Mierda que pasa

After writing the previous footprint in Ciudad Ixtepec, there was another go-see-what's-up call: fireworks and loud music. Turns out to have been another carnaval parade with dancing and music on the streets, where Kathi also caught a useless little Cheetos bag that I am now using as a coin-wallet. After that, we had dinner in a US-style diner — or at least that's what we took it to be— to pay too much for a salad and a sandwich, so we went to a taco place afterwards for the main dish.

The next day was supposed to be a longer flat ride on the way too tuxtla, but after some weird gravel section I felt super weak, and was struggling to keep up with Kathi on the highway that followed. And we were supposed to follow that highway for the entire day with no alternative... So we changed course, decided to go to the beach, and figure things out there. Kathi also spotted a coffee shop in some town on the way, and of course a coffee break is hardly ever a bad idea. Then, when I was talking about the podcast I was listening to about the Anthropic vs Pentagon fight, another (white) guy who had just shown up started quite loud with "what are you doing here!?!". Initially, our reaction was to not start a conversation, but he seemed genuinely interested, and it turned out he was a Gringo from Florida who had moved nearby to a ranch (close to in the middle of nowhere) who just didn't expect any white people in THIS town. Because, according to him, there were a lot of sketchy people around; he even pointed some out to us. We were invited to visit him and his wife on his ranch, and they gave us some tips on where to go near the beach. It was an amazing conversation with them.

Coffee did wonders for me and we reached the, I must say, super uninteresting and ugly town of Salina Cruz; it was good the two people just mentioned gave us a nice beach location, because the town itself is really not worth it. We went to "playa brasil" and, after the price for a beach room magically went up from 200 pesos to 800 pesos when talking with some woman at the first spot we tried (she also didn't seem to notice or acknowledge the peculiarity of this abrupt and drastic price hike), we were allowed to camp on the beach in front of some beach restaurant. An amazing spot.

(Well... During the night I got scared that the waves were getting too close due to the tides changing, but that was fine. And in the morning, after the attached tent-view beach photo was taken, one of our first conversations was:
- "did the dog just shit on our tent?!"
- "yes. Yes he fucking did."
Not ideal.)

We had decided the evening before to go visit the people mentioned above this day and then take the bus to Tuxtla, but Kathi's movistar network again didn't reach to the beach, and it turned out that they, because they didn't hear from us [shrug] were going to a wedding instead. So, yeah, instead we decided to take the bus to Tuxtla, and cycle to San Cristóbal from there.

All of that went fine, until Kathi started feeling uneasy in the evening, and that unease quickly developed into a full-blown food poisoning with a full night and half a day of vomiting. According to some, "part of the foreigner price [of travelling in mexico]". We still don't know what caused it, because we shared basically everything. Ah, she also had her credit card sucked in by an ATM; Glück im Unglück, because of the food poisoning, we were still there on Monday to re-collect the card at the bank.

In the meantime, I checked out Tuxtla a bit: a much more modern city with not a lot of tourism, but big markets, food chains, and very very busy traffic. I had coffee with the locals (in a not hipster store, which I enjoy way more due to the authentic feeling), tried eating vegetarian but failed twice (once by ordering the wrong thing—rez is not arroz— second time by not getting what I ordered), and wandered rather aimlessly in the markets. Also tried understanding the Cartel situation and the who's-who of Cartel gangs and who's-where, and apparently we are now in a sub-gang (?) of the Sinaloa cartel.

We tried cycling today, as Kathi was looking better, but it was too early and we turned back. So tomorrow we are taking the bus to San Cristóbal and the cycling fun starts again in a week — alone. =(Read more