I arrived in Oaxaca Mexico in the morning and quickly entered the country through customs. Already, I felt the feeling of being in a new foreign place. It has been so long since experiencing that feeling. I took some cash from the ATM and struggled with my little Spanish to make change for the bus. As I exited the Airport on foot, I walked into the countryside that I would know as Zapoteca or Oaxaca! My first lesson was that taking the bus requires signaling for a stop. There are no real bus stops in the area and this caused me to miss it. I followed up by hopping into a red looking taxi that I kept seeing people enter. Turns out these are called collectivo taxis and they are a great way to get around Oaxaca. It is a red taxi with a lettering on the front glass such as "El Centro" which is where i wanted to go. I proceeded to enter the front seat with random people and shared the front seat making it an overfull car experience. I reached Oaxaca and paid my 45 peso fare and began the walk through this Spanish colonial city to my accommodation. I was staying at a hostel in the part of town near the Guelegueta stadium. I reached, checked in, and dropped my belongings.

Immediately I was blown away by the culture, architecture, and street food. Because the Gueleguetza festival was upon, the street was lined with many street food vendors and also many boutique vendors.

I ended the day by enjoying a relaxing drink of mezcal at a nearby mezcaleria Casa Convite.

I woke up early to join the OAX Sports team for their track workout. This was across the town at a university campus. I decided I would jog there across the town. It was still dark and I reached what looked like a seemingly abandoned track field. After circling the complex a few times I started notice runners entering inside through a gap in the fence. As I began to notice this I joined them and entered the track complex and met my training team. The track workout was all voluntary and I was able to meet some great people from OAX Sports and made a connection that would last the portion of the trip!

After the workout, I returned to my hostel to have breakfast, and then do a fantastic introductory walking tour of the city of Oaxaca. On this tour we visited an Organic Mercado, El Centro main square, the Gueleguetza venue on top of the hill, tried some ice cream with Tuna(Nopal fruit), Tacos, and even saw the aqueduct that Nacho Libre was shot!

We also entered both of the enormous Mercados. Mercado Benito Juarez and Mercado 20 de November. These places are enormous! The is the full experience I wanted by walking through the halls of a giant market and getting lost weth countless vendors selling things like mole, jugos naturales, mezcal, street food, and even regular household goods!

I also came to know a fantastic cacao drink called tejate. This chocolately drink consists of cacao blossom, mamey seed & coriu cacao. It has a foam on the surface that makes for a delicious and refreshing drink.

That night I met up with the local Couchsurfing group in Oaxaca and joined them at the Feria de Mezcal. This is a massive Mezcal trade show and party located in the Oaxaca convention center. I came to meet some great friends in this CS community and we rode together to the festival. In fact on the ride over to the festival, I also met a great friend randomly by chatting on the bus!

The Mezcal festival also featured a street food festival and we began by filling our stomach before the alchahol! There I tried some more tejate, and a tostada with two tortillas instead of one. Quite delicious.

The mezcal show itself had many vendors and we could sample each type of mezcal. The vendors featured a variety of agave (Maguey) drinks such as espadin, tobalar, coyote, and tepistate. The event had a dance floor where a band was playing some traditional and norteno music and towards the end of the day we had entered the dance floor and danced into the night until the event was over! We finished the night by walking back and trying some street elote.

The day started with a trail run with the OAX sport group. They were going to Sierra Norte to trail run in the Ixtepeji Autonomous Region. We met early in the morning and I rode with the OAX Sport staff into the heights of the Sierra Norte, a mountain range just north of Oaxaca. We entered a different climate with tall trees and some magnificent large agaves. We were planning a trail run because the next day was the trail race. This mountain is indigenous land, and is not public so we needed to ask permission from the local government. There was an agreement that the trails may be used for this purpose and we entered the park. The trail run began on some single track through an open range area. What a great and beautiful course. I ran around 20k in total in around 2 hours and we returned tired and hungry. Just in time for some breakfast at a rural mountain restaurant on the way back down the mountain. There I had some traditional hot chocolate and some carne asada that was very satisfying after the run!

After the run I had some free time until meeting the Couchsurfing group for a Gueleguetza parade in downtown Oaxaca. This parade was starting at 7PM but the CS group suggested meeting a few hours early to get a spot. Luckily I did because the street really filled up. Best thing is that I was recommended to get a mezcal glass made out of bamboo because the parade would offer free mezcal to the spectators! This is not something I would have ever expected. As the parade began, I saw my first glimpse of the Gueleguetza festivities. The parade featured fireworks, costumes, marching bands and each region of the Oaxaca region showcasing their culture!

That evening was a free salsa dance lesson put on by my hostel. Now I was a true beginner but it was truly a great experience that I was able to join and learn making it a great time!

The day started out early again as I met the OAX Sport staff to join them on the Cerro Negro Mountain Race. This race takes place in Mixteca, a region outside of the city of Oaxaca. I rode in one of the staff members car, leaving at around 6 AM. It was an absolutely scenic ride though some desert and mountains until reaching the puebla of Magdalena Yodocono de Porfirio Díaz. We reached the start of the race and were ready to start the 12k at around 8AM.

The race course took us up the side of a large set of hills, through the trails and forest on top, down the back of the hill, through some mountainside, and through a desert area and back into town. What a difficult course! This trail run was incredibly steep in certain parts going up resorting me to hiking it, and some steep downhill sections. The locals who lived these mountains their whole lives wore zooming past me at this point and gave me a newer level of respect for the mountain natives!

We finished the race, which actually turned out to be 18k instead of 12k and they had some festivities as well as some great street food in the little village. I ended up meeting a new friend from Chicago, living in the Mixteca area and we shared some Mezcal he invited me to try in a little tienda. We waited for all the racers to finish celebrated by cheering the winners of each event. I was also able to meet some of the atheletes racing in this event! After trying some street tacos and purchasing some Kamkoco snacks from a local vendor, we headed out for a final photo and departed the Mixteca region back to Oaxaca.

I headed back to my hostel to check out and I would meet my friends who I would be staying with the rest of the trip. This would be in a shared accommodation. I located the place and checked into what seemed like a lavish Oaxaca estate complete with a central outdoor room with bedrooms and kitchen encircling the space. The place had a distinct spanish colonial feel with tiles and tall ceilings. A true Oaxaca experience!

After freshening up I joined my friend from OAX Sport for a a walk around the city of Oaxaca and some good hangout time! We explored some parts of town such as Reforma, a cafe, and even some of the campus.

A friend and I decided to visit the Gueleguetza performance. Not the main one because tickets were being given out first-come meaning an incredibly long line to wait! We visited a secondary Gueleguetza taking place in the Estadio Tecnológico. This secondary performance was free admission and a very impressive experience. What a rich cultural showcase with each region of Oaxaca representing its own dance! It is best shown in video form!

The festival lasted around 4 hours with breaks for Micheladas and some snacks! Afterwards was sort of a free day. I met with a running friend Edith who ran her own artisinal mezcaleria. She was running with us at OAX Sport. I also visited some of the mercados for a second time and had some street food that evening!

We started the day off very early for our mezcal hike and tour to Hierve el Agua a set of rock formations in San Lorenzo Albarradas, Oaxaca. This tour was through a group known as COYOTE Adventures that my friends arranged. This was definitely a highlight of the trip. We started in a caravan that took us to the natural park area and we hiked and explored the wonderful rock formations. We even were able to swim in a few of the pools as a refreshment!

The tour took us onto a journey of discovery of many of the agave and tree species in the area! This was truly a great ecotourist experience and I found myself fascinated in many of these species. The tour progressed into a mezcaleria and artisinal tour of a few of the smaller scale mezcal growers and distillers. This sgave us a personal connection to the people who produced the mezcal and it was a great way to directly support them. In fact, we even were given a tour of a distillery and shown the process that it is made. After, we were invited as guests into the family's home for a meal. That was a very nice touch that I will always remember.

I rose early to check out a local mercado for breakfast. I tried some empanadas at a place called La Guerita purely because the long line out front. It must be good if locals are lining up right? It did not disappoint!

This was also sort of a free day where we visited the mercados to try some delacies such as Chapulin (crickets) and the Mayodormo chocolatier. The last evening I went to a late night Chicharron taqueria near the accomidation.

This day involved getting up and heading to the ADO bus station in Oaxaca. The bus system in Mexico is pretty impressive and ADO is the regional bus service in this part of the country. I took the bus to Mexico City which was around 8 hours total. Thu bus made no stops, but that is okay because there is a restroom onboard. However, I wish I had brought something besides bread!

The journey to CDMX was very scenic and featured mountains, desert, countryside and everything in between. The bus was a great way to see the countryside of Mexico that you would otherwise be flying across. I recommend these busses for your travel in MX!

When I arrived in CDMX, it was at the TAPO station. It is connected with the CDMX metro so I bought a system card that I could fill with money for use in trains and bus. This way I could easily get around town and to the next accommodation our group was staying. I reached the accommodation and found a nice hamburguesa place and relaxed for the day.

Here is a link to the entire photo album: https://photos.app.goo.gl/j8w9h7WGT7L3MSbH9 And videos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Om4eJX381oc&list=PLVXoDcbm8YOw7WKfiBtx8pKDWlLG7p_AV

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