(Post 11 of 189. Thanks again to those who participated in the Fundrazr!)

I walked over 11KM my first day in Oaxaca, but unfortunately, I did not sleep well my first night, a combination of a horrible typical Mexican mattress and my not having slept in a bed in a full year. The awful bed was a shame because, otherwise, the room was quite dark and quiet.

I had coffee and breakfast at the apartment and put in several hours of work before heading out for a ramble. I made the decision to keep Thursday and Friday very unstructured, with no museums or organized activities as I had quite a bit of work (proofreading) to do and I didn’t want to go into “vacation mode” just yet.

My first stop Thursday morning was the Alcalá, Oaxaca’s pedestrian street.

I thought a raspado (shaved iced) with pineapple and chamoy would be lovely, but it was sadly too sweet for my new tastebuds and I was unable to finish it (I call them new, but I’ve had them six years now…).

Oaxaca is really interesting from an architectural point of view in that sometimes, I feel like I’m in Europe and other times, I feel like I’m in Arizona.

Lots of stray dogs around time, but they mostly look well kept.

This is the famous Boulenc bakery, at which I bought my first real croissant in years.

My apartment is close enough to everything that I can go in and out. I headed home to put away the baked goods and to do more work.

Then, I set off in search of lunch by the Zócalo. On the way there, I cut across a courtyard with a lovely stone pattern.

The gate was lovely as well.

The plan had been to have my first comida corrida/menu del dia at a more upscale restaurant on the Zocalo… but the special of the day was… Yucatecan cochinita. You can’t make this stuff up! I ended up wandering around and found a more average meal, which is the subject of the next post!