Thursday, March 27^th: We got on the road by 7:30am, early for Chris and I! But, it was a good thing we did as it turned out to be a very long day of some 430kms of very twisty desert roads. Our original destination was Puerto Angel, but we decided to stop a few kms further on at the small village of Zipolito. Puerto Angel is a cute little fishing town but it doesn’t have very good beaches. Zipolite offered us a huge choice of cheap beach cabaņas with beautiful sea views. For US$8 per room we decided to stay put here for a few days and really relax. We could literally not be any closer to the beach and surf. Sitting here writing this in our second floor room I can see groups of pelicans comb the surf for fish while surfers try to catch big waves.

One of the big things to do here is go snorkeling. For US$10 pp you can go snorkeling for 4 hours, at several different sights and spot dolphins and even Orca whales if you are lucky. We went on Friday and we actually did spot one dolphin, dead in the water unfortunately due to the bad net-fishing practices of the really big tuna fishing boats, and also a sea turtle, but we didn’t spot an Orca (although we heard from other tourists that they did see one the day before). We saw loads of interesting fish, starfish, sea snakes and rays before the day was done. The young captain’s helper on the boat dove down deeper than any of us dared and fetched interesting stuff for us to see at the surface. We felt it was definitely money well spent.

The next two days we spent mostly lying in the beachside hammocks, reading, and watching the graceful groups of pelicans swoop over the waves searching for a meal. The days were quite hot but blessed with a cooling sea breeze in the shade. The evenings were cooler but with no wind. We would have Cuba libres (rum and cokes) on the beach watching the sunset each night, then later have a delicious fish dinner in the little village.

Sunday, March 30^th: Took a short ride further up the coast to Puerto Escondido. The friends we made while trekking to Machu Picchu last year, Gabriela, Jesse, Jackie and Rob, have a house in a small village just outside of the town. They invited us to visit the place and their uncle Pablo who also lives there and takes care of the property. Pablo was very gracious giving us a bit of a tour of the place and telling us about the local history in the area. Apparently Puerto Escondido has the third highest waves on average in the world, which makes it a huge attraction for surfers from around the world. It’s an interesting landscape with brown desert-like hills dotted with green cacti leading down to the white sand beaches and blue sea.