This blog tells the story of our journey cycling from Oaxaca to San Cristobal (via the Oaxacan Coast) in April 2018. If you’re looking to do a similar trip we go into a lot more detail about the logistics around this here. You can also read about our trip from Mexico City to this point in Oaxaca here.

We finished our language school in Oaxaca in an unfortunate cloud of sniffles, sore throats, and ear aches. Both Konstantin and I were not feeling 100% and so rather than getting straight back on our bikes we took an extra 5 days trying to recuperate. This involved drinking lots of medicinal hot chocolate so wasn’t all bad, but after 5 days I was itching to get back on the road. Unfortunately, despite copious amounts of rest, a trip to a doctor, normal medicine, homeopathic medicine and ridiculous amounts of fruit, I wasn’t much better. In fact, I was worse. My ear ache had morphed into a hideous mix of random bouts of vertigo and a whooshing tinnitus which was both painful and really annoying.

But, we figured a change of scenery might be good for us, so instead of cycling out of Oaxaca, we chucked our bikes on top of a van and took a minibus out. Saving us a good few kilometres in scorching heat, about 2000m of ascent, and another day to try and kick our various ailments to touch.

We headed to San Jose del Pacifico – a tiny village that you could easily miss on the map, but that is nestled in gorgeous blue mountains and is famous for its magic mushrooms and very hippy vibe.

For some reason, a 3 hour bus ride and a relocation to another city didn’t really change anything as far as the old illnesses were concerned, so we took another day to relax, read and try and get better, but eventually just decided to spurn all conventional advice and get on the bikes. It was just downhill to the coast right? Urm no. I mean, yes, in fairness, it was 3500m of ridiculously fun, very curvy, downhill mountain roads. But there was still 1500m of ascent, and I may have spectacularly misread the distance we needed to do. 102km was actually 120. Oops.

But it worked (ish!). Okay, so I wasn’t miraculously cured, but I was no longer as much of a snivelling wreck. And, we were able to enjoy a relaxing day on the beach.

The next day we headed back out along the coast, and soon realised that when we thought it was hot before, we really knew nothing. It hit at least 38 degrees in the midday sun. It was relentless and very very tough. I was feeling a lot better, but my ear still wasn’t 100%. So, after we collapsed in a thankfully air-conditioned room (hallelujah!) at about 2pm and reset our core body temperature, I headed out to a doctor. He took one look and confirmed my suspicions – it was infected. No wonder I’d been feeling so shoddy! He prescribed some antibiotics and we went on our way.

Given our generally lousy feeling, we decided a little laziness was needed. So rather than storming along the coast like a MAMIL pretending he’s Bradley Wiggins, we took it super easy. Pottering on from one beach to the next – a particular highlight was a 14km day. It was nice to spend most of our day doing something that wasn’t cycling – just relaxing and taking in the beautiful coastline.

But, all good things come to an end and slowly but surely the coastal road moved further and further from the coast. We cycled away from Salina Cruz hoping to get to Juchitan by lunch. Google said it was 80km – but it was FLAT, so we should have been able to make good time. Note the ‘should have’ here. About 20km in my pedal snapped clean in two, making everything a bit wonky and slower for a while. Then, at lunch, I made the fateful error of remapping our route along some “back roads”. Unfortunately google has a very loose definition of what constitutes a road, and so we found ourselves down a very sandy and muddy track, unable to do much cycling.

I then hit my knee on my handlebar and cried out in pain. Knut dropped his bike, and his pannier snapped off. Angry at said broken pannier, he kicked the sandy dirt and the top of his shoe ripped open and he twisted his ankle. It was like a comedy sketch.

We did a bodge job of attaching the pannier back to the bike and then both wonkley plodded on. Eventually we made it to a road…which was completely flooded. This was a bit of a blessing as it allowed us to get some of the layers of caked on mud off our wheels, but didn’t make for quick progress.

About 3 hours after Google said we had an hour remaining, we made it to the town of Juchitán de Zaragoza. We put the bikes through a pressure hose wash to get rid of the mud (much to the amusement of carwashing facilities staff!), and checked into a hotel.

We spent a day licking our wounds in Juchitan. It was an odd place. It had been hit badly by the earthquake last September, but unlike Mexico City where the evidence of the earthquake was quite hidden away, in Juchitan it looked like the earthquake could have been yesterday. Piles of rubble lined the streets, the shells of half collapsed buildings teetered precariously, both the main market hall and municipal building were still condemned – yellow tape flapping across the entrances. It was very different to any other place we’d visited in Mexico to this point, with even simple things like going out to a restaurant turning out to be quite difficult even though it was a town of 300,000 people (there was only one we could find, we went there both nights).

We didn’t feel uncomfortable, but it was clear there was probably quite a lot of anxiety about unrest in the town. The police presence on the streets was unlike any we’d seen before. Our restaurant had an armed guard. The door to our hotel was bolted shut from 8pm. I’ll be honest, the city wouldn’t be top of my recommendations for a nice holiday in Mexico, but we’re pleased we got to see a slightly more raw side to the country.

Out of Juchitan we hit some more dirt roads, avoiding the motorway and getting to explore very rural Mexico. We made slow progress, but it was awesome to have the road basically to ourselves (apart from the odd tuktuk!). And, we finally got the drone out!

Eventually we made it to the two towns of San Francisco – Del Mar and Ixhuatán, they’d had an argument in the 1920s and literally split up. The split was obviously so acrimonious that they didn’t build a bridge over the river and we had to be carted across (literally!!) by horse.

In the town we stopped at the hotel and were glad to see a flashing neon “open” sign. However, it was definitely not open. After a few helpful gestures from the locals we realised we needed to ring a number. The guy would be round in an hour to let us in. We went off to find some food and were obviously looking a bit helpless, so a bloke drove past on a motorbike and tried to help…by taking us to all the closed restaurants in the town. In the meantime, hotel guy had got in touch to say he’d not be there until 6 – 2.5 hours later.

This was a dilemma. Did we wait for possible hotel man? Did we get back on our bikes and cycle another 30km to an open hotel? Did we try and find somewhere to wild camp? We first tried to find the other hotel in the town, but despite being on Google it didn’t exist. I had mentally checked out of doing anymore cycling so we decided to wait on hotel man.

6pm rolled round and hotel man didn’t show. We rang, and well, our telephone Spanish is awful, and all we could fathom is he’d possibly gone for a takeaway. Which was nice, but didn’t really help us get a bed for the night. We waited 25 minutes and then enacted plan B. Get back on the bikes and cycle 30km as quickly as possible to get to the next hotel before dark. We thought about wildcamping, but some guys had asked us some odd questions about our bikes earlier in the day and we didn’t really want to leave the town into the middle of nowhere just before dusk!

It was going to be pretty tough. We had a lot of ground to cover. So you can imagine our delight when 1km out of the town we saw a massive sign for the hotel we couldn’t find earlier. The sign led us to a courtyard where we were welcomed by an opera singing parrot. The parrot gave us a couple of renditions of some (actually incredibly tuneful) Spanish songs, and then started squawking the hotel’s name. Every time one of us laughed the parrot mocked the laugh exactly. It was hilarious, which caused more laughter and more parrot piss taking.

The hotel owners welcomed us to a lovely (air conditioned! Oh the luxury!) room, and so only a mere 3.5 hours after we arrived in San Francisco we were able to lie down and relax!!!

On from San Francisco we had some more dirt roads and a LOT of mango trees. Turns out mango plantations smell awful. Like rotting, fermenting mangos. Yum.

We got back onto the highway and crossed over into Chiapas. Now, I don’t like to read too much in to hype about places – but according to the US government Chiapas is one of the four most dangerous states in Mexico. But, a lot of the people who say places like Mexico are dangerous have never been out of their home county, so it’s always worth taking stuff like this with a pinch of salt.

Unfortunately, about the same time we crossed over the border – some reports about two missing cyclists in Chiapas began to look a little more sinister. We’d seen a few things pop up on our facebook feeds about a German cyclist that was missing, but we’d chosen to try and stay calm until anything confirmed came out. As we arrived in the (nothing to write home about) town of Arriaga, it was confirmed that a polish cyclist, Krzystof, had been found dead between San Cristobal and Palenque (about 100km from our current location). The reports said he had had an accident and fallen down into a ravine. He couldn’t be identified properly as animals had eaten his head. Holger, the German cyclist was still missing.

So we left Arriaga feeling slightly more disconcerted about good ole Chiapas. But, we put our heads down and got some pretty epic cycling done. From Arriaga we were properly leaving the coast, which meant going up. A lot. We started early, but the sun was already very strong and the humidity really high. Suffice to say, we sweated a LOT. It took us ages, but we did it!

Given the massive ascent, we’d planned a fairly short day km wise, spotting a random hotel in the middle of nowhere on Google to lay our heads. We rocked up at about 1pm and instantly knew something was up. Half the roof of first building had collapsed. We cycled round into the beautiful courtyard and were met by very confused looks from the resident family.

“Do you have a room?” We asked.
“Erm, the hotel is closed”. They replied, pointing to the cracks in the wall and the considerable earthquake damage.

It was at least 25km to the next hotel, which wasn’t the end of the world, but we were knackered and much more apprehensive about wild camping than we might be usually. And, it was now the middle of the day which meant it was 37 degrees and blasting sunshine.

“Erm” I replied. Putting on my most pathetic ‘please let us stay anyway’ face.

The few family members assembled started speaking in rapid Spanish and we struggled to follow. Eventually I heard the mum of the house (the owner) be convinced, and they let us stay. It was an absolutely amazing hotel. It was built over five hundred years ago with rooms around a beautiful courtyard and swimming pool (this may have been a later addition!). The roof of our room had gorgeous wooden beams and lovely authentic Mexican décor. A proper treat. We just ignored the few ominous cracks in the walls!

We sat outside and relaxed, listening to the birds and the sounds of the cow ranch in the distance, when Martin (the owners son) came and sat down to chat. We pulled out our best efforts at Spanish and talked about politics, the state of the world, Mexico, the US, the EU. It felt pretty awesome to have such a conversation in another language.

Martin’s daughter Julia asked if we wanted some food. After cycling for 4 hours we weren’t going to say no! We were invited into their kitchen and enjoyed a massive feast with all the family. Turns out it was a national holiday and this was a big family reunion we were crashing (sort of like accidentally turning up on someone’s door at Christmas and not realising it…). Anyway, it was an absolute, unexpected treat. And yet another example of how amazing the Mexican people have been.

Despite the lovely experience, the next day I was in an absolutely shocking mood. I could simply not be bothered to cycle. The roads were really busy and the cars were passing quite close. It was hilly. And the missing cyclists situation just kept playing on my mind. We did 25km and got on a bus to Tuxtla and checked into a hotel. We spent a day relaxing and visiting the zoo while we considered what to do next.

It’s difficult to describe the feelings we felt during this time about the disappearance of Holger and Krzystof. Knowing what we know now, it sadly vindicates all the feelings of discomfort. While in Tuxtla, we heard the news that the body of Holger had also been found, near that of Krzystof. They were about 60km from San Cristobal de la Casas – our next destination and on a road that we were planning to travel. We were about 2 weeks behind them. It made us feel pretty sick.

There was a huge amount of misinformation flying around. For the first week or so the police put out a statement that the men had both fallen off the cliff. Two experienced cyclists falling off a cliff at the same time? Not even at a corner? Sounded very odd. Some local people also smelled something fishy and so started investigating. Eventually, a new police officer was sent in to investigate, and soon after the family of Holger confirmed that he had been shot. Krzystof had had his head cut off.

We still don’t actually know why this all happened. We probably never will. But, from what we could tell, these were just two adventurous cyclists out enjoying Mexico. It was completely and utterly tragic.

It put us off cycling for a while. We took another bus to San Cristobal de las Casas where we took in the beautiful city, eating lots of food and walking the, thankfully much much cooler, streets.

We took a trip out to the indigenous villages of San Juan Chomula which was really fascinating. The villagers practice an interesting form of ‘traditional’ Catholicism. Basically, they use the catholic saints and baptise their children, and that’s where the similarities with any modern religion end. You’re not allowed to take photos in the churches – but it was unlike any church we’ve ever seen before – candles everywhere, shamans practicing medicine and sacrificing chickens, saints with mirrors on their chests, reeds all over the floor, and a random person taking a phone call. It was pretty surreal.

We also had the opportunity to ride around the city last Friday evening in memory of Holger and Krzystof. This was quite special – seeing all these people come out to pay their respects and to denounce this kind of violence in their country. It was nice to know there was a support network of people out there, and that Mexicans were as shocked and saddened by the situation as we were.

After spending more time than we wanted in San Cristobal de la Casas (at the unfortunate mercy of the shocking Mexican postal service), we headed off to Palenque and the waterfalls at Aguaazul (on a bus, again). These were stunning.

And then, sat in Palenque, an ongoing issue came to a head. You know earlier we mentioned not feeling great coming out of Oaxaca? Well, I was now completely fine and dandy, but, alas, Konstantin was STILL nursing some very sore lymph nodes. It was a difficult problem. He hadn’t lost a leg, so we could continue to avoid medical attention and power on, but it was just an underlying frustration. Particularly for me – an ill Konstantin is HARDWORK.

Eventually, after a very fractious day of bickering and trying to establish what the best plan of action was, we made a last minute U-turn of plans. Rather than getting back on the bikes and struggling into the mountains of northern Guatemala we were going to head on another bus (overnight) to the town of Chetumal just north of Belize and on the Yucatan peninsula. We had been planning to get medical help in Belize as the country speaks english…..but after doing a bit more research it turned out anyone with money headed to Mexico and Belizean health services weren’t actually that great.

We arrived at 6am in Chetumal, grabbed an hours sleep in a very convenient hostel and then got ourselves ready to hit the health centre.

ALL HAIL MEXICAN HEALTH SERVICES! Seriously. We walked in, got an appointment within an hour with Doctora Jenny who gave Konstantin a FULL checkup. This included me unwittingly getting front row seats to a camera tour right down Konstantin’s nose. I’m sure marriage is meant to have intimate moments, but this was perhaps a bit too far. Dr Jenny decided Konstantin needed blood tests, which we were able to get STRAIGHTAWAY. 6 hours later we had the results and the all clear. Konstantin didn’t have malaria, dengue fever or any other dodgy infection. In fact, he was pretty normal on the blood front. Dr Jenny thought he must be on the tail end of a viral infection and seemed hopeful it would be over in 2 weeks.

And so, we spent our last day in Mexico out on the incredibly stunning Lake Bacalar. A pretty special end to our time in this amazing country.

Next stop Belize…