After arriving late in Oaxaca and getting an apartment for the first night, I met Peter and Jule again for a breakfast at Boulenc, which is a cute little place in the heart of the city, with a small backyard including a terrace with three tables. Afterwards, I had to quickly switch with Samantha to the Airbnb we got together with Pauline, Mat, and Cat after they arrived one day later from Puebla. Next stop where the markets of Oaxaca, which are located in the south of the city center. Each connected to a certain theme, we visited Mercado de Artesanias for clothing, art, toys, and other souvenirs, Benito Juárez which is like a big food court, and Mercado 20 Noviembre, which consists more of raw food like chicken, meat, and vegetables.
A special and highly recommendable experience made the "Pasillo de Humo" (English: Smoke Street) which is an alley on the eastern side of Mercado 20 Noviembre which holds stands of BBQ grills on both sides of the path. Next to each BBQ people offered different kinds of raw meat which you can pick to be grilled for you. In addition, there is a stand in the center where you can pick plates of sides like vegetables, salad or salsas, and guacamole. You can also just sit down on one of the tiny tables between the BBQs and tell someone to bring you your preferred food. Keep in mind: you need to pay everyone separately, if it's the guy selling the meat, the person selling sides as well is whoever serves you your beer and the grandma selling tortillas, but it's really cheap overall and definitely one of the culinary experiences of your travels. Must-Do when in Oaxaca and interested in authenticity and you dodon'tnt care about having sheets of papers as plates.
After this truly Mexican experience, we were all looking forward to our evening where we planned to cook Ratatouille together, to even out our vegetable demand. Therefore I bought a load of various vegetables for the seven of us, also including Cayote, which looks like a wrinkly, green pear, but is basically a vegetable with the consistency of potato as well as a lack of taste. Also, it needs to be peaked under running water, because it loses a silky, sticky liquid that you don't like to get on your hands.
After dropping the first bag of vitamins in the Airbnb and letting the others in, I went out with Pauline to search for salt, pepper, and oil, which is harder than you think in Mexiko. Again, Oxxo and six which are all around, don't have much more to offer than soft drinks and snacks and basic supplies can only be bought in the Mercado or rare small shops. So we went to another Mercado in the east, which was officially already closed, but they let us in to quickly get these things. In a shop on the other side of the street, we bought fruits as dessert, also including a Guanabana. The whole diner was a huge success, and we felt at least one day kinda healthy in Mexico.
In the evening we went to Mundo Ceiba A.C. which is a bar with an additional huge bike rental whose owners organize four times a week a night biking session, where people just gather and they provide music and some people to block streets and take care about accidents or bike failure. The tour takes about 1,5 hours and is a fun experience to drive in a huge crowd through the town and also support the efforts of the people to make Oaxaca more bike-friendly. Beyond others, the tour also brought us through Jalatlaco which is considered a nice and colorful neighborhood which is nice to see.
After all that effort we went with some people on the tour to La Mezcalerita to sit on the rooftop for a cold drink. When strolling through the streets to find another bar, we heard a Saxophon and ended up following it into Cozana. Even though the atmosphere seemed to be a bit chicer including the live performance with saxophone and DJ set, the prices were really good. After all, getting invited by a crowd of Mexicans to their table who were partying because of a birthday, made our evening and we stayed a while, before leaving back home.
The next day was waiting for us with another day trip. The goal was to reach Hierve el Aqua in the east of Oaxaca. This was definitely the trip with the most effort at this time. It was necessary to get a bus to Mitla, from where you jump on the back of a Jeep to drive more than an hour through bumpy, dusty, windy mountain streets during which you have to pass autonomous towns which charge a street toll to pass until you reach the location. Hierve el Aqua are rock formations looking like waterfalls. They exist because of the springs which are oversaturated with calcium carbonate and offer the possibility to swim in the natural pools while having an outstanding view over the valley beneath.
You are also able to hike down to the foot of one of the "falls" or just use it as a really special photo location (feel free to check Instagram for many professional shots).
After we made the whole trip back home and we all had our shower we decided to go to a really local Tlayuda place called Las Ánimas. Tlayudas are sometimes called Mexican pizzas, which might refer to the size, the form, and the general idea of topping the dough with different things including cheese. They were prepared on a BBQ which only consisted of a bunch of bricks around a fireplace and a rost.
After we had to say goodbye to Peter and Jule, we got ourselves a bottle of wine and ended the evening with a Dutch card game (At least cards are available in OXXO!).
The next morning Matt recommended us a place to get breakfast in buffet Form, including cereals, fruits, Chilaquiles, spaghetti, meat dishes, scrambled eggs, and free coffee. Even though it was not the best breakfast ever, BUFFET del Chef was still convenient and very affordable for 60M$/2,50€.
During the following walking tour, we learned a lot about the city, including a demonstration (selling tamales) against a planned McDonald's on the main square, which the people did not accept in this culinary town, the amount and strengths of the frequent earthquakes in Mexico as well as the mandatory diversity of house colors along streets, which is tracked by the city to ensure no double usage of colors. Apart from a stop at a local sewer, we also stopped at Mercado organico la cosecha which is a lovely food court located in a backyard, where we tried drinks made of Bugambilia - a purple flower. The tour ended for us in an art gallery in which a group of artists tried to point out political issues and unjustified happenings in the world, like 44 shot students on a demo in 1968 or 43 students who got lost potentially kidnapped in 2014. Also on the less depressing side, they had an interesting collection of art painted on bills.
Finally, we took a bus in the evening to go back to the coastline which we were craving for. After 6h we arrived in Salina Cruz which was by far the less touristy place on our whole trip. More to come...
Additional recommendations:
Empanadas del Carmen: based in a small market hall - the name says everything
Taqueria El Primo: small local taco shop with lovely owners
Mercado Sánchez Pascuas: smaller more local market than the other three mentioned ones
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