(By the way, life here is back to normal! There are still posters, notices, TV commercials and talk shows about the influenza but everything is progressing as usual.)
On April 13th, we traveled to:
Puerto Arista--a small little coastal town. Unfortunately, since the week before was a week off, many people had visited the little town and left a lot of trash behind. We spent time relaxing on the beach and drinking beer. We also walked to visit to the Turtle Santuary outside of the town. We were a little surprised at the amount of abandoned buildings, houses and offices on the way out of the town. The morning before we left, we body surfed in the ocean which had huge waves and tepid water temperature! It was a blast!
From Puerto Arista, we took a cumvi (van) to Tonala, bought our tickets to take the bus back to Mexico City (we actually thought that it was Thursday, but it was Wednesday--we had totally lost track of time on our vacation!), ate lunch, caught a bus to Escuitla then took a taxi to Acapetahua to spend the night.
Acapetuahua--a small town (pop. 14k) close to the Reserva de la Biosfera La Encrucijada. This large biosphere protects 1448 sq. km (900 sq. mi.) of coastal lagoons, sandbars, wetlands, seasonally flooded tropical forest and the country's tallest mangroves, some above 30m (98 ft.). This ecosystem is a vital wintering and breeding ground for migratory birds. The area also has one of Mexico's biggest population of jaguars, spider monkeys, turtles, crocodiles, caimans, boa constrictors, fishing eagles and lots of waterfowl--many in danger of extinction. We hired a lancha (long, thin, motor boat) and driver to take us on the waterways through the mangrove forest. He took us to the various different sections of the forest, explained interesting facts to us and showed us a crocodile on the shore. After about 2 hours, he dropped us off at the Barra de Zacapulco (a small settlement on a sandbar between the ocean and a lagoon) where we had a relaxing lunch. Later, we walked on the beach to another turtle sanctuary where we were able to see skeletons of dolphins, whales and turtles. The lancha driver came to pick us up and take us back to the dock where we caught a cumvi back to town.
That night we caught the bus to Mexico City and 18 hours later, after catching another bus, we arrived in Cuernavaca! It was the first overnight bus trip that I had taken in my life and definitely the longest! It was interesting, we stopped only once at about 2 am where we could actually get out and stretch BUT the bus got stopped 7 times by Federal Police roadblocks so that the police could check for drugs. Apparently, there is a lot of drug traffic in the border towns of the state of Chiapas (where the bus originated from).
For pictures, click on the link below:
Coming next: Cinco de Mayo vacation
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