Sun 1832 In room with bt keyboard.
Things are sort of coming together but I also feel a tiny bit edgy. Maybe writing about it will help, so let me do this before writing up the day proper.
I was having a coffee (two actually) at the deserted yet again Cafe Bar Central this afternoon and feeling reasonably meditative and "well, not doing much, but this is quite a nice way to not be doing much". No idea how the place can stay open, it didn't iirc look busy last night either and I was the only custome there yesterday despite it being weekend both days and square quite busy. Anyway. I was mentally totting up how much cash I have and how much I might need for rest of trip. Very rough estimate is I might need 8000 pesos for rest of trip and I maybe have about 3k, so doing another withdrawal of my usual 7k is not too unreasonable.
I went back to hotel and started poking at online accom, the guide book and a web site I found recommending staying overnight at El Chiflon. If I didn't already say the basic plan here is to visit Tenam Puente tomorrow, stay at this hotel again tomorrow night and then on Tuesday go over to El Chiflon early and either spend the day there then come back to Comitan for the night or stay over at EC. Either way I would have the option to extend further in EC or Comitan but I would probably go back to San Cris and the hostel there on Wednesday during the day unless something particularly attractive comes up.
I did see on the web that it would probably be 700 a night for a cabin at EC but I WAed them anyway and long story short I have reserved for Tuesday. Only while going out for a little walk before deciding what to do about hotel for tomorrow night did I realise I'd played myself a bit - I had been mentally comparing that 700 with the 500ish I have been paying here for *two* nights, so rather than being "a bit more" it is "double, and then a bit more" as it is 700 for one night. But it is OK, it might be nice and it might allow me to be a bit more relaxed at EC and it just may help with the bloody swimming angle (although the website I saw says it is cold, so I can't imagine being in that long) - you know, the "no lockers but I have my phone with me so what if my bag gets stolen while I am in the water and how would I get back home if my bag was stolen" aspect. If I have localish accom I can potentially have the P7 with me when I am hiking for good photos and go back to accom and swap over to the O6 or no phone at all for swimming, and if my bag gets stolen I am only a km or two's walk from my accom without any clothes except soaking swimming trunks or money rather than a colectivo ride away etc etc.
I do I think broadly have time to extend for a second night at EC - one night is never super relaxed, but I can apparently check in from 8am and I do hope to get over there super early and I might sort of have the morning of the following day too (although if I am going over to San Cris that same day I have maybe 3-4h of buses to take and would like to be at SC hostel before dark despite semi feeling SC is OK after dark). At 700 a night I am less likely to extend for a second night (obviously there may not be availability but it is low season and it is expensiveish so I rather suspect I could get a cabin for wed night if I want) but you never know - that is about £28 which is expensive but tolerable for a night or two and if it is nice it would be silly to spoil the fun for the sake of that amount of money.
So while I went for my little walk maybe 1730-1800 ish I thought I might try to withdraw some cash. I am trying my Chase card here. I tried HSBC, Banco Azteca (a cash machine in a motorbike shop!) and BBVA (thinking they might not suck with Chase, as they do with Starling) and was offered fees of something like 94, 130 and 194. I literally LOLed at BBVA's insultingly high fee right there in the cash machine lobby. I checked my notes and Santander+Chase only charge 34, OM has a Santander machine where the Banco Azteca is but also shows a Santander out on the main highway and I just may go over there tomorrow if I have time, I figured it wasn't smart to be heading out there (1.6ish km straight line each way) as it was getting towards dark with no real pressing need for cash right now. If I can't get a Santander machine I will go with HSBC, their fee is shit but not awful.
When I got back just now I checked the price for a room here on booking.com and it is about 255. I spoke to the actually quite nice bloke on reception (the same one who checked me in) and asked about this and he said that their list price is 280 (it shows on the wall) but the best he could do was 250. He acted as though booking.com (I showed him my phone while badly asking in Spanish if he could beat that price) was cheaper, perhaps cos he was only seeing the before-tax price. But anyway it was all amicable and I checked with him and I can just book on booking.com and keep my room and I don't need to go to reception to discuss it, so I will probably do that but I am writing this up first. There are AFAICS no bad reviews about fuckery with extensions and charging extra on checkout on booking.com so maybe it was another hotel that had those. But anyway, I figure I will go with booking.com because it is only about 5 pesos more expensive and I will be able to pay on credit card (that is how it is set up for this hotel, often you book and then pay cash on arrival for hostels) which will reduce demands on my cash (and I already paid on card once so privacy impact is negligible) and also give me a no-quibble guarantee in the sense they cannot deny I have paid, and if (as has sometimes happened with extension bookings via booking.com) they claim I am a no show it shouldn't matter given I paid the full price up front anyway.
Oh, at the start of the cash machine walk I went to where OM/the guide book say you can get colectivos to EC and Tenam Puente and I found the relevant mini terminals just fine, so that sets me up hopefully for an easy early departure tomorrow and Tuesday.
I am not planning a big evening out but since it is a weekend and it is a bit dull sitting in room on own I do plan to go out for a bit of a stroll round the main square (it is literally a block away) after dark.
I got some weird colourful biscuit things (10 each) at a stall in nearby street on way back from that walk and also broke a 500 and got a bottle of cold sparkling water at Oxxo as I did last night too. (There is supposedly free drinking water here but I didn't see any in reception, I should maybe ask next time I pass through, but I have been using my lifestraw and it is nice to buy a bit of fizzy water etc.) The biscuits - have only had one so far, might have the other now, seem to be coloured but probably arbitrarily so and are probably mainly sugar and coconut.
I saw earlier that at Famacias Similares you can pay 60 (75 on weekends) for a medical consultation, and the procedures seem to cost double to low triple digit prices - the only one I specifically remember is "removal of a whole nail" (!) for 220 or so.
I didn't sleep great but not too bad. Dithered around at hotel in the morning a bit stupidly and probably didn't head out til getting on for 11. I went and wandered round a bit and found a bakery and got a couple of pastry/cake things (one of which was a very nice and probably very sugary horn of plenty looking thing stuffed full of a white sweet creamy stuff, the other probably a concha) for 28 and also separately got a 600ml bottle of Pepsi Black for only 16 in an Oxxo. I went to museo Belisario Dominguez which was quite cool but it seems museum here shut by about 2 on Sunday because I was in the final room and without a word being spoken I heard and then saw a woman going round shutting the doors to all the rooms round the courtyard and basically shuffled myself out (she locked the door I had come out of behind me), which was a bit annoying although I had nearly finished and it was only 20 to get in, and I was still grateful for the event there last night.
I then went and had lunch at a cheap but cheerful chinese place called Golden Express which I had found during my bakery seeking peregrination earlier, got a big plate piled up with noodles, ribs, chicken in sauce and a spring roll plus a probably full fat coke for 150. Yes yes it isn't authentic but sod it. The other customers were all Mexicans so it is kind of local. :-)
I was then going to go to the Museo Hermilia Dominguez but unsurprisingly it was shut. Not a huge loss but a bit annoying as it does mean I haven't done much today, but I did wander round and quietly enjoy myself on the whole and I have sorted out the next couple of days and kind of relaxed so I can't really complain. So at this point it was maybe 4ish but not sure and I went for that coffe at Central and that's what I have already written up.
The clothes I washed yesterday are mostly dry (uw always takes longer but it is not too bad) and since I am 95% certainly extending for tomorrow night I may do another wash now and book the extension and then go out for a wander and try to get to bed early-ish so I can be up maybe 7ish and get the first 730ish colectivo to Tenam Puente.
TP and EC is not the extent of everything you can do locally, but I don't generally think it's possible or desirable to completely do everything. Even without the worries about some stuff which is right on the border and thus advised against all but essential travel, it is good to leave some stuff for a future visit, and you just can't see everything in the world so it is silly to fret about not doing everything there is to do here, as doing that would mean I don't do something else etc etc.
I think if I can do TP tomorrow and then EC the day after (and just possibly two days depending how nice it is ec) I will feel I've had a solid visit to Comitan and environs without rushing around like crazy. Yes tomorrow and Tuesday will both involve buses, but just local colectivo services, not major journeys like Oaxaca to here.
1905 OK, I am not doing the laundry just now. I could, but it probably makes more sense to do that after I come back from a little walk, then I can shower and wash the clothes I just took off (the only dirty ones I have right now) and go straight to bed, rather than putting on a fresh set of clothes just to go for my little walk.
1. I am feeling some vague "time is ticking away" pressure but it is on the whole OK I think. As I say I feel like while sort of wasteful I had a kind of slow travel mildly pleasant wander round Comitan for the second-ish day today - oh, the weather today was pretty sunny and borderline too hot except in the shade, it feels pretty much like I remember San Cris being which would make sense given then altitudes are the same and they are something like 60ish km apart - and I have some not excessively demanding touristing lined up for the next two days with a probable option to extend in EC for an extra night if I want, then hopefully back to the hostel in SC (which I hope won't be disappointing) for a few nights before starting to worry about getting back to Cancun. In some sense I would rather get back to SC on Thu than Wed given both the town and hostel activities I am most interested in are more Thu-Sun than Wed (not saying I will stay til Sun tho) but if I have "finished" with Comitan and environs for this trip on Wednesday then so be it. I am trying to keep my expecations of SC hostel contained, it wasn't outstandingly fantastic in general but it was reasonably social and there is a chance it could be fun depending on what new guests etc happen to be there. I think the main thing I would like to do is the quiz (probably Friday night, but it did move to Thursday one week I was there IIRC) and I may pay for a second fucking attempt at Sumidero tour while I am there which will profitably fill one of the days. I could well see myself leaving Sat-ish in order not to feel too rushed for the remainder of the trip depending on how fun it is and what is happening and what the situation looks like wrt getting flights vs buses back towards Cancun and so on.
I sort of digressed. I guess the point is that more-or-less I am "doing" Comitan and environs in a relative relaxed and not too stressed out way, much as I probably would if I still had (say) 2 months of my trip left rather than 2-and-a-bit weeks. As time goes on there is inevitably going to be more (and reasonably justified) "really got to keep moving on, I don't have time to spend an extra day here" stuff but at the moment I think I am successfully avoiding it without unintentionally storing up unnecessary pain for later in the trip.
I ought to go book this hotel for tomorrow, then that is sorted. especially given the reassuring conversation with the guy at reception there is really no reason not to book, even if I were going to do EC as a day trip from here instead of staying over it would still be desirable to have a booking here for tomorrow night given my plan to go to TP tomorrow. (There maybe some rain next couple of days but it can't be helped and shouldn't be too intense. I may take my jacket with me tomorrow but probably not my overtrousers.)
I hope to treat TP like Monte Alban and Mitla - go round the site at my own pace and not rush off (and barring the pseudo need to withdraw money when I get back to Comitan tomorrow afternoon I don't have any pressing demands on my time for the rest of the day) but also not absolutely milk it and make myself miserable and feel I "ought" to spend hours there just because I can and don't have anything else to do etc etc.
1928 OK, just booked hotel for tomorrow night and also finished the chapulines which had been in a plastic bag in my knee pocket since I bought them and had been eating a few a day. Made an effort to get all the little bits out of the bottom of bag so as not to waste any, didn't get absolutely everything but most of it.
1932 just popped over to reception a) to casually mentioned I booked for tomorrow night, guy was fine about it and I probably didn't need to tell him but now I have b) to ask about drinking water and they do have a water bottle in there on a dispenser and he let me half fill my admittedly large disposable bottle which felt a tiny bit restrictive but also sort of makes limited sense and isn't a big deal and I can get more (in a smaller bottle) tomorrow if I want and I have my filter anyway.
I have put my waterproof jacket in daypack ready for tomorrow, mildly annoying but it isn't that heavy and there is no point lugging these things round in my main bag if I don't use them when potential need arises.
I will probably drink a bit more of my cold sparkling water and go out for a bit of a wander just round main square. Won't probably be as extensive in distance or time as last night and given it was feeling chilly just before dark I am unlikely to stay out for a beer (plus it would be nice to have a day off alcohol, not that I have drunk much lately but there has been something most days) but I just might have a coffee or two etc.
Feel a tiny bit stressed about getting up early tomorrow but if I make an effort I will be pleased with myself etc and it would be good to be at TP as early as possible to help beat the heat.
I understand there are two "sides" at EC and I suppose it is possible I will consider putting in Wed night staying at a cabin on the other side, but we will see how thing look when I get there and I think it would probably be OK to only do the one side at least this time. But if it is nice and not causing of rushing or insanely expensive etc I do have time to do both.
2045 OK, I went out for a little wander maybe 8ish. (It isn't on the blog of course, but in the unlikely event Future Me is curious about details like this, the GPS tracks I record while I'm away should give a lot more detail on exactly where I when and when.)
That reminds me, this morning the first thing I did on leaving hotel was to go to Iglesia de San Caralampio and surroundings, which are v near hotel and which guide book makes out are in one of the very different barrios of the town. I couldn't see much obvious difference and the guide book mentions no other barrios so fuck knows. I have wandered round a moderate bit of the town, including the lengthyish walk from OCC terminal into centre. There was a mostly non-operational fair and market set up round the church (I did poke my head in but not sure if took a photo given it was Sunday and people were maybe in there for service or something) and I bought some probably overpriced and not that great but also still kind of nice french fries for 40 (which came with a few bits of frankfurterish processed meat sausage).
Anyway, back to tonight, I was oddly cheered to see that a little fake train I had spotted at the side of the square earlier today and which I had taken as a stationary children's plaything was in fact driving round the square with kids on it and their parents following round at walking pace.
There were quite a lot of people about, CB Central seemed empty or nearly so and I was tempted to get a coffee but didn't. I wandered round the square once or twice and then saw people with polystyrene cups at some of the food stalls set up and I was going to ask if they had coffe but as I was waiting around not sure if there was a queue etc I saw they were actually serving some kind of soup (they had multiple thermos type "big flask cylinders" so may have had coffee too for all I know) and when I did get served I asked what it was but didn't catch much except the word "galleta" (which I momentarily mistook as "gallina") but it was only 15 so I got some and it was actually quite a nice sweetish biscuity (power of suggestion? I suspect it really did taste like that) thickish drink. I wandered round the square drinking that and followed the train round a bit and then - not wanting to milk it - I finished the drink and came back to the hotel.
I keep talking about milking it but I do think this is kind of important. Yes it is important not to rush off when you're doing something fun or memorable (even if in a low key kind of way) when you have nothing more to do than maybe a bit of laundry or shaving or going to bed or watching a YT video back at your accommodation, but it is also important not to drag things out and say "FFS, I have to soak in every possible moment of this, I am getting a bit bored and maybe the magic is fading but I had better keep walking round or sit here for another half hour or hour or whatever all the same". That risks turning a nice memory into something a little bit crappy and so on.
They also had tamales at this stall - other people asked and I saw them - as well as other things, they appearently only had tamales of "raja" (no idea how that is spelt) and I had no idea what that was and the not great dictionary app on my phone doesn't clarify even if I am spelling it right, and I also thought I'd stick with trying the soup instead. I may well go for another wander round the square tomorrow (probably my last night here) and may eat something else eg a tamal. This stall was pretty busy so I figure it passes the test for "safe" street food. (I maybe took a chance with the french fries this morning, and perhaps with the coconut sweet things although with the latter I figure it's cold food and a sweet so somehow - not sure if this is rational or not - it feels less likely to be prone to having whatever causes food poisoning.)
I did briefly experiment this afternoon seeing if I could plug my USB backup memory stick (which has some DVD rips on it which I delete as necessary to fill up space) into the room TV to in theory watch a film on, but although I managed to get the stick into a socket on the back (the TV is high on the wall and tightish against it and even using phone camera I am far from sure there was actually a USB port) I couldn't persuade the TV to show the contents of a USB stick, there may simply be no USB support. Not a big deal but I thought I'd note this wrt a possible benefit of having a few favourite films on a DVD to maybe watch on a TV instead of on phone.
2058 Let me clean my teeth and shower and shave and maybe do some laundry. I may watch a bit of YT afterwards depending how early it is and how I feel.
2135 OK, had shower and shave and somewhat inefficient laundry, since I am doing just one set of uw and one top and as I like to wash uw and non uw separately that is two separate washes for just one full set - it is more efficient to do two or three sets of uw together one night and two or three tops another night, but since I am using destroyer tactics here and trying to take advantage of having private bathroom plus a day of drying time it can't be helped.
FWIW - not sure if it is just a bit "not so rubbery" or it is generally not that useful - I never seem to find my universal sink stopper handy for laundry in sinks, I think I always end up using a sock to plug the hole. I am hanging the clothes up on a rail in a wardrobe-ish alcove (with a couple of hangers for tops) and aren't using my travel clothes line and haven't the whole trip. I should maybe stop carrying it round, although as always maybe if I more regularly had private bathrooms it would get more use.
If I didn't already say I saw a sign for "Xoo Yaguar" (or maybe "Yaguar Xoo" but probably not) on drive back from Mitla and something about these words and their spelling and conjuction tickled me. The Australian woman (I don't believe I ever knew her name BTW) at the language exchange that night told me "Xoo" is a local language and isn't derived from English "zoo" and it means something more like "refuge", but it still tickled me. This place sounds like a "rescate los pumas" deal and it might have been cool to go, but something for another time given the time constraints I was under.
It is not that late even for a 7am getting up so I think I will watch a bit of YT before bed. I don't think there is anything else I need to do - oh yes, except for FUCKING DUOLINGO, which I will do in a second - so I will probably send this before I start watching YT and if anything really important happens I will just start a fresh entry.
I really need to reconsider Duolingo when I get back home, I am far from sure I am really learning anything and it is maddening as hell without a real physical keyboard (and in landscape mode as I tried last night since I did have the BT keyboard out, a) sod's law dictated I got no free typing exercises anyway for once b) the interface doesn't fit on the screen without scrollig so it is annoying as hell in a different way) and I have this nasty feeling of being played by the stupid compulsion to keep the streak going even though I have enough gems to just keep buying streak freezes for months if not years if I wanted so the streak is kind of meaningless.
Things are sort of coming together but I also feel a tiny bit edgy. Maybe writing about it will help, so let me do this before writing up the day proper.
I was having a coffee (two actually) at the deserted yet again Cafe Bar Central this afternoon and feeling reasonably meditative and "well, not doing much, but this is quite a nice way to not be doing much". No idea how the place can stay open, it didn't iirc look busy last night either and I was the only custome there yesterday despite it being weekend both days and square quite busy. Anyway. I was mentally totting up how much cash I have and how much I might need for rest of trip. Very rough estimate is I might need 8000 pesos for rest of trip and I maybe have about 3k, so doing another withdrawal of my usual 7k is not too unreasonable.
I went back to hotel and started poking at online accom, the guide book and a web site I found recommending staying overnight at El Chiflon. If I didn't already say the basic plan here is to visit Tenam Puente tomorrow, stay at this hotel again tomorrow night and then on Tuesday go over to El Chiflon early and either spend the day there then come back to Comitan for the night or stay over at EC. Either way I would have the option to extend further in EC or Comitan but I would probably go back to San Cris and the hostel there on Wednesday during the day unless something particularly attractive comes up.
I did see on the web that it would probably be 700 a night for a cabin at EC but I WAed them anyway and long story short I have reserved for Tuesday. Only while going out for a little walk before deciding what to do about hotel for tomorrow night did I realise I'd played myself a bit - I had been mentally comparing that 700 with the 500ish I have been paying here for *two* nights, so rather than being "a bit more" it is "double, and then a bit more" as it is 700 for one night. But it is OK, it might be nice and it might allow me to be a bit more relaxed at EC and it just may help with the bloody swimming angle (although the website I saw says it is cold, so I can't imagine being in that long) - you know, the "no lockers but I have my phone with me so what if my bag gets stolen while I am in the water and how would I get back home if my bag was stolen" aspect. If I have localish accom I can potentially have the P7 with me when I am hiking for good photos and go back to accom and swap over to the O6 or no phone at all for swimming, and if my bag gets stolen I am only a km or two's walk from my accom without any clothes except soaking swimming trunks or money rather than a colectivo ride away etc etc.
I do I think broadly have time to extend for a second night at EC - one night is never super relaxed, but I can apparently check in from 8am and I do hope to get over there super early and I might sort of have the morning of the following day too (although if I am going over to San Cris that same day I have maybe 3-4h of buses to take and would like to be at SC hostel before dark despite semi feeling SC is OK after dark). At 700 a night I am less likely to extend for a second night (obviously there may not be availability but it is low season and it is expensiveish so I rather suspect I could get a cabin for wed night if I want) but you never know - that is about £28 which is expensive but tolerable for a night or two and if it is nice it would be silly to spoil the fun for the sake of that amount of money.
So while I went for my little walk maybe 1730-1800 ish I thought I might try to withdraw some cash. I am trying my Chase card here. I tried HSBC, Banco Azteca (a cash machine in a motorbike shop!) and BBVA (thinking they might not suck with Chase, as they do with Starling) and was offered fees of something like 94, 130 and 194. I literally LOLed at BBVA's insultingly high fee right there in the cash machine lobby. I checked my notes and Santander+Chase only charge 34, OM has a Santander machine where the Banco Azteca is but also shows a Santander out on the main highway and I just may go over there tomorrow if I have time, I figured it wasn't smart to be heading out there (1.6ish km straight line each way) as it was getting towards dark with no real pressing need for cash right now. If I can't get a Santander machine I will go with HSBC, their fee is shit but not awful.
When I got back just now I checked the price for a room here on booking.com and it is about 255. I spoke to the actually quite nice bloke on reception (the same one who checked me in) and asked about this and he said that their list price is 280 (it shows on the wall) but the best he could do was 250. He acted as though booking.com (I showed him my phone while badly asking in Spanish if he could beat that price) was cheaper, perhaps cos he was only seeing the before-tax price. But anyway it was all amicable and I checked with him and I can just book on booking.com and keep my room and I don't need to go to reception to discuss it, so I will probably do that but I am writing this up first. There are AFAICS no bad reviews about fuckery with extensions and charging extra on checkout on booking.com so maybe it was another hotel that had those. But anyway, I figure I will go with booking.com because it is only about 5 pesos more expensive and I will be able to pay on credit card (that is how it is set up for this hotel, often you book and then pay cash on arrival for hostels) which will reduce demands on my cash (and I already paid on card once so privacy impact is negligible) and also give me a no-quibble guarantee in the sense they cannot deny I have paid, and if (as has sometimes happened with extension bookings via booking.com) they claim I am a no show it shouldn't matter given I paid the full price up front anyway.
Oh, at the start of the cash machine walk I went to where OM/the guide book say you can get colectivos to EC and Tenam Puente and I found the relevant mini terminals just fine, so that sets me up hopefully for an easy early departure tomorrow and Tuesday.
I am not planning a big evening out but since it is a weekend and it is a bit dull sitting in room on own I do plan to go out for a bit of a stroll round the main square (it is literally a block away) after dark.
I got some weird colourful biscuit things (10 each) at a stall in nearby street on way back from that walk and also broke a 500 and got a bottle of cold sparkling water at Oxxo as I did last night too. (There is supposedly free drinking water here but I didn't see any in reception, I should maybe ask next time I pass through, but I have been using my lifestraw and it is nice to buy a bit of fizzy water etc.) The biscuits - have only had one so far, might have the other now, seem to be coloured but probably arbitrarily so and are probably mainly sugar and coconut.
I saw earlier that at Famacias Similares you can pay 60 (75 on weekends) for a medical consultation, and the procedures seem to cost double to low triple digit prices - the only one I specifically remember is "removal of a whole nail" (!) for 220 or so.
I didn't sleep great but not too bad. Dithered around at hotel in the morning a bit stupidly and probably didn't head out til getting on for 11. I went and wandered round a bit and found a bakery and got a couple of pastry/cake things (one of which was a very nice and probably very sugary horn of plenty looking thing stuffed full of a white sweet creamy stuff, the other probably a concha) for 28 and also separately got a 600ml bottle of Pepsi Black for only 16 in an Oxxo. I went to museo Belisario Dominguez which was quite cool but it seems museum here shut by about 2 on Sunday because I was in the final room and without a word being spoken I heard and then saw a woman going round shutting the doors to all the rooms round the courtyard and basically shuffled myself out (she locked the door I had come out of behind me), which was a bit annoying although I had nearly finished and it was only 20 to get in, and I was still grateful for the event there last night.
I then went and had lunch at a cheap but cheerful chinese place called Golden Express which I had found during my bakery seeking peregrination earlier, got a big plate piled up with noodles, ribs, chicken in sauce and a spring roll plus a probably full fat coke for 150. Yes yes it isn't authentic but sod it. The other customers were all Mexicans so it is kind of local. :-)
I was then going to go to the Museo Hermilia Dominguez but unsurprisingly it was shut. Not a huge loss but a bit annoying as it does mean I haven't done much today, but I did wander round and quietly enjoy myself on the whole and I have sorted out the next couple of days and kind of relaxed so I can't really complain. So at this point it was maybe 4ish but not sure and I went for that coffe at Central and that's what I have already written up.
The clothes I washed yesterday are mostly dry (uw always takes longer but it is not too bad) and since I am 95% certainly extending for tomorrow night I may do another wash now and book the extension and then go out for a wander and try to get to bed early-ish so I can be up maybe 7ish and get the first 730ish colectivo to Tenam Puente.
TP and EC is not the extent of everything you can do locally, but I don't generally think it's possible or desirable to completely do everything. Even without the worries about some stuff which is right on the border and thus advised against all but essential travel, it is good to leave some stuff for a future visit, and you just can't see everything in the world so it is silly to fret about not doing everything there is to do here, as doing that would mean I don't do something else etc etc.
I think if I can do TP tomorrow and then EC the day after (and just possibly two days depending how nice it is ec) I will feel I've had a solid visit to Comitan and environs without rushing around like crazy. Yes tomorrow and Tuesday will both involve buses, but just local colectivo services, not major journeys like Oaxaca to here.
1905 OK, I am not doing the laundry just now. I could, but it probably makes more sense to do that after I come back from a little walk, then I can shower and wash the clothes I just took off (the only dirty ones I have right now) and go straight to bed, rather than putting on a fresh set of clothes just to go for my little walk.
1. I am feeling some vague "time is ticking away" pressure but it is on the whole OK I think. As I say I feel like while sort of wasteful I had a kind of slow travel mildly pleasant wander round Comitan for the second-ish day today - oh, the weather today was pretty sunny and borderline too hot except in the shade, it feels pretty much like I remember San Cris being which would make sense given then altitudes are the same and they are something like 60ish km apart - and I have some not excessively demanding touristing lined up for the next two days with a probable option to extend in EC for an extra night if I want, then hopefully back to the hostel in SC (which I hope won't be disappointing) for a few nights before starting to worry about getting back to Cancun. In some sense I would rather get back to SC on Thu than Wed given both the town and hostel activities I am most interested in are more Thu-Sun than Wed (not saying I will stay til Sun tho) but if I have "finished" with Comitan and environs for this trip on Wednesday then so be it. I am trying to keep my expecations of SC hostel contained, it wasn't outstandingly fantastic in general but it was reasonably social and there is a chance it could be fun depending on what new guests etc happen to be there. I think the main thing I would like to do is the quiz (probably Friday night, but it did move to Thursday one week I was there IIRC) and I may pay for a second fucking attempt at Sumidero tour while I am there which will profitably fill one of the days. I could well see myself leaving Sat-ish in order not to feel too rushed for the remainder of the trip depending on how fun it is and what is happening and what the situation looks like wrt getting flights vs buses back towards Cancun and so on.
I sort of digressed. I guess the point is that more-or-less I am "doing" Comitan and environs in a relative relaxed and not too stressed out way, much as I probably would if I still had (say) 2 months of my trip left rather than 2-and-a-bit weeks. As time goes on there is inevitably going to be more (and reasonably justified) "really got to keep moving on, I don't have time to spend an extra day here" stuff but at the moment I think I am successfully avoiding it without unintentionally storing up unnecessary pain for later in the trip.
I ought to go book this hotel for tomorrow, then that is sorted. especially given the reassuring conversation with the guy at reception there is really no reason not to book, even if I were going to do EC as a day trip from here instead of staying over it would still be desirable to have a booking here for tomorrow night given my plan to go to TP tomorrow. (There maybe some rain next couple of days but it can't be helped and shouldn't be too intense. I may take my jacket with me tomorrow but probably not my overtrousers.)
I hope to treat TP like Monte Alban and Mitla - go round the site at my own pace and not rush off (and barring the pseudo need to withdraw money when I get back to Comitan tomorrow afternoon I don't have any pressing demands on my time for the rest of the day) but also not absolutely milk it and make myself miserable and feel I "ought" to spend hours there just because I can and don't have anything else to do etc etc.
1928 OK, just booked hotel for tomorrow night and also finished the chapulines which had been in a plastic bag in my knee pocket since I bought them and had been eating a few a day. Made an effort to get all the little bits out of the bottom of bag so as not to waste any, didn't get absolutely everything but most of it.
1932 just popped over to reception a) to casually mentioned I booked for tomorrow night, guy was fine about it and I probably didn't need to tell him but now I have b) to ask about drinking water and they do have a water bottle in there on a dispenser and he let me half fill my admittedly large disposable bottle which felt a tiny bit restrictive but also sort of makes limited sense and isn't a big deal and I can get more (in a smaller bottle) tomorrow if I want and I have my filter anyway.
I have put my waterproof jacket in daypack ready for tomorrow, mildly annoying but it isn't that heavy and there is no point lugging these things round in my main bag if I don't use them when potential need arises.
I will probably drink a bit more of my cold sparkling water and go out for a bit of a wander just round main square. Won't probably be as extensive in distance or time as last night and given it was feeling chilly just before dark I am unlikely to stay out for a beer (plus it would be nice to have a day off alcohol, not that I have drunk much lately but there has been something most days) but I just might have a coffee or two etc.
Feel a tiny bit stressed about getting up early tomorrow but if I make an effort I will be pleased with myself etc and it would be good to be at TP as early as possible to help beat the heat.
I understand there are two "sides" at EC and I suppose it is possible I will consider putting in Wed night staying at a cabin on the other side, but we will see how thing look when I get there and I think it would probably be OK to only do the one side at least this time. But if it is nice and not causing of rushing or insanely expensive etc I do have time to do both.
2045 OK, I went out for a little wander maybe 8ish. (It isn't on the blog of course, but in the unlikely event Future Me is curious about details like this, the GPS tracks I record while I'm away should give a lot more detail on exactly where I when and when.)
That reminds me, this morning the first thing I did on leaving hotel was to go to Iglesia de San Caralampio and surroundings, which are v near hotel and which guide book makes out are in one of the very different barrios of the town. I couldn't see much obvious difference and the guide book mentions no other barrios so fuck knows. I have wandered round a moderate bit of the town, including the lengthyish walk from OCC terminal into centre. There was a mostly non-operational fair and market set up round the church (I did poke my head in but not sure if took a photo given it was Sunday and people were maybe in there for service or something) and I bought some probably overpriced and not that great but also still kind of nice french fries for 40 (which came with a few bits of frankfurterish processed meat sausage).
Anyway, back to tonight, I was oddly cheered to see that a little fake train I had spotted at the side of the square earlier today and which I had taken as a stationary children's plaything was in fact driving round the square with kids on it and their parents following round at walking pace.
There were quite a lot of people about, CB Central seemed empty or nearly so and I was tempted to get a coffee but didn't. I wandered round the square once or twice and then saw people with polystyrene cups at some of the food stalls set up and I was going to ask if they had coffe but as I was waiting around not sure if there was a queue etc I saw they were actually serving some kind of soup (they had multiple thermos type "big flask cylinders" so may have had coffee too for all I know) and when I did get served I asked what it was but didn't catch much except the word "galleta" (which I momentarily mistook as "gallina") but it was only 15 so I got some and it was actually quite a nice sweetish biscuity (power of suggestion? I suspect it really did taste like that) thickish drink. I wandered round the square drinking that and followed the train round a bit and then - not wanting to milk it - I finished the drink and came back to the hotel.
I keep talking about milking it but I do think this is kind of important. Yes it is important not to rush off when you're doing something fun or memorable (even if in a low key kind of way) when you have nothing more to do than maybe a bit of laundry or shaving or going to bed or watching a YT video back at your accommodation, but it is also important not to drag things out and say "FFS, I have to soak in every possible moment of this, I am getting a bit bored and maybe the magic is fading but I had better keep walking round or sit here for another half hour or hour or whatever all the same". That risks turning a nice memory into something a little bit crappy and so on.
They also had tamales at this stall - other people asked and I saw them - as well as other things, they appearently only had tamales of "raja" (no idea how that is spelt) and I had no idea what that was and the not great dictionary app on my phone doesn't clarify even if I am spelling it right, and I also thought I'd stick with trying the soup instead. I may well go for another wander round the square tomorrow (probably my last night here) and may eat something else eg a tamal. This stall was pretty busy so I figure it passes the test for "safe" street food. (I maybe took a chance with the french fries this morning, and perhaps with the coconut sweet things although with the latter I figure it's cold food and a sweet so somehow - not sure if this is rational or not - it feels less likely to be prone to having whatever causes food poisoning.)
I did briefly experiment this afternoon seeing if I could plug my USB backup memory stick (which has some DVD rips on it which I delete as necessary to fill up space) into the room TV to in theory watch a film on, but although I managed to get the stick into a socket on the back (the TV is high on the wall and tightish against it and even using phone camera I am far from sure there was actually a USB port) I couldn't persuade the TV to show the contents of a USB stick, there may simply be no USB support. Not a big deal but I thought I'd note this wrt a possible benefit of having a few favourite films on a DVD to maybe watch on a TV instead of on phone.
2058 Let me clean my teeth and shower and shave and maybe do some laundry. I may watch a bit of YT afterwards depending how early it is and how I feel.
2135 OK, had shower and shave and somewhat inefficient laundry, since I am doing just one set of uw and one top and as I like to wash uw and non uw separately that is two separate washes for just one full set - it is more efficient to do two or three sets of uw together one night and two or three tops another night, but since I am using destroyer tactics here and trying to take advantage of having private bathroom plus a day of drying time it can't be helped.
FWIW - not sure if it is just a bit "not so rubbery" or it is generally not that useful - I never seem to find my universal sink stopper handy for laundry in sinks, I think I always end up using a sock to plug the hole. I am hanging the clothes up on a rail in a wardrobe-ish alcove (with a couple of hangers for tops) and aren't using my travel clothes line and haven't the whole trip. I should maybe stop carrying it round, although as always maybe if I more regularly had private bathrooms it would get more use.
If I didn't already say I saw a sign for "Xoo Yaguar" (or maybe "Yaguar Xoo" but probably not) on drive back from Mitla and something about these words and their spelling and conjuction tickled me. The Australian woman (I don't believe I ever knew her name BTW) at the language exchange that night told me "Xoo" is a local language and isn't derived from English "zoo" and it means something more like "refuge", but it still tickled me. This place sounds like a "rescate los pumas" deal and it might have been cool to go, but something for another time given the time constraints I was under.
It is not that late even for a 7am getting up so I think I will watch a bit of YT before bed. I don't think there is anything else I need to do - oh yes, except for FUCKING DUOLINGO, which I will do in a second - so I will probably send this before I start watching YT and if anything really important happens I will just start a fresh entry.
I really need to reconsider Duolingo when I get back home, I am far from sure I am really learning anything and it is maddening as hell without a real physical keyboard (and in landscape mode as I tried last night since I did have the BT keyboard out, a) sod's law dictated I got no free typing exercises anyway for once b) the interface doesn't fit on the screen without scrollig so it is annoying as hell in a different way) and I have this nasty feeling of being played by the stupid compulsion to keep the streak going even though I have enough gems to just keep buying streak freezes for months if not years if I wanted so the streak is kind of meaningless.
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