After checking out one last little surfing beach in Puerto Escondido, taking one last barf at surfer culture, I got packed and started driving for Oaxaca. My plan was to get lunch in Mazunte, drive through Zipalote, and then spend the night in San Jose del Pacifico. And that’s just what I did. At Zipalote I began the long climb in to the mountains as I felt the heat of the sun begin to subside on my back.
Puero Escondido
As I rode into the mountains I felt my heart lift. I could feel the humidity increase on my face, the temperature chilled my hands and nose, and my eyes absorbed the vibrant colors of the jungle, plants, and waterfalls everywhere. My nose screamed with joy at the fresh mountain air.
I was so happy to be in these little mountain towns again. I checked into a cabana at Cabanas Rancho Viejo that cost me 1100 pesos and went into town and got some Thai food which wasn’t too good. San Jose Pacifico is littered with mushroom murals on almost every building. It is known for it’s magic mushrooms during rainy season. Word is that they feed it to kids sometimes.
The cabana ended up being one of the coziest places I’ve ever stayed. As it got quite cold at night they put a huge fireplace in the middle of the room stocked with a lot of firewood. I spent the whole night reading to the glow of the fire with the flames baking my face snuggled under a blanket.
After recovering from my quinceñera hangover I booked a flight back to Puerto Escondido. I flew over, took a taxi to my hotel, and went to grab a coffee and wait for Sam, who was watching my motorcycle, to wake up.
Everything in Puerto Escondido is made for foreigners who are there for surf lessons so at the coffee shop I ordered, “the big wave” and an espresso. I soaked in the surfer vibes and got high on caffeine.
Sam messaged me eventually and I went to pick up the motorcycle and I picked up a bunch of Coronas for him. We popped open a couple coronas after noticing they were the tiny ones. I put the bike back together and we chatted a bunch. He is a super interesting dude from Switzerland that I would hear about again down the line.
Sam the man
After leaving Sam’s place I stopped by a welder where I would buy a fat steel washer and the guy welded it on for 100 pesos. The BEST $5 I have ever spent in my entire life. I was having so many issues with the kickstand sinking in and the bike falling everywhere I put it. Now I can essentially I was a little worried the added weight would pull it down while riding but I have had 0 issues with that.
Puerto Escondido would mark the last city on the Coast I would be at for a long while. I had followed coastlines one way or another all the way down to Puerto Escondido. It was one of the big reasons I had started the motorcycle trip to begin with. A ridiculous amount of people had recommended it to me over the years and it had floated high on my list of places to go.
I had initially thought I would pretty much just drive down and live there for a few months, and then drive back. But my trip was slower than I had anticipated, there were too many other places I liked on the way, and the looming end of my 6 month permit pushed me to go further. I also just did not love Puerto Escondido as much as I thought I would. This trip has made me abundantly aware that I love tropical mountain rivers a lot more than beaches. I find beaches to be pretty good places to read and drink an espresso and I always find myself wondering what the hell people do after that.
So from Puerto Escondido I would set my compass inland to the world of monkeys, warm streams, and enormous shady trees.
Finally got off work! I got off 4 days early for some reason(bad crew scheduling!). I originally booked a flight down to Puerto Escondido to get back to Burro but my friend Adrianna told me there was a Quinceñera in Guadalajara that she was going to for her cousin and I could join her and her family there. So I immediately asked for another flight and after a little bit of convincing they got it for me.
I arrived in Guadalajara and was offered a ride from the guy sitting next to me on the plane to downtown Centro. His name was Roberto and he was the nicest old dude and insisted that he would take me out for some local coffee in the morning the next day.
The plane landed and I walked through customs with Roberto, who’s sister was also on the plane. Roberto reunited with his wife and they drove me into town and dropped me off right in front of my airbnb. Roberto handed me a black card that said, “Abogado.”
I took a nap and then messaged Adrianna to meet up with her and her family downtown. I walked downtown, found them, and we went to Punto Mago which is a Harry Potter themed bar. It was super cool and they had Harry potter themed drinks like butterbeer, which was perfect because I was just finishing Harry Potter 4 in Spanish.
We finished out butterbeers and went our separate ways to prepare for the quinceñera the next night.
“science”
I ate breakfast with Roberto and his family at a very typical Mexican place and rested the day away waiting for the party. When they sent the text to come over I threw on my party shirt, jumped in an uber, and shot over.
When I arrived I felt pretty damn weird. I was worried I would feel like people were staring at me but in the end I really didn’t feel that way at all. The family was incredibly welcoming the entire time.
Partayyyyy
There was a full service bar at the party so I ordered a strong rum and coke to catch up with the rest of them. With rum and coke in hand I went around meeting some very friendly Mexican people. I enjoyed meeting the whole family and felt myself quickly slipping past tipsy.
I tried my hand at the most gringo salsa you’ve ever seen and was outdanced by every Mexican there. But we had a really good time and at one point they were trying to light some of those big puffy flying candle things but they just kept going up in flames instead and Adrianna and I ended up cracking up so hard that we both had to lie down in the grass in pain. We all stayed up till about 2 or 3 am singing karoake and finally decided to go to bed.
I woke up really early as it was bright and I slept on the floor of the living room. I swam in the pool and lounged around for hours before other people started waking up. Kevin made and shared some bomb chilaquiles and I had a pretty good time swimming and hanging out with the family members but I felt a little bit detached. Even though my Spanish is pretty good it’s still really hard to communicate and I didn’t have much in common with most of the people there. The older people would speak quietly and I just can’t understand them. A lot of the conversation is me saying, “que??”, “mande??”
Day after Quincenera vibes
The family requested I sing some English songs so I sang some karaoke in the middle of the day but then Adrianna was itching to leave. So we left around 7pm and invited Kevin to join us. We went to an area just outside of the city called Tlaquepaque that ended up being incredibly nice to walk around. We accompanied Kevin buying something different from each street vendor and ended up at a Mexican place with absurdly loud music with some dude doing sexy dances at presumably the “after hours” gay bar across the street.
Adrianna and Kevin sang along to the absurdly loud music and I danced along pretending to know the songs. We were all pretty tired so after exploring around for a bit I headed to my Airbnb and Adrianna and Kevin headed to their house.
Adrianna, Kevin, and me
All in all the quinceñera was an incredibly interesting experience. The most touching moment was the parents of the girl talking about her, as it is her coming of age party. In this day and age it is just a big birthday party with some quirks. They all buy dolls that are supposed to look like the quinceñera girl. It’s a bit creepy, but as are most traditions.
