Mexico - Winter 23/24 : 2024-01-26 : Xilitla

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Travel
Type Name Service Provider Origin Destination Cost Notes Actions
Bus To Xilitla Vencedor Jalpan de Serra Xilitla $36.00 Two people, round trip
Activity
Type Name Description Service Provider Cost Kms To Date Total Notes Actions
Sight See Day trip to Xilitla Laura says, "Try to make it to Xilitla, about 3 hours from Jalpan, but worth it." It's a 2h bus ride, $7-$9 $0.00
Accommodation
Type Name Service Provider Confirmation Location Cost Notes Actions
Bed and Breakfast Very clean, cozy room in the center. AirBnB Jalpan de Serra $263.34 Paid $131.67 2023/01/29. Balance due Jan 14.
Free cancellation before Jan. 22.
Host: Guadalupe
Check-in: Flexible
No laundry facilities
Luggage drop
beautiful terrace. a lot of steps. common kitchen. location is in the middle of the town: there is a chruchbell playing songs for three minutes straight, starting at 7 or 8 am.


Trip Log

Notes Actions
We chose Xilitla as one of our things to do in/from Jalpan because our friend, Laura G recommended it. We couldn’t get schedule information online so we asked at the tourist booth last night. The guy didn’t speak English but he did point us at the Vencedor bus terminal (which is separate from the main bus terminal). We walked over there to inquire, and with some help from a local who speaks a little English (plus the SayHi app) we were told that we had to go to the main bus terminal and that busses for Xilitla left every hour. This morning we got as fast of a start as we could and hoofed it over to the main bus depot. Bought our ‘regreso’ (return) tickets and got on the bus. Moments after we stepped on (8:45) we were underway. Thank goodness for the fast start and good bus karma!!

When we were pulling into Xilitla, we saw that it’s a town clinging to the side of a steep canyon. There are buildings lining the road, but at one point there was a gap in the buildings and I could see the town above and below the canyon. I said ‘oh my’ but by the time I said it it was too late for Brent to see what I was ‘oh my-ing’ about.

When we got off the bus, our first stop was to walk back to the ‘oh my’ spot and take a pic. We then explored the really cool, really bustling centro. We met some Canadians, Andrew and Catherine, and they said they were taking a tour of the surrealist garden at Las Pozas at 3pm. Apparently you used to be able to go in and walk around but now you have to do a tour. The English tour was at 3pm. We decided that we would aim to go as well, but instead of buying our tickets in town ahead of time, we decided to trust that we could buy tickets at the entrance in case we ended up not making it. Seems reasonable, right? Well the walk to Las Pozas is no small feat with all the elevation gain (and loss) around here. We walked all the way over just to find out that you cannot, in fact, buy tickets at the entrance. The people at the entrance told us we had to go back into town (a 3km walk with 500m elevation loss and 600m gain) to buy tickets. There were no taxis around to take us back and forth, so we noped out of the surrealist garden. We did see Andrew and Catherine there. They were smart and bought their tickets in town.

That was disappointing, but not nearly as disappointing as the walk back though. We decided to walk back along the highway. Longer, but just a gradual climb instead of crazy amounts of gain and loss. At one point the highway got narrow and there was almost no shoulder and lots of traffic so we took an opportunity to leave the highway and walk back through town instead. We were walking up the hill from the highway when a woman’s five small dogs charged out at us barking. We ignored them and tried to keep walking… but before we could say holy chihuahuas we both got bit on our legs. Brent kicked ‘his’ dog away (gently… maybe should have been harder) and I tried to swat ‘mine’ away but it was too fast for me. The owner just stood there and watched. After a moment of shock, we kept climbing and there were more, larger, dogs ahead barking aggressively at us. Brent grabbed a big stick and a rock and I grabbed a thin branch… sort of what I would call a switch. We kept climbing. As we got closer to the other dogs, when they barked I yelled ‘leave it!’ and smacked the switch on the concrete beside me. They left us alone, thank goodness. That was way more exciting than it needed to be.

So, I have a bruise and some broken skin. Brent is bleeding from four punctures. So I guess an unscheduled visit to the hospital at Jalpan is in our near future. *fast forward several hours* Hospital visit completed. We seem to have horrified the Mexican hospital system with our complete lack of Mexican identification. They had no choice but to treat us for free and give us some antibiotics, also for free.


Photos

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