Puebla and Tlaxcala

New pictures posted and the map is updated to include our trip to Oaxaca tomorrow. Check it out.

We've spent the last 3 nights and will spend tonight in Puebla, about 2 hours south (and a little east) of Mexico City. It's a very colonial town, meaning the architecture is typical of when the Spanish colonized Mexico. Most of the buildings are from the 16th to 18th century. The streets are brick or some sort of stone, they are narrow and there are lot of little balconies, it actually looks a bit like the French Quarter in New Orleans. They have a great tree shaded Zocalo at the center of town with an enormous Cathedral. Very cool.

Totally different atmosphere than Mexico City. It's still a big city, and there are a lot of people visiting for the Easter holiday, but still not close to the craziness of MC. Also, most shops and things are closed for the holidays, so it's been mostly low key.

We've spent some of our time watching Semana Santa festivities. There was a huge procession on Good Friday that was cool to watch. The atmosphere was part festive and part solemn. Anyone who wanted could march behind the "floats" (for lack of a better term). People carried relics they'd made themselves and carried balloons and threw confetti. Very interesting. Rich practiced his spanish with the man next to him, and tried to make a joke that a policewoman was kind of fat ("gordo"), but accidentally called her beautiful ("guapo")... regardless, the man laughed so point taken.

We've also been enjoying the food a lot and hanging out with some friends from our hostel. We met some very cool people yesterday evening and had a great time.

Yesterday during the day we took a side trip to Tlaxcala (pic on left), which is a small city that is very cool and draws some Mexican tourists. It's set in between a bunch of hills and we hiked up to the top of one to a very cool church where supposedly Our Lady of Guadalupe appeared in the 16th Century. We also saw an old convent and stumbled upon a bullfight which we could see from atop one of the hills! Rich watched, Kendra didn't.

We also ate at one of the cafes in the square and had one of our more interesting lunches so far. Taco Placero (pictured) was tortillas with cheese, guacamole, fried cactus leaves, served with pork rinds. We also had deep fried chipotle peppers stuffed with cheese which Rich loved on hard!

We head to Oaxaca City (it's also a state) tomorrow which is famous for chocolate and cheese and is supposed to be very very cool. We are then considering doing some hiking in the mountains north of the city of Oaxaca. ¡Adios!