Sunday June 16th. 12am- 12pm.
The 2nd of 3 legs of the flight to Puerto Escondido arrives in Mexico city a little after midnight. By the time I clear immigration and then customs it is close to 1am. Even though my next flight is not until 10:45am I begin looking for where it’s gate is. As it turns out it is in the newer terminal and the only way to get there is via a monorail train which does not run between midnight and 5am. The terminal I am in is mostly deserted, occupied by policia in their orange caps, and maintenance workers cleaning and polishing floors. I wander around and find a Wings restaurant and proceed to order de-caf and juice and I settle in for the night. I do not speak any Spanish myself, but the spanish-only waiter and his boss show me how to connect to their Wi-Fi in a flash when I point to the connection menu on my Kindle, and thru the night I attempt to learn my first few words (cafe, jumex, el cheque por favor, el cajero automatico.
AT 5am when the monorail began running again I got on and was taken to Terminal 2. Mexico City is at altitude (7600 ft.), but I left all my jackets and sweaters at home. Even though it was a fairly pleasant 69d F outdoors the air conditioning was blowing cold air and it seemed to be coming from everywhere. It also became extremely busy with hundreds and hundreds of travelers shortly after I arrived, and the seats were very hard and not conducive to sleeping on. I dozed but that was all. Every 1/2 hour or so I got up and wandered around, and I stumbled upon a Mayan Culture exhibit with many large photographs accompanied with narratives, which I of course found very exciting.
At the appropriate time I got checked in and made my way to my gate, and the last 90 minute flight to the coast, which took place on a very nice 50-seat twin engine turbo prop that flew smoothly at 21,000 ft. There were only 9 passengers on the flight so I was able to choose my seat, and I watched the landscape roll by below us for most of the flight. I wished to see what Oaxaca province looked like, thinking as always about future motorcycle adventures.
When we got to the Pacific we were given a great surprise. The plane flew out over the ocean (at about 1000 ft) and then along the coast for a good five minutes before banking slightly inland for the airport, which lies a very short distance from the water. The entire time we had ocean on the right and endless beach on the left. Very Nice.