Oaxaca's a long way when the toilet smells

I'd forgiven the canyons for roughing me up a bit and sadly we had to head somewhere new. Aware that time is ticking by, heading south was the plan, and the city of Oaxaca (pronounced wah-acka) the destination of choice. There are many many miles between Creel and Oaxaca. We talked of taking a flight but the bus easily won on financial grounds. Here's how it went; five hours to Chihuahua, change bus and 20 hours to Mexico City, change bus, six hours to Oaxaca. Dark, hey? That's 31 hours on a bus and about 37 hours total trip time. Unfortunately, we spent the longest stint at the back of the bus right near the toilet. It's potluck on buses, and this one hadn't been cleaned as recently as I'd hoped. You start to think, what constitutes a smell? Well, tiny particles..... I'll stop there!

We arrived in Oaxaca at 5.30am and had a nice chat with a lovely Japanese girl who lives in London. She'd been credit crunched (are we still in a recession in Blighty?) into a bit of traveling, so we chatted until sunrise when we could realistically go searching for accommodation.

Oaxaca reminds me of Florence. It has quite a relaxed feel about it. The architecture is attractive and there are plenty of museums, cafe's and restaurants - plus you can go to the market and grab a handful of fried grasshoppers, an Oaxacan specialty! Not very Italian, and not for me, thanks.

Oh, and a note about our accommodation. We're in a great little hostel that comes with breakfast and wireless Internet. It's our first time in a hostel thus far, and aren't you supposed to meet lots of fellow travelers and exchange stories and generally have a bit of a chat? Not here. Its as much as you can do to get a "hi" from these guys. Thankfully today we met a nice guy called Andrew from Denver (but originally a Brit) and had a good old chat on the way to some ruins.