Tepoz

So this is the town I went to in November for the long weekend with Shania's cousin.  He has a house there and we drove by car in the middle of the night (I slept).  This trip was different of course since it was a day trip and by bus.  The only thing we got out of the house to do in November, though, was climb the pyramid, so basically the end goal was the same!

We got on the bus and luckily had entertainment from several small children and their families.  It only took 30 minutes, so it wasn't bad.  

The bus stopped at a corner and it didn't all come back to me, so I asked if we were there and the bus driver assured me that yes, in fact, we had arrived.

We started walking toward the pyramid, only I was still disoriented.  We passed the market that I remembered, but it didn't seem to be where it was supposed to be!

Then I saw it.  There was a church that I remembered raving Beto to.  So we zigzagged our way toward that church, seemingly going down, down, down a new hill with each block (about 4 blocks).  I didn't remember the downhill part being that dramatic.  Hmm....

We walked a little more and then I saw that there was no road in front of the church.  Seems there was back in November.  Weird.  

We stop and ask.  We should turn left, go about 6 blocks, and then take another left.

Turns out we had gone down those 4 blocks unnecessarily.  We had to go back up them.  So we did.  I, of course, was already breaking a sweat and we hadn't even gotten to the entrance of the hike...

This is the main street (that we got sidetracked from!) of Tepoztlán.  The pyramid is not the highest point you see, but the second highest.

The path is 2 kilometers long, but has an incline of one kilometer.  So it's a pretty good grade (at least for this girl).  The sign says that it's about an hour ascent.  We started off with 235 steps before hitting pure rocks.

It's a pretty good hike.  We stopped 2 or 3 times to catch our breath and cool off, which is about 4 times less than we stopped with Beto and Chory, the smokers. 

After about 40 minutes of hiking, we got to the staircases.  There are two: the ascending and the descending.  
We took our turn up the stairs and were about 5 minutes away from achieving the goal for the day.  We paid our 35 pesos to "enter" the pyramid, which supposedly has healing/calming/something powers.
(These two pictures are out of order.  We took these on the way back down.)

Once at the top of the stairs, I stopped and got what I thought was lemonade.  It turns out it was what's called a suerito: which is mineral water, lime, and salt.  Bleh!  But it was cold and I was thirsty.  After getting over the initial nastiness, it's decently quenching.

That's the cup in my hand in the picture above and that's why there are people lined up in the picture below.

At the top of the pyramid, we had to wait a good 15 minutes to get a spot to sit down.  It was crowded!  And once you're there, you don't want to move!  The view is spectacular, but even better is the breeze and sense of calm.  They say this pyramid is a source of energy, and part of me buys it.  This whole town is about hippie stuff and UFOs.  Astrology, etc.

I think we spent about 45 minutes up there next to the sun and Ashley had the sunburn to prove it!  Her shoulders were bright red.  Her legs were the best, though.  She called it strawberry and vanilla from where she had sat with her legs crossed.  I got to be chocolate because I did nothing but renew my tan.
As we were preparing to go back down, who do we see?  The Frenchys.  After listening to them some, I decided they were speaking German, so maybe I misheard the day before?  Ashley was heartbroken, but mostly because "Germanys" is not nearly as fun of a nickname as "Frenchys."

I just remembered that we actually saw them on the way up.  We started the hike at the same time, thought I think they sprinted it.  But it was when we were headed back down that we realized that it was German.

The descent is never as fun as the ascent.  Not to mention it's almost harder.  It's harder on your joints (in my humble opinion) and you just want to be there, but have to go cautiously to avoid a slip.

A very nice restaurant (that was one of the three recommended in my book) was conveniently located before the exit from the hike.  We were more than happy to enter (as you can see below from our absolutely exhausted expressions).  We were less than thrilled, however, to have a  new set of stairs to first descend and then ascend to get to the restaurant.

Once inside, it was peaceful and beautiful.  It's too bad we looked like we did!
I had a mole dish that was INCREDIBLE and terribly expensive.  We shared a jar of some mixed juice: mango and pineapple maybe?  Even though I had had my 1.5 liters of water throughout the hike, plus the salty drink, I still had more than my fair share of 2/3 of that pitcher!

We both ate way too much (as in basically licked our plates clean, including our appetizer of guacamole)!

As if we hadn't had enough trouble walking due to too much activity, now add to the fact that we were miserably stuffed.

On the positive side, there was a great bathroom at this restaurant.  (And Ashley can contest that you don't ever want to use a bathroom offered by a sign on the side of the road.)