Hello again!

Had a wonderful few days in Mexico with my gorgeous friend from college - Lucy Manders. It was so wonderful to see her and to be back in Mexico - I love the food and bright colours, it's a great country. Lucy has been living and working in Mexico as a teacher, but she managed to clear out her diary so that she could hang out with me and Ben! It was lovely to be staying in Lucy's apartment, with her gorgeous dog Gilly and catching up with a good friend was just what I needed. Thank you to Lucy and Becca for letting us stay.

We arrived quite late on the Tuesday night - flying from Rio to Bogota in Columbia and then on to Mexico City - it was so great to be met at the airport by smiley Lucy! That night we just caught up and chatted until the wee hours.

The next day Lucy left us snoring away in bed as she headed off to work - when she got back (about 12ish) we went for a lovely long walk through her neighbourhood with Gilly to a yummy restaurant to fill up on delicious Mexican food - I loooove real Mexican food so I was in my element as Manders chose lots of delicious things I hadn't tried before. Yum. Lots of lime and cheese and salsa, guacamole, tortillas and re-fried beans. Delish. On the walk back we stopped at a snazzy cupcake shop to get exciting cupcakes for our afternoon tea time! I got chocolate and banana - which proved to be a firm favourite with Manders!

That night we walked Gilly and picked up some yummy snacks from food stalls on the streets - it was great being with Lucy who could show me all the best things to try!

The next day Ben and I had a chilled out morning before Manders came home from work at lunchtime. We all went in to the city centre to show Ben the sights. (I've been to Mexico City before - when I came to visit Lucy when she was doing a year abroad at uni with a group of friends) We saw the big art gallery and church and government buildings, before we headed to a market. Ben and I are suckers for a good market and spent ages browsing the stalls - Mexico seemed so cheap compared to Brazil, so we couldn't help ourselves stocking up on presents! I love all the crafts and statues made for the 'Day of the Dead' celebrations, all the brightly painted things and gorgeous textiles - I could probably have spent all day wandering around!

After the market we rushed back to the flat and made pizzas before heading out to see a performance of Chicago at the Swiss school Lucy teaches at! It was so fun - Ben loves musicals so he was loving it! I've never seen Chicago so I didn't have much of a clue what was going on as the play was in Spanish - but the songs were in English so I got a rough idea of what was going on! It was really well done and the costumes and songs and dances were awesome. It was cool to see the school that Lucy teaches at too.

We had an early start the next day as we headed on a day trip to the town of Tepoztlan, an hour on the coach from Mexico City. The town is famous for the remains of a temple built on top of the nearby Tepozteco mountain. We walked up the very steep mountain to see the remains - it took us about 45minutes to reach the top - it was pretty hard going but the views were awesome and the weather was great. It was cool to see the temple on top of the mountain and to imagine people visiting many years ago - very impressive. After a little sit down we made our way in to the village for a well deserved lunch of more incredible Mexican food! Again I let Manders chose the best food to try and I loved all of it! I wish I could remember the names so I can try them again! The restaurant was so brightly painted with gorgeous paper flags hanging from the ceiling and flowery painted chairs - I loved it. After lunch we went to look round a big old church with amazing paintings all the way up the walls and on the ceiling - very cool. In the late afternoon we headed back to Mexico City.

That evening after a really fun day out we ordered sushi and sat down to watch Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid - I'd been told to watch it as bits of it are filmed in places we visited in Bolivia - a great film!

It was sad to say goodbye to Manders after a really fun few days that sped by way too fast - thank you for a fab time. It has been so great to share these adventures with so many friends along the way - it's made it even more special - thank you to all of you who've been part of the journey!

Next stop Canada and a massive temperature change! xxx

(P.s. Ignore the photo attached to this blog - it isn't where I visited - I just had to choose a photo from this website and they didn't have any photos of where I'd been! Sorry!)