The second day was less pleasant than the first. The first part of the walk was very easy indeed: first a steep walk down to the floor of the narrow valley with a small yellow silted river (I would call it a stream really) running down in, and then along the stream for about four hours. Of these, the first two were very same-same, a few small fields in the valley, otherwise the steep valley sides on either sides covered in slender trees. Gradually, however, the landscape became more interesting: we rose above the river and the trees became covered in clouds of white lichen, ghostly even in the bright sunlight. The vegetation gradually changed and more cactus and succulents appeared. There were some specacular vertical gardens along this way, hung with cactuses, ferns and lichens in glorious profusion. This path is an old pre-Hispanic trading route from the Gulf of Mexico to Oaxaca’s central valleys, so we passed some relics along the way: an old steam bath made of stones, centuries old and festooned with flowering vines and cactus, and an open space where a long vanished cabin had stood; serpents carved into rock; and what we were told was a map of the route indicating where not to spend the night because of the danger of wild animals. This last I was sceptical about. There were also the stones which look like things, a genre beloved of guides the world over. Here we saw the stone that looked like a duck, and a stone that looked like the Virgen Soledad (a triangle, basically). There was also a shrine along the way to where the Virgin had appeared: a white triangular monument high on the cliff face, like a shark’s fin, and at the level of the trail an actual shrine with an image and many offerings of flowers.
The last two hours of the walk were hellish: dusty, exposed and very, very hot and bright, and of course, uphill. I was quite miserable though at least I didn’t turn as purple as I often do, a most humiliating experience. Anyhow, we got to the top and had a fairly inferior lunch in the final village, San Miguel Amatlan, scenically perched on a cliff edge over a valley. Then the long drive back to Oaxaca about two hours. On the way I listened to podcasts, first one about a controversial BBC Access programme in the 1980s about racism on the BBC, and it was depressing to realise that it made exactly the same points about letting racists like Enoch Powell set the terms of the debate that are made about Nigel Farage today, with right-thinking liberals in power responsible in both eras. Plus ca change. Then I moved on to the film review where my old love, Keanu Reeves, was interviewed about the new John Wick film, and actually made me want to watch it.
We got back to Oaxaca and had our showers and finally the heat caught up with me. I succumbed to a truly hideous migraine, unable to bear the slightest bit of light, and threw up what remained in my stomach of my lunch. This actually made me feel better and though I couldn’t eat dinner, I had a cup of tea and a corner of a pastry, and then dozed for a couple of hours. Actual sleep was late in coming as there was some sort of party going on somewhere in Oaxaca, with a very adept DJ playing what seemed to be the greatest hits of every year from 1970 onwards, so there was a fine mixture of songs I knew and songs I nearly knew, so it was hard not to pay attention. Anyhow, when I did finally sleep, around 2, I slept well and woke without a headache and with appetite fully returned.