(Post 228 of 263)

Wednesday, I had thought to do another all-day tour to see dolphins and a cenote, but it would have been just me, so the cost was very expensive and, frankly, it didn’t sound like much fun on my own. Spoiler: I ended up being happy that I stayed in Campeche as I had a perfect vacation day.

Campeche has two forts high up on either side of the city. I decided I would take a taxi to the western one, Fuerte San Miguel, which also hosts the Campeche archaeological museum, and then walk back into the city via the Malecón.

First, though, was breakfast at Origen again as I had to have those chilaquiles again! This time, they did not have green sauce but could offer me a smokey “slightly spicy” red sauce. It was delicious and not even remotely spicy.

I went to Plaza Principal to try to get a taxi and ended up getting in one colectivo-style, where the taxi is full of passengers. I ended up getting an impromptu tour of the city, complete with the driver pointing out landmarks to me and treating it like a guided tour, before making it to the fort, for the low-low price of only 70 pesos. What a great start to the day!

The fort was reminiscent of similar structures in Canada.

The fort was great in that you have the fort history to learn as well as the Mayan museum within that had tons of artifacts. The space wasn’t huge, but it was easy to spend an hour there.

This Mayan calendar display blew my mind. They had an agricultural calendar and a religious calendar that worked together like gears to create a cycle of time of 52 years roughly equivalent to how we use centuries to mark time.

Their numbering system based on 20 broke my brain but kinda sort makes sense.

After a quick break, I headed north out of the hotel to go to the bank.

This was a day to get back on the Balkan pizza diet of walking a lot and breaking up the day with a giant pizza! I did some research and Patroni’s, where I’d had the shrimp pasta, seemed my best bet. All of their pizzas sound amazing and gourmet and it was hard to decide. After the server came back a third time, I said, “Almost there, I’ve narrowed it to two!” “Perfect,” he said, “We’ll do half and half!” Genius move to offer that!

The left side of my pizza was their “California” with a white base, blue cheese, Serrano ham, and fig jam. OMG. The right side was their “Aspen” with sundried tomato, roasted garlic, and Italian sausage. OMG. LOL!  This was quite a big meal, but the California side was a bit overbaked, so I did not eat most of the crust on that side. The crust on the Aspen side was chewy and amazing. The salty sweet combo was perfect. I think either pizza alone would have been too much of their respective type, but half and half worked great. I’m definitely coming back to Patroni’s next time I am in Campeche to try more of their pizzas!

Campeche historic centre has almost no cell service, oddly enough, so I went to the tourist info centre to ask about museums. You would have thought I was asking for directions to the moon. They had no idea about museums in the city or why I would even be looking for such a thing. Very odd. I ended up finding the small but interesting museum of Mayan architecture and then the city museum (next door to each other) on my own.

The info in the Mayan architecture museum cannot be condensed in a blog post. It was so informative. I learned about the four types of construction and daily life. Like all museums I visited in Campeche, it was tiny, but really well done. Most museums have some English, but not everything is translated.

The city museum was next door across from Plaza Principal and was the first place with free entrance (everything else had been $65). This museum was spread out across the building, so you had to follow the yellow arrows around, which was fun, almost like a treasure hunt to find where to head to next.

As time passed and the native, mestizo, and European populations continued to integrate, you could see the influence of the cultures in the clothing. These are traditional native and mestizo dress with European cuts.

I learned about logwood, Campeche’s black gold, a dye that allowed Europeans to achieve purples, blacks, and other colours more cheaply than with European methods.

There was a display of the original market in Campeche and all the people who worked there. I was amused by the tortilla lady. Some things never change. You can see her in Mérida at the Chaya Maya restaurant making tortillas exactly like this, on a little stool.

I was very tired after my day of walking, so I headed back to the hotel for a few hours, showered and changed, and went back out after dark to get an ice cream.

There was a 9PM walking tour about Campeche legends that sounded interesting, so I decided that I was going to do that! I bought my ticket, went back to my hotel for another rest, then headed out for the tour, which should have been 90 minutes but was a full two hours. I was beat by the end of it! It was very interesting, but unfortunately the guide spoke very fast and had some odd intonations that meant that it was hard to understand him. It was the first time of my entire trip that I really felt like I was travelling in a foreign language and not able to get enough to fully enjoy the experience. It was still very fun and there were some great jump scares.

I thought I could get a late dinner after the tour, but everything shut at 11PM, so I went back to my hotel and had peanut butter sandwiches!

Wednesday was an absolutely perfect vacation day. I’m pretty sure I haven’t put in that many steps in a single day since my Balkan adventures. I brought great footwear to Campeche (all Clarks brand sandals) and rotated them out throughout each day so I was never footsore.