Living the High Life

We set off after breakfast with our new guide, Alberto. Our first stop was Agua Azul, a series of waterfalls that due to deposits in the rocks of the river, the pools are an amazing bright blue. 

The only thing that lay between us and our destination of San Cristobal, was the now very familiar hills, twists and turns and those awful speed bumps.  Added to the bumps were hoards of children shoving all manner of things through the car window for us to buy.  This time, the mothers were joining in by adding a washing line across the road to slow us down even more.  We duly arrived 2 hours later.

San Cristobal is a lovely colonial town with three important ingredients for us: a centrally located hotel (Casa Mexicana), numerous bars and restaurants and safe streets. A winning combination! More importantly, restaurants are open late and so early dinners and nights are postponed for now. The only downside is the altitude, because the town and surrounding villages are all around 2,500m high making traipsing around very hard work.

Above is Casa Santa Domingo, under threatening skies.  Although the days are sunny, the evenings are quite cool (but probably not as chilly as England right now) and our fleeces are now being unpacked.

We visited two nearby indigeous villages, San Juan Chamula and Zinacantan.  It was a fascinating morning spent understanding their way of life and the links between Maya and Catholic cultures.  In SJC we were taken around the neighbourhood and shown homes belonging to the Mayan elite who you must not photograph at any cost. Traditional costumes are worn, with the men wearing a cream tabard of a very shaggy material tied around the waist with a belt. 

From a post card as you cannot photograph them

 We were allowed into one of their homes to see the alter, statues and other offerings to their saints. Whilst we were there a gathering took place that included incense being wafted throughout the room and various other activities (oh to be able to press a shutter button and capture it).

We moved on to the church which is very much this villages' cultural centre and every week stages a special ceremony in homage to the Mayan gods.  In the church we met a spectacular sight.  The marble floor was covered in dried grasses and family groups gathered sat on the floor lighting candles of all sizes and colours each with a different meaning  - there were literally hundreds of candles. They also scatter petals and offer both a soft drink (e.g. bottle of coke) and the local hooch known as posh.  The final act is the sacrifice of chickens which were being contained alive in black plastic bin liners.  As all this went on, music was playing and fireworks were going off outside. 

At Zinacantan we visited Antonio's House where a Mayan family have opened up their home to tourists.  You can see the various costumes they wear and of course visit the obligatory shop full of weavings.  HJ bought a lovely purple scarf so she can face the winter chills on returning home.  

In the kitchen granny was making tortillas from the four different coloured corn (black, white, yellow and red) which we were able to taste filled with cheese, black beans, guacamole and a rather piquant salsa.  

We also visited their church which was a far more catholic based affair without the crowds and with preparations aimed at forthcoming Easter festivities.

It was a long day and we felt quite exhausted at the end of it and not very hungry, nor did the bar beckon. We blamed the altitude.

Our final day in San Cristobal was spent on our own and we found the first frustration was the weird and varying opening and closing times of shops and attractions which did not coincide with our agenda. However, we persevered and RM got his hair cut, HJ phoned home, had an ice-cream and a massage to ease the aching legs.

To some extent this is the final chapter of our tour: we fly to Mexico City tomorrow for four nights (strictly speaking this is not in Central America) but we return, when we fly to Tulum for 13 nights on the beach (but with Mayan ruins within a stone's throw).  Next week starts the beginning of Holy Week which is a huge event over here: we are not quite sure what it means for us.  We think we will ether love it or hate it.