In the end we got lazy and took the ‘main’ road from Teotitlan de Flores Magon to Oaxaca. This turned out to be a whole lot less main than we’d expected. I also rashly mentioned that it was largely downhill. This was based on looking at the contours of the first 50km or so, and turned out to be ever so slightly incorrect. I was reminded of this a number of times during the 40km climb from Dominguillo…

We made it out of Teotitlan de Flores Magon after lunch (there’s another Teotitlan near Oaxaca, hence my use of the full name to avoid confusing the pedants). The main square in Teotitlan gets very full at lunchtime with what seems to be all of the local school children. While lots run around and do small children things; the teenagers spend most of their time eating each other in an effort to out-do each other in a public kissing competition. Sarah and I are positive they would never have got that passionate in public at that age!

That night we snuck off the road in our usual well coordinated ‘you see us, and now you don’t’ manner. Our tent-site was a bit more sloping than I would have liked, but otherwise all seemed peaceful. That night however, it turned out to have mightily offended the resident horse who spent long periods huffing mightily, clopping away and back then repeating the process. Apologies were not accepted unfortunately.

That night and for a few beforehand we’ve noticed that life’s less cold, and getting going in shorts and t-shirt isn’t unknown now. During the day this means we’ve started dreaming of swimming holes again…

The final approach to Oaxaca was the sprawling urban concrete mess we least like about cities (and why we usually avoid them, now matter how pretty the centre is). The centre itself is worth the effort with loads of brightly painted colonial buildings. It also has other caucasian tourists. It’s quite a shock to us, having only met one or two other native english speakers in our 3 months in Mexico! It’s quite nice to be a bit more normal and less of an object of attention, though the people wandering round trying to sell us things we can’t carry are a bit wearing. I am now the proud owner of a small wooden spoon. As I’ve been using a moulded tuna can lid to eat off for the last 2 months or so, this is a bit of step up in the world.

Oaxaca is to be a rest spot and sorting point for us. We’ve managed to get some much needed bicycle parts to arrive, after some didn’t turn up in Durango. We’re still waiting for some more things to arrive, and will now have to work out time-filling activities until they get here.

Mapping a route to the coast will be one of these, and if there’s no sign of our stuff by next week, we’ll probably get some spanish classes here.