From Palenque to Villahermosa, Mexico

Yesterday (Saturday) we decided to sleep in and not rush off ‘to beat the crowds’, after all we are part of the tourist crowd! Our focus was to visit the archaeological park of Palenque. Without much effort we discovered transportation out to the park was relatively cheap and frequent. Jim has an uncanny knack to commute well (even with his elementary Spanish) so we hopped into a taxi with a young German couple, getting to the park in record time. As it turned out the park is quite large, people seem to spread out quickly so it never did feel crowded. Palenque turned out to be one of our favourites - it’s well maintained and like all we’ve visited - grand, picturesque and awe inspiring. The actual town of Palenque is welcoming to tourists, seems to thrive on its proximity to the ruins but a little different than the site - in itself not particularly attractive…

We left this morning, taking a ‘colectivo’ to Villahermosa, a 2 hour ride north of Palenque. We’ll spend the night here, catch a flight tomorrow morning to Mexico City. This afternoon we found the ‘La Venta Parque’ (not for from our hotel) we’d been looking forward to visiting, but unfortunately it’s been closed due to some issue with one of the ‘felines’ housed in the park. Regardless, we stuck our heads through an opening in the surrounding fence to catch a glimpse of one of the stone Olmec heads we’d hoped to see many of… Oh well, we discovered there’s a lengthy ‘malecon’ along side the park that skirts a section of a very scenic lagoon. Being a Sunday with nice balmy weather, there were families, couples and lots of vendors (selling treats and toys) enjoying the public walkway - no lack of entertainment!