Travels with Hayley

Today started with an egg white omelette with squash blossom at the hotel restaurant – don’t worry, I’ve not turned into some kind of health nut, I just really wanted to try squash blossoms!

Turns out they are very tasty and taste rather like sautéd greens, so now we are all educated on that and you are very welcome! I lost the table lottery though as I was sat next to an wildly obnoxious American couple who kept demanding various things from the extremely charming wait staff with not a single please, thank you or eye contact the entire time. And – she ate her yogurt with a fork. Utter savages.

Hopped in a Uber across town to the meeting point for todays tour in Xochimilco, past all the street art and sculptures, art seems to be everywhere you look, I love it. Somehow I managed to mess the address up slightly so the lovely lady Uber driver had to circle the block a few times until we came upon it. I forced a tip and multiple Spanglish apologies on her and still made it with 10 minutes to spare, phew. Took advantage of the time to nip to the loo – below are the 3 notices in order that you saw them – you can actually see the anger mounting and the politeness going of the window as time moves on can’t you 😂

We were a group of 8 today and I was in the car with the guide Gaby and a lovely American couple in their 60’s who had been here for a month. They had done everything, it was so interesting to talk to them but now I have an even longer list of things I want to do here and not enough time darn it!

First stop was to a beautiful old church where mass was being held, the singing was so beautiful, I wish we could have stayed longer to listen. At the back of the church was a patio belonging to the monastery – in a very entrepreneurial move by the monks you can actually rent out this space for wedding receptions and the like! They’re cannier than you’d think are the brothers…

Off for a whistle stop tour around a local market – I asked Gaby what the most popular street food to buy there is – apparently it’s tlacoyos – a white or blue corn dough stuffed with either potatoes, cheese or meat and topped with cactus and fresco (fresh) cheese. Obviously I needed to try them all so she helped me buy enough for the whole group to have half each with some left over (this largesse cost me the grand sum of £2.50…) and we stashed them away for a bit later.

Wandering through the rest of the market I came across the normal fascinating mish mash of things including this time a piñata section, stalls that sold only home made crisps, and some blow up dolls in suspenders, just casually hanging up by the bananas. So just like the markets at home…

Grabbed a horchata to go, this is a really refreshing drink made of sweetened rice milk with added cinnamon and spices. It was delicious but this version was a bit too sweet for me to be honest – the hunt is on for the perfect one though!

Next stop was the Xochimilco canals for our trip in a trajinera – a bright, highly decorated wooden boat. We walked past the guys repainting the bold designs on the more worn out boats and headed onboard.

Whilst tourists now come here too, hiring a boat to cruise the canal while eating and drinking is still a really popular pastime with Mexico City residents, as it has been for over 100 years. It’s a common venue for birthdays and it’s famous for it’s party atmosphere, especially at the weekend which apparently can get so busy that the boats can barely manoeuvre along the canal. In fact, the parties can get so racous that the boats have a pole set across the ceiling that can be let down vertically for impromptu pole dancing!

Bearing that in mind I chose to go on a weekday instead (saving my pole dancing for another time, you can’t peak too soon…) and it was a great choice – there was enough ‘traffic’ on the river to have a fun atmosphere, but it was still quiet enough to be really relaxing. Boats pulled up next to us offering to sell all sorts – drinks of every type and flavour, tequila shots, food being cooked right there on the boat, cuddly toys, flower headdresses – anything and everything. The other floating attraction is the mariachi bands who for £10 will board your boat and play you a song of your choice! We recruited a very sauve looking crew for 2 songs and it was hilarious – camp and funny and joyful.

Next was an optional stop to see a reptile house that housed axolotls, who are indigenous to Mexico and endangered (possibly because they used to be used as a taco filling. According to the guide’s grandfather who used to eat them, they taste – and I quote – ‘like chicken’. Why do we bother eating anything other than chicken, everything tastes like it apparently!)

I was expecting more of a sanctuary to be honest whereas this felt like a mini zoo really but we made the most of it – the likelihood of me seeing an axolotl in real life again seems slim so I thought it best to get it done when the chance occurred! Also housed there were bearded dragons, chameleons and snakes – see pictures of me holding the first two (including the runaway chameleon who decided my hand wasn’t nearly interesting enough and only my shoulder would do) and gingerly holding the tail of the last – I was up for holding him until the guide told me ‘he likes to kiss people’ – I decided maybe I’d been brave enough for one day so I stuck to the tail end!

All of them were so soft feeling though, a bit like a silky kind of rubber. Not at all slimy as I had thought.

While we were on the boat we had lunch – on offer was a taco with roast pork, rice and potato, a chicken tinga sope (sope being a fried tortilla) and a mushroom and cheese quesadilla, plus the extra bits I’d bought at the market. It was all ok – it could have done with some salsa but the ‘mild’ green salsa almost burnt a hole through my tongue – Gaby agreed something had gone awry there with the spicing levels, even she couldn’t eat it! It’s all quite heavy for me, I couldn’t eat very much of it (without being impolite, this is a heavyset nation to put it mildly, these are not health foods…) but as always I was glad I got to try it all.

I relaxed on the front of the boat watching all the celebrations happen around me, fending off offers from the water borne stall holders and generally enjoying the spectacle. Kids were on their way home from school, being punted across their river in their school uniforms – beats the bus any day!

Once the tour came to a close it was back in the car and we headed through the traffic back toward the city – again, a purely English playlist – not only did we have ABBA today, the spice girls too. I asked Gaby, is this just for the English speaking guests but no, this is her favourite type of music! I think I’ve been sold a pup, I was expecting Latin tunes blasting from every corner and instead I’ve got Dancing Queen and If You Wannabe My Lover.

Once we arrived back to the city I really needed to stretch my legs as it had been a pretty sedentary day so I walked the mile into the centre and popped into the Diego Rivera mural exhibition which is just one room with one of his most famous murals in.

I really enjoyed sitting and looking at it – it’s not my kind of art as in I wouldn’t want it on my living room wall, but it’s very political – the museum did a good job of explaining all about it and how every person in it represented a key policial figure either historically or from the present day so that really brought it to life. Frida is in there too.

I decided to walk from there back to the hotel, another mile or so, so set off through a strange route that took me alongside a homeless settlement, and then literally two minutes later I was in a really upmarket neighbourhood, walking past Soho House and some incredibly modern shops and restaurants. 2 minutes after that I popped up into the financial district, walking through huge intersections lined with skyscrapers for multinational banks and the like.

On my travels I walked though a street market where I managed to pick up some new sunglasses as I’d put a crack in mine in the balloon yesterday. Honestly, things aren’t made to last anymore – you’d think £6 sunglasses from a Costa Rican supermarket would last through more than 3 continents but obviously you just can’t trust the workmanship these days. Let’s hope this new £2.50 investment bears more fruit!

Speaking of walking here though, you have to keep your wits about you – there’s traffic lights but I’ve not seen a single motorbike or bicycle pay the blindest bit of attention to one – I can’t believe they’re actually exempt from the law but for all intents and purposes it appears that way! There is the occasional pedestrian crossing but there might be a bit of an issue with the programming of some of them – see below where the traffic signal is green at the same time as the green walk now sign!

I was waiting to cross one of these massive streets to go and listen to a rock band playing on the other side of the road that had drawn quite a crowd, when a Mexican guy came up to me and asked if I spoke English (I stick out like a sore thumb what with the pale skin, blonde hair and ‘I’m a tourist’ backpack on!) When I said yes he started chatting away, telling me the history of the area and asking where I was from etc etc. To begin with I kept a tight hold of my bag, assuming some kind of scam, but gradually realised he just wanted a chat! He was a teacher and was grateful for an opportunity to practice his English apparently.

We ended up walking for about an hour, taking the scenic route back to the Zocalo, the main square where my hotel is based – although he did ask ‘what area are you staying, are you in a hostel’ – so I might need to work on smartening my appearance while on these trips a little 😂. We chatted away about all sorts – music, architecture, Brexit, the health benefits of olive oil were just a few of the topics covered, and walked down streets where each shop on that street specialised in the same genre – there was a music street, an electronics street (with a shop piled to the ceiling with old cathode ray tube tvs), a computer street etc etc.

Nearing the end of the journey Alfredo asked if I might like to go out tonight – I answered how lovely that would have been but unfortunately I was already going out with friends – true. He then asked if maybe tomorrow was a possibility? I answered again, how lovely that would be but sadly I was leaving for Oaxaca the very next morning so would not be available – not true – but politer than saying an outright no thanks sunshine 😂 Bless him for trying though! We parted ways as friends with a handshake and he went on his way to the metro and I made it back to the hotel, quite tired as it was almost 7pm by this point, it really had been a scenic route back!

Quick salad and soup at the cafe (this is such a great hotel, did I tell you they left a handwritten welcome note on my bed on arrival and each day the cleaners leave a different sweet on my pillow!) and then back in an Uber – Latin music this time, result! – and headed out to meet the girls from the balloon trip yesterday at Mama Rumba, a salsa club across the city.

Again this was a good life lesson in having patience – when I got there there were huge lessons going on with the instructors screaming out instructions in Spanish – so I had no idea what was going on – and literally hundreds of people crashing into each other. I also realised very quickly they were teaching Cuban salsa which is different from cross-body salsa that I’ve learned. Cross body the first step is backwards on the right leg, Cuban it’s forward on the left as far as I could work out. Honestly, it’s taken me a year to remember the right leg to start with, what with that and the chaos and a Spanish man telling me – ‘concentrate!’ – which I replied with ‘shut up!’ – in fairness he did…I opted out of the lesson and grabbed a drink.

At that point I very almost left, I was worried I wouldn’t be able to dance at all and I felt a bit stupid – fortunately the lesson ended and the girls came to join me, along with Juan Carlos, the balloon guide (we think he has a little crush on Leah 😜) and I had a dance with him to start – turns out no one cares what style you dance there as long as you’re full of enthusiasm and follow their lead! I ended up having an amazing evening, they played one of my favourite songs (Yo no say mañana) and I danced with at least half a dozen different people and held up really, really well, I have to admit to being pretty proud of myself – I even got a few compliments on my dancing!

Some of the guys were hilarious – one guy asked me to dance, pulled me close and all 5ft 4 of him looked deep into my eyes and declared ‘I am Alessandro. I am your boyfriend. I am your salsa teacher. I am your love!’ Safe to say my face hurt from laughing as much as my legs hurt from dancing by the end of the night!

We made a gracious exit at about 12.30 and I jumped in an Uber back to the hotel, a huge grin on my face and Latin fever in my heart.

More adventures tomorrow!

Lots of love xx