Mexico Day 7

Despite eating nothing yesterday I’m still getting the tummy gripes. However we did get a long sleep.

We left at 8.30 for a full day. Our first stop was a weaving place. The family showed us the whole process from carding the wool (merino they said, but it felt coarse to me), spinning it, then making the natural dyes from indigo, pomegranate, cochineal, camomile and a few others. The colours were beautifully mellow. After dyeing they dried the hanks of wool then wove them on huge pedal driven looms. She said the patterns were all in her head - one large rug was for sale at £2500, having taken 4 months to make. They had lots of stuff for sale so I assumed it came in from others in the area. Maguey

Not to far away we went to a Mescal distillery. Mescal is made from an agave called Maguey, whereas tequila come from Blue Agave. The heart of the plant is used - it looks like a giant pineapple. We had a taste of various ages and bought a small youthful bottle. I prefer tequila but it will be a present for Carol my cocktail buddy.

Next stop was Mitla palace - not old at 700CE. The Spanish had built a church on top of some of it but we could enter another part to see lovely carvings.

Close by we had a buffet lunch for 180 pesos, about £8 each. I nibbled a bit of Mr C’s bread. Then it was a 5-6 hour drive through mountains almost to the Pacific to stop for the night at Tehuantepec at 6pm. We have descended from 1555m to 30m so it’s no longer the dry heat - it is very humid being so low and only 35km from the Pacific. We hope to reach San Cristobal tomorrow night.

My blip is a collage of the weaving place.