Day 24 - August 26th

The morning in Puebla brought a serious desire to leave the big city. After some quick sandwiches, we hit the road and headed south-east toward Oaxaca. We tried to find libres (non-toll highways), but somehow managed to get funneled onto the cuortas. No regrets though... The roads were twisty, scenic, mountainous, and great to drive. We began driving like the locals do, by passing semi trucks on two lane highways on blind corners at 130 km/h with busses coming straight at us. Not to worry - they'll move for us. We hope. This highway was in the top 4 roads we had ridden on the trip so far. We needed a good day with some fun riding and good weather.

With our spirits restored, we stopped at the side of the road for some mystery meat tacos. Again, incredible food and incredible value. Happy and full, we carried on to Oaxaca. We pulled into town and were already stoked on the place. It seemed small and low-key, yet still exciting and bumpin. We found a hotel pretty quickly that had secure motorcycle parking and affordable rates. It was just outside of Oaxaca Centro, which meant the historic and exciting area was within walking distance.

After moving into the room, we went for a wander to find some cervezas. We found a fancier restaurant right in the centro which served a "mole taste tester" with 4 different kinds of moles. Still not too sure what mole is. After supper we wandered the square and found a great deal on more cervezas. From the patio we watched a political march and rally and tried to figure out what was going on. It seemed pretty intense from afar, but when we got close up it was actually super tame. Headed back to the hotel to grab some laundry and more pesos, and the lady at the lavanderia insisted on delivering the clean clothes to our hotel that night. Sure thing lady!

Wandering towards the centro again, we met Leo the police officer. He let us take photos with the riot shields, then told us how he could get us anything we wanted. "You guys want good drinks? Beer? Mezcal (The Oaxaca version of tequila)? How about girls? You want girls?" We politely declined and were on our way.

The old buildings and architecture in the town was also amazing. We looked around a couple churches and other old buildings. They were super neat! Our feet then took us to a super divey restaurant with super friendly workers. We told them we only wanted a cerveza or two, but they insisted on bringing us these weird deep fried things and nachos. They had a rad guestbook with signatures from people all over the world and various different types of money. After we had paid and were on our way out, the owner insisted we try some Mezcal - free of charge. We couldn't say no! The drinks were really smooth and quite tasty.

Next we went to a weird nightclub kind of place. It had flashing lights, music, and tables... The waiter screwed us out of 40 pesos by pretending that everything was on special, when in fact it was only a certain type of beer... Greasy move. No tip for him. We met a couple of Aussies named Jack and Fuschia who were also travelling Latin America. Jack had been exploring since last December, and Fuschia started in June. After trading stories for an hour or two, we went home and called it a night.