2013, Day 311 - Humping hoppers

We had a sleep in day this morning which means we didn't get out of bed until seven thirty!  I guess we're on our schedule and it is hard to break the habit of getting up early.  Today we're traveling from Teotihuacan to Cuernavaca to be closer to the ruins at Xochicalco which we are visiting tomorrow.  So we took our time and when a knock came at the door we didn't know what to expect.  As it happens the proprietor of our hotel was coming to tell us that she was making us a complimentary breakfast.  That meant getting out of bed and putting getting dressed; food is a great motivator.

She fed us well, huevos Mexicana with fresh baked bread, a side of beans, fresh squeezed orange juice, and a massive pitcher of coffee.  It was more food that I could eat although my traveling companions decided to make me look bad by cleaning their plates.  I just have to remember, it's not a competition.

After breakfast we continued to kill time as we couldn't check in to our next hotel until three o'clock.  Bored, I asked Francene if she wanted to look for spiders in the vacant lot next door.  Araceli opted not to join us, she doesn't like creepy crawlies I guess.  There were a number of huge spider which we later discovered were cannibalizing each other and we found a number of butterflies, some more grasshoppers, a couple scary looking wasps, and a caterpillar.  The grasshoppers were still mostly interested in mating which meant they were big and fat and not especially concerned with us as much as finding a partner.  It was a lot of fun but we did tell Araceli we would be right back so after a little while we returned to our hotel and finished our packing.

Burdened with our luggage we set out from our hotel by cab to the closed bus terminal.  There we caught a bus to Mexico City and we made a connection to another bus line on to Cuernavaca.  Had we our own car and no traffic it would have taken about an hour and forty minutes but instead it took about three and a half hours.  Oh well, we got in about as early as we could check in anyway.

Our new hotel is very fancy where the last was quite basic.  We're in the midst of everything which we discovered when we dropped off our bags and went in search of dinner.  Apparently there are all kinds of bars right outside our door and some were already packed at five o'clock.  We skipped all these and found a nice place across the street from the central plaza.  While we ate we watched vendors setting up booths and by the time dinner was over the park was getting crowded.

Ever curious we first wandered past the graduation photos and on through a little market.  Nothing there caught our fancy so we kept walking on to the plaza.  It was obviously an event for the locals, they were setting up a stage at one end where eventually the ballet folklorico dancers would perform, and there were tons of food and snack vendors.  We made the rounds, found a bunch of mariachi groups, none performing, and when we looped around the dancing had started.  It was a very energetic performance and we stayed for about half an hour before returning to the hotel.

On the way we stopped for ice cream, tonight I had pineapple with chile.  It was spicy, sweet, and refreshing!  We arrived back at our luxurious hotel for the night and got cleaned up.  Tomorrow it is on to Xochicalco for more ruins!

Canon 1D X, Canon 100/f2.8L IS
100mm, f4, 1/500 sec @ 100 ISO