Return to Mexico

We’d planned a trip to Oaxaca with our friends Barbara and Dan Williams in 2023. But Barbara got COVID at the last minute, so just three of us made it. At the time, we resolved to return with Barbara. And we did that this year! The four of us, along with intrepid guides Jorge Montejo-Diaz and Amy McAndrews, revisited most of the places in and around Oaxaca (but with a few changes and additions). Before and after the time together, Terry and I traveled with Jorge and Amy. Here are a few highlights from the various segments of our trip.

A word about safety in Mexico. There are definitely parts of this country where travel is not safe because of the drug cartels. But other parts of the country are quite safe. In between, it depends on what’s happening with the cartels. Our guides live in Veracruz state, and have friends in all the areas we traveled. They were able to get recent information about any safety issues so we could have adjusted our schedule and route if needed. As a result, we did not have any concerns during our trip.

Chiapas State

We flew in to Tuxtla Guitérrez and arrived at our Hotel Palmarecas about 1:30 a.m.! Luckily we were able to sleep in the next day. This is the capital of the state of Chiapas.  “Tuxtla” means ‘place of the rabbits’ in the indigenous Aztec language.

At Parque Nacional Cañon del Sumidero just outside of the city, we had impressive views of the canyon, which is deeper than Arizona’s Grand Canyon, and of the Rio Grijalva that carved it. There were also some nice views of life birds, despite an incoming cold front.

The next day, we visited the El Ocote Biosphere Reserve in the morning, drove to San Cristobal, then to the Parque Ecoturistico Montetik in the afternoon, a biodiverse area maintained by the local community (ejido). The cold, windy weather kept us from finding many birds. We were glad to have the cozy Hotel Buen Samaritano to return to for dinner and the evening!

Our next day at the mountainous Montetik was much more successful, with beautiful scenery and great looks at some gorgeous hummingbirds and warblers. In the afternoon, we stopped at La Sepultura Biosphere Reserve on our way to Arriaga. We enjoyed an impressive display of acrobatic flying by a flock of Giant Swallowtail Swifts; we also had the surprise of meeting up with a group of Jorge and Amy’s friends, who were doing surveys of native plants in the reserve. Birding stops the next day allowed us to find some interesting birds, including the endemic Nava’s Wren in dense, foggy forest on a karst limestone slope.

We returned to Tuxtla Guitérrez for the night and our friends Barbara and Dan arrived on the same late night flight we’d taken a few days earlier. So the next day all of us returned to La Sepultura Biosphere Reserve. We saw the very beautiful Rosita’s Bunting (now known as Rose-breasted Bunting) much better than we did two years ago.

Oaxaca State

As we traveled the main highway from Chiapas to Oaxaca, we began noticing a slowdown and many huge trucks parked along the road. Pretty soon, there was a logjam of trucks with a few cars mixed in, and many people milling around. It turned out the workers in the nearby mango orchards had blocked the highway to protest wages and working conditions. Luckily, our driver knew a tiny dirt backroad and we were able to get around the stoppage.

We arrived in Huatulco and enjoyed staying again at the Hotel Mision de Los Arcos and eating at the Sabor de Huatulco. While in Huatulco, we repeated our activities from 2023 – a lovely pelagic birding trip, birding in the Parque Nacional Huatluco, visiting the historic Cruz del Monte trail crossing, and eating lots of good food.  The event we enjoyed the most involved a group of boobies and other birds perching on the backs of basking sea turtles.

As we did on the previous trip, we went up into the Sierra del Sur Mountains and stayed in cabins at the Puesta del Sol lodge in San José del Pacifico. The mountain scenery was spectacular and the pine forests had some great birds as well.

Oaxaca City

It was great to return to our Hotel Azucenas in the historic central part of Oaxaca! The hotel has a great character and is within walking distance of many museums, plazas and restaurants. One of the highlights was dinner at Las Quince Letras, serving creative regional cuisine and mezcal cocktails on a rooftop terrace. We also visited several of the major churches and the Textile Museum, and spent an interesting morning again at Monte Alban.

Two cultural experiences were new this trip and added to our enjoyment and understanding of the area’s culture. We visited the Casa Encanto weaving studio in Teotitlán del Valle. Their demonstration of the process began with cleaning the wool and ended with operating the looms. Their designs range from generations-old Zapotec patterns to digitally-drawn sci-fi scenes. We also went to Oaxaca’s Jalatlaco neighborhood for “Mezcal & Molé”. This turned out to be great fun! The owner, Daniel, has created mezcal tastings (similar to tastings at wineries) that are paired with different types of molé. We had no idea there were so many different mezcals, nor so many variations of molé – we had seven pairs – and it was even more surprising to find how well the two tastes can complement one another.

We did some birding in and around Oaxaca as well. On our last visit, we’d birded the slopes at La Cumbre and wished we could be there in the late evening or early morning to search for owls in the forest. This time, we spent one night at rustic cabins on this slope. Although we didn’t find the owls, we did get Dwarf Jays and Terry’s nemesis birds, Aztec Thrushes.

After a very long drive to Tuxtepec, we visited a different karst foothill habitat (very dry and open) and found the rare habitat specialist, the Sumichrast’s Wren.

Veracruz State

Our last birding area together was outside Catemaco, in Veracruz state. We birded along the lakeshore and in another Biosphere Reserve of beautiful forest on a mountain slope, where we found the elusive Tuxtla Quail Dove. Then we said good-bye to Barbara and Dan in Veracruz. With Jorge and Amy, we continued on to Xalapa, the capital of Veracruz state. We spent two days birding here. Among the highlights were birding in a little subdivision that looked like a ghost town and birding in the rain at the top of Xalapa Park in the central part of the city.

Veracruz City

The next day, we drove back down to the city of Veracruz, on the Atlantic coast. Jose and Amy brought us to our Emporio Hotel on the waterfront, and we said our good-byes. We spent parts of two days exploring the city.  It was founded by Cortes in 1519, and was the major port for shipping gold and other treasure from Mexico back to Spain. A major fort, San Juan de Ulúa, protected the harbor from pirates; it was later used as a prison for political prisoners (among others). The last night here we had a harrowing taxi ride but finally found Fussion, a charming restaurant in a small house in a neighborhood outside downtown. The food was extraordinary and the ambiance both cozy and unique.

In the course of the trip, we visited 3 states and saw 379 birds in all. Of these, 20 were lifers for Karen and about 13 for Terry. There were many distinctive areas, interesting cities and fascinating birds.