Domingo

When the fellow wheeled his bicycle into the cathedral in Toluca I just had to have a photo.

The long colourful Mexican style dress that Annabelle gave me is perfect however everyone stares at my neon green Dawgs. People are all wearing coats and long pants and the women dress very fashionable for work many wearing tall stilleto heels.

The coffee is delicious everywhere even from the machine in the Botanical gardens.





The walk from the Hotel Colonial to the bus terminal took almost an hour. Janet and Denise willl know why I took this photo for them. I stopped to have a slice of pizza and soda and asked directions when I was about a block away. It cost 100 pesos for the trip which took just under two hours.












The bus ride from Toluca to Mexico City was a trip! I loved the mountains covered with tall cedars and pines. Spider man was playing on the bus. Once we got closer to the city small communities became visible. The highway sliced into the rock and the cliffs were covered with ivy and ferns and pampas grass which made me smile because it reminded me of Bob. When I moved in with him he had a large vase full of dusty pampas grass.









Travelling through Mexico City en route to the airport which is in the city centre the freeway rose above the streets to the level of rooftop gardens and lines of laundry. I saw a woman scrubbing clothes in a tradional cement sink with several lines full of wash directly beneath a giant billboard.



I also saw several small racetracks in a row-perhaps five-which made me think of Dylan and Bob and the new track in Kindersley where Dylan had so much fun racing some kind of machine.






I had loads of time in the airport in Mexico and since there were no chairs I got a cappiccino and cinnamon bun and sat at Cinnabon for as long as I could and read my overpriced novel only to discover I had already read it.

Finally we boarded the plane and the adventure really began. Just before takeoff as we were ready to taxi the captain made an announcement that we had to return to the terminal. For some reason we were unable to land in Oaxaca that night. After a couple of hours of uncertainty we were put up by Aviacsa Air in a hotel and told to return at five next morning for a 6:30 flight. Needless to say I didn´t get much sleep as I was worried about oversleeping. I knew the desk would be busy checking in the entire flight of around 90 people so didn´t bother to ask for a wake up call.



It was smooth from then on and Sally and Armando were there to meet me in the crush of people in the small Oaxaca airport. I had carried a large cardboard parcel of paintings for Sally to frame and was guarding them with my life. When this little man approached and offered to take them I thought it was a taxi driver wanting to help and I held on to them tightly and said no gracias. Turned out it was Armando who got a great laugh out of that.