Salsas & Salsa!!

We woke up this morning refreshed after a good nights sleep in a real bed instead of airport floors or buses or tents.....and went upstairs to the cool terrace they have at the hostel for breakfast, toast and coffee. We then spent a significant amount of time on the internet trying to decide what to do with our time here in Mexico as well as booking more salsa congresses and 'miracle of miracles' telling Matthew which congresses to book also as he now has dates for when he can come round Europe with us...a whole 7 weeks!!!!!! At about 1 we decided we really must get out and had decided to go on the tour bus of the city to help get a general overview of the place but when we arrived at the stop, only a few minutes walk away, the next bus had just left. Assured that they run every half an hour we sat in the shade of some trees by a little fountain that wasn't turned on, but would have been quite pretty if it was and waited for the next bus. We watched as more and more people turned up to wait too and when it finally arrived over an hour later we went to get on board with the idea of doing both circuits, the north and the south, until the driver said that we should allow 7 or 8 hours for that instead of just 3-4 for the north circuit which seems to be the popular one. Deciding to wait until the next day so we would have time for this to get our moneys worth we left and headed back to the hostel to ask where we could find a tourist information centre as we needed to find out bus times and prices for when we wanted to travel Mexico. We followed the instructions given and arrived at an enormous monument in the middle of the road topped by a huge golden 'Angel of Independence' which formed a large roundabout. The monument is super impressive in itself and has a backdrop of many modern skyscrapers making it look even more so as it is reflected in the glass all around. We found the tourist info booth here but it was all closed up and had no opening times so we turned round and headed back to the hostel deciding we'd have to work things out for ourselves using the guide books at the hostel and the internet. This took a long time as typically the websites we needed were slow and difficult to navigate but eventually we had a rough plan formed and feeling hungry now it was nearly 6pm we headed back to the metro station again eager to try more mexican food! We went to a little hole in the wall type place where several Mexicans were sitting eating on little stools on the pavement and thought this would be a good place to try. We weren't wrong, we ordered a gordita, not really knowing what it was and a quesadilla each and sat down to watch the lady making the tortillas by hand as we waited. When ready we were offered various bits to go on them, cilantro, onion, red or green salsa and 'nopales' which we think is the cactus leaves, before she finished them off on the hotplate. The gordita was delicious, served kind of like a stuffed pitta with a paste of refried beans, cheese and whatever bits we had chosen, green salsa and the veggies, Andy even tried the nopales and they turned out to be a bit like green beans crossed with jalapenos, quite pleasant! Then came the quesadillas, which were the best we've ever had having such a better flavour and texture to what you get with your typical TexMex type fare. Satisfied with our dinner and even more so as it only cost $4 we went back to the hostel to relax and change before heading out that evening to a salsa place we had found on the internet. At about 8.40 we walked the few blocks to Mama Rumba's and found a queue waiting to be let in, a good sign we thought and when the doors opened at 9 we entered this cuban bar to find a large venue with a good tiled floor, a large stage and a second floor too. We waited for the 'lesson' to begin and at just after 9.15 a man climbed up on the stage and called everyone onto the floor for the warm up...an even better sign! By this time the place was packed and more and more people kept coming in as we tried to follow what was going on as the people danced on stage and the guy called out the moves like in a Rueda but in line dance form. Not knowing all the spanish/cuban names for stuff we got a little mixed up sometimes but there were loads of beginners and other tourists there too so we didnt feel rubbish and when after 3 or 4 songs like this he split the crowd into classes we decided to go upstairs with the beginners to make sure we had the right moves to the right names! The beginners class, which consisted of about 60 people, was split into men and women and we went through 8 or 9 basic cuban moves for about 45 minutes before joining as partners and dancing to the calls of the teachers for another dozen or so songs before the lesson finished at 10.30. We were suitably impressed with the fact that so many people turned up to dance and take lessons, it is something we've really missed since being in South America and we were now looking forward to a few hours dancing downstairs where we were ushered after the lesson finished. The rest of the evening was fantastic, loads of people dancing all different styles at various levels, a live band that performed two 45 minute sets and actually sang different songs to the usual line up and best of all people asked me to dance!!!!! Although the main style was cuban I only had maybe 2 cuban dances all night, the rest were cross body and we agreed it was the best dancing we've had since the Peru Congress!! Tired, with aching legs and sore feet we left near the end of the night happier than we have been for ages, grinning from ear to ear and deciding that we thoroughly approve of Mexico!! :D