Oaxaca (pronounced Wa-ha-ka) is both a state in Mexico and the capital city of the state. We drove through some beautiful high mountain terrain to Oaxaca city. The roads were quite good, if not all the drivers. I have dash cam video of two cars, a semi and a pickup truck, all shoulder to shoulder trying to pass each other, going up hill and around a corner…..again, wish I had the internet power to upload the video, maybe one day.
We hadn’t planned on visiting Cholula, but we needed to break up our drive to Oaxaca and Cholula was about halfway. It turned out to be one of our favourite stops.
Taxco is a city built into the side of a hill and is known for its silver mines, jewelry production and colonial architecture. People have been taking silver out of the hills here long before the Spanish arrived, but, today, the main industry is tourism.
The Grutas de Cacahuamilpa are Mexico’s largest caverns and are one of the longest cave systems in the world. There are 15 large chambers that stretch out over about 12 km. Continue reading
Nevado de Toluca is an extinct volcano and, according to our guide book, at 15,090 feet is the fifth tallest mountain in Mexico. You can drive to near the rim of the crater, at 13,700, and then hike up and over the rim to two lakes – La Luna (the moon) and El Sol (the Sun).
Lake Chapala is Mexico’s largest natural lake, but more importantly, it was the location of the condo we had rented for a few days over New Year’s Eve. Daydreams of elaborate meals, prepared in a fully operational kitchen, served on a real table (“Maybe they will have some candles we could light!”), daily hot showers without the need for flip flops, laundry churning away in the washing machine and a full sized bed filled my head as we drove to the lake.
With one more night before our highly anticipated stay in a condo for a few days, we decided to head to a place we had seen on iOverlander called Laguna Larga. It is a small recreational lake that allows you drive to the edge of the water to camp after 5pm, thus allowing day users of the lake more places to spread out blankets, etc.,. It sounded nice and peaceful.
We had an AirBnb condo reserved for December 30th at Lake Chapala. We’d paid for the campsite in San Miguel until the 28th….should we pay for another couple of days? Should we hit the road? If so, where would we go? We had seen most of the places we had wanted to see and many more, but we were getting itchy feet…..we needed a plan.
So, which Spanish word do you think we have said the most since entering Mexico? Buenos Dias? Good guess, it means good morning, and when we are walking around we say it to everyone we meet, but that is not it.
We had made reservations for Christmas at a campground in the town of San Miguel de Allende, so we said our goodbyes to our excellent hosts in Guanajuato and drove about an hour to San Miguel.