length of the island, from tip to tip it only takes a half an hour to drive. It was a pleasant uneventful escurtion, until on our return we drove past a truck and police car pulled over the side of a road surrounded with police tape right outside a naval base. The next street we passed, small and narrow, we saw locals standing by some more tape, looking down the street where a car with an open door was abandoned and now had police in white overalls taking photos and examining the scene... We only got a glimpse but it was enough to know it was a crime scene.

Later that day we found articles, with graphic photos, of the murder scene we had witnessed! Seemingly it had happened just a half an hour before we drove by. A 'sicario' had come to the island that day by ferry for the hit, and for some reason, thought close by the naval base was a good place to kill his target. It was all caught on the cctv cameras belonging to the naval base and he was quickly caught by the island police attempting to make a get away back to the ferry terminal.

Alot of excitement for an island with a population of  12,600. The victim was a young male islander, we never found out the reason for the assassination but no doubt it was cartel/drug related.

With that, we were ready to leave Isla Mujeres and make our way to the cartel free city of Mérida!

Mexico City

We got into Mexico City at about 9.30pm and we were both shocked to see the city was full of police, on every street corner, driving around patrolling on trucks, all armed heavily, some with machine guns. I assumed it was due to covid, Jonny assumed it was due to Mexico Citys reputation for being dangerous, the jury is still out.

In Mexico, the Covid levels are colour coded, red being the worst, then orange, yellow and green meaning practically back to normal. While we were in Mexico City, it had just gone from red to orange, meaning all shops and services open, hotels, museums and restaurants were supposed to operate at 30% capacity, restaurants to close at 10pm, with alcohol to be stopped at 7pm, and no live music in bars and sadly no salsa or wrestling.

But there were still plenty to keep us entertained for our 5 nights here. Mexico city is enormous, with a sprawling population of 21 million. There were plenty of amazing museums, beautiful parks and streets to explore. After weeks of a lockdowned winter in Dublin it wouldn't be hard to keep us entertained. Even just being in a new place was a thrill. It's winter here, in Mexico City that meant a cool average of 25 degrees during our stay. The bustle and exoticness of a Latin American city with food vendors on every corner was almost overwhelmingly exciting, let alone the chance to make friends with strangers again. 

Our first day brought us to Palacio de Bellas Artes, one of the most beautiful museums I've ever seen, the art deco building in some ways outshining the art pieces it holds. Anywhere we went in Mexico City before entering, you have to walk on a disinfectant mat, have your temperature taken, hand sanitiser is squirted into your hand and in some places, you are also sprayed with a misting, of what I assume is disinfectant spray, around your body. This happened for all museums, shops, restaurants, our hotel, basically anywhere that involved going indoors.

Though the city is busy and buzzing with people, there were very few tourists while we were there, meaning we had usually very busy places virtually to ourselves. The stunning Antropology Museum, which is full of pre-Columbian artifacts including Mayan and Aztecs. The museum usually sees about 2.6 million visitors a year, had about 60 the day we visited. But still the walk through the park to the museum is lined with stands of people trying to sell there wears despite nobody being around to buy them.

I was concerned before coming to Mexico that we wouldn't be welcomed by the locals. In Ireland there is a strong wariness for air travel and foreign tourism with arguments for closing airports. But this attitude seems to be totally absent here, we've felt very welcomed, there's no animosity for our obvious foreign presence, an enthusiastic 'Beinvenido a México' meets us everywhere, even a gardener in a park welcomed us to his city as we walked past. 

Despite the wearing of masks (inside and outside) in Mexico City it very much felt like business as (almost) usual on the streets and in the markets. Of course, like everywhere, there are restrictions that don't make sense. In the historical center some areas are fenced off or have one way entry systems, but in reality people are just forced to go through narrow entries, with no apparent counting of how many people are entering. While the markets are insanely busy, no restrictions on numbers and narrow passage ways full of colour, flavour and Latino Christmas cheer. 

And of course the drink curfew of 7pm, but there's alot to be said for lunch time drinking. We also figured out after a couple of days where we could drink until 10pm (when the restaurants closed) and we really didn't have to search very hard. And even though parties and gatherings weren't supposed to be happening, there was a definite sense that they were, walking past shuttered doorways we could hear Reggaetón blaring from inside, and even were given a flyer for a secret party the night before we left... We didn't go. No doubt the fact that it was the beginning of Las Posada, a nine day Christmas celebration, wasn't helping people's desire to gather. In our hotel a large 'private' family party took place, with gift exchanging, eating, music and salsa! 

While in Mexico City we also took a day trip to Teotihuacan, the amazing Teotihuacan os pyramids. We were joined on the trip by Haviar from Panamá (originally from Venezuela) and José from Guatemala, both who were staying in our hotel. Most residents while we were there were from Latin American countries, on a working holiday, but there were some Europeans and we met just one American.

Our fantastic tour guide showed us just a small section of the 83 sq km site, showing us the Pirámide del luna and Pirámide del Sol which were incredibly impressive. The pyramids only reopened to the public in October, however you still can't climb the piráminde del sol, to prevent over crowding due to covid, although given how few people were there the day we visited, I can't imagine they would have been a problem. After the pyramids we had lunch, and our tour guide gave us cocktails to celebrate our honeymoon, which was very sweet. 

After our five days of the crazy metropolitan of Mexico city, we were ready for the first of many beach stops. 

Traveling in a Pandemic

'Are you allowed to go?' The lady threading my overgrown, lockdown eyebrows asked the weekend before we left.

Plenty of people asked me this when I told them of our 5 week honeymoon plan (yep, I'm now a wife!). There has been a huge amount of talk of air travel, or the lack thereof in Ireland during the pandemic, but the advice of non essential air travel is just that, advice. Of course there is more complicated question of 'should' you travel. We're in the fortunate position of being able to pay for a PCR test on return and restrict our movements for adviced 5 days on our return. 

Mexico has plenty of covid cases but has more or less been open to tourist most of the year. In a country to little, to no social welfare system and regions with high reliance on tourism, they don't have the privilege of extended lockdown. Covid entry requirements are limited-- no test required, no quarantine and no travel insurance. The last one being most important, as we can't get cover given the governments non essential travel advice.

So Mexico it would be for 5 weeks of adventure, sunshine, and mine and Jonnys first Christmas together!

Finding flights was difficult, not just because there are so few flights out of Ireland at them moment but also, thanks to Trump, Europeans are not permitted entry into the US, even just to transit through an airport. We found flights with KLM through Amsterdam to Mexico city.

We said goodbye to a freezing dark Dublin at 4am and made our way to a very empty Dublin Airport. 

No queues, ours seemed to be the only flight that morning, but the flight was completely sold out, every seat taken. Because there are so few flights from Ireland the ones that happen tend to fill up fast. It did feel a little strange to be crammed into a plane of strangers close by but by the second flight we were already accustomed to it. Masks are manditory, of course, but they are removed for eating meals and drinking.

After a 6 hour layover in a much busier Schipol airport we boarded our second sold out flight to Mexico city. Other than the masks, flying is just the same as it always has been. The day we flew, the European Center of Disease Control announced air travel to be low risk, based on research into planes filtration systems and very very few global documented cases. 

Before entering Mexico we spent 45 mins queuing to get through immigration, first having our temperature checked and then given hand sanditisor (more than what happens in Dublin Airport). We'd filled out a health check form and tourist visa application which we presented to the officer, in our terrible Spanish. He stamped our passports with no hesitation and off we went. 

We were jetlagged but excited for our first adventure in Mexico City!