A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Guadalajara...

We´re tired, we´re groggy, we're sunburnt.  We've had enough tequila and cerveza in Puerto Vallarta to fill a kiddie pool.  Our modest, if not absurd, budget of $50USD a day has been completely shot to hell.  It's time to beat it outta town.  So we do what any intrepid traveler would do... we book a bus for Guadalajara leaving at 1 in the morning.  This is our brilliant idea to save money otherwise spent on a hotel.  Makes sense, si?  We sleep on the bus and wake up in another glorious Mexican town just in time for coffee.  Well, it doesn´t exactly turn out that way.

When we arrive at the bus station in Puerto Vallarta around midnight to pick up our tickets, the desk agent stares at me a bit warily.  "You cannot get on this bus Señor if you are drunk."  "I´m not drunk," I stammer.  This is all happening in Spanish, of course, so my reaction time is a bit delayed.  Like I´m, uh, drunk.  Thank goodness we learned the word for "drunk" in Mexico City: borracho.  "Has your friend been drinking?"  I look at William.  He is red-faced from the sunburn and his eyes are bloodshot.  He just woke up from a nap moments before we left for the station.  And since he doesn't understand Spanish, he is staring at the desk agent with his mouth hanging open.  He looks totally drunk.  "Of course he is not drunk."  The agent does not believe me.  "You should give him some coffee before the bus leaves."  He hands us our tickets, snarling.  This is like that airport reality show where obnoxious people en route to Las Vegas or to their daughter´s wedding  are denied boarding because they are stinking, falling down drunk and ranting about Socialism.  I guess this is what we have become.

The bus is enormous.  No, seriously.  Ridiculously huge.  Bigger than a smallish airplane.  There are two bathrooms on board.  The seats are bigger and better than Lazy Boy recliners.  The interior looks like a plush stretch limo on steriods.  We even get a bagged meal and choice of beverage.  Take that, Greyhound.

We are arriving in Guadalajara with no plan.  No hotel reservation, nothing.  What we didn´t bargain for was that when our space ship bus pulled into Guadalajara it would still be dark out.  Very dark.  6AM and no sign of the sun.  We take a cab fromt he bus terminal to the city center.  I tell the cabbie to drop us off in the Plaza de Armas.  Which is sort of the Mexican equivalent to arriving in New York City in the middle of the night, for the first time, and asking to be dropped off in Central Park.  Stupid.  The cabbie asks me what address near the Plaza?  I say, "oh, you know, just anywhere.  In the center."  Haha.  Stupid gringos.  So we get out of the cab, pitch dark outside, huge backpacks on and stumble into the very middle of Guadalajara, a pretty big city of several million.  Although, most of those millions are still asleep.  We are alone on the streets.  It was our hope to find a cafe to sit down at and make a plan, but there are no cafes open.  A few places are being hosed down and polished in anticipation of the sunrise, but no one is serving anything.  In America, we would be firmly catagorized as "homeless drunks."

We find a hostel that we had seen advertised on the web and ring the bell.  "Who is it?"  It is 6:45AM.  "Hola?"  I can't believe they buzzed us in.

So we´ve spent two days here, touring the beautiful Baroque buildings, more cathedrals, more crowded markets and food stalls, lounging in the sun on the roof deck of the hostel.

There isn´t a whole lot to do, so now we are again on the move.  Travel in Mexico is far more expensive than anticipated, so we are heading South towards cheaper pastures.  Another epic bus trip today will take us back through Mexico City and then onward to Oaxaca, where we should arrive tomorrow morning around, um, 6AM....