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At the End of a Long Drive


Shreesh and Neena Taskar

We didn't make the decision, the decision made us. On October 20th, 2007, we left our comfortable city of San Francisco to follow a simple algorithm - go North till the road ends then turn around and then go as far South. In between those two points was the stage, the timeline, the space, where we made things happen and things happened to us.

The past is fleeting and the stories, the sights and the feelings are perishable. One sees what one wants to see, and perhaps we are not capable of more. We saw that people are kind and helpful even if they were not materially rich. Some we could understand even though we didn't speak the same language, the motivations of others were incomprehensible even though we did. In the end fragments remain - the smell of roasting chocolate, a flock of snow Ptarmigians on snow, the creaking of the rainforest, the rough feathers of penguins, and the intoxication of Curanto.


So these are our stories. Every time you visit the site you will see a random post below. Each starts with Lo que pasa es que...

Campeche-by-the-Sea

Mar 24th, 2008 by

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Cathedral

On the road to Merida, Campeche is a lovely stop. (Map this!)

The moment we pulled into Campeche, I felt a strong desire to spend more than the couple of nights here than we had originally planned. A World Heritage site, Campeche is a walled city located on the coast, with a refreshing breeze blowing in from the sea dispelling the tropic heat. The houses along the streets are all painted in pleasing pastels; must be a city rule as all the colors go so well together.

Campeche – An undiscovered gem.
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An undiscovered gem, it seems devoid of the usual tourist surge. The government seems to have high hopes that tourism will take off, though, as most of the beautifully painted houses are actually façades with just grass, blue sky and old ruins behind the closed doors. With such a beautiful setting, I have to assume that one day it will be as popular as San Cristobal.

3 Responses to “Campeche-by-the-Sea”

  1. madhuri says:
    March 25, 2008 at 10:35 am

    Looks quite idyllic!

  2. Fred says:
    March 25, 2008 at 12:35 pm

    Why the facades on the buildings? i.e. why aren’t those buildings occupied? Do you attribute this to a slow economy?

  3. Shreesh says:
    March 26, 2008 at 3:11 pm

    Fred,

    We were wondering exactly the same thing. Apparently UNESCO gave them a bunch of money to spruce up the place after its inclusion on the WHC list in 1999. Very surprisingly the city officials seemed to have actually used it for public good as opposed to lining their pockets with it.

    Campeche used to be the only port on the Yucatan so the city boomed. Later, Yucatan built another port and all the shipping traffic went there, causing Campeche to depopulate. Hence a large portion of the houses were abandoned for almost a hundred years. With the UNESCO funds the city fixed up the ‘look’ but I guess they are still awaiting people to come back and fix up the town.

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