Tulum. To, I think, rhyme with doom, tomb or heirloom. Or maybe just hum instead.

Required: A synonym for hangover. Instead settle with ¨Last night´s expensive red wine sloshes around the synapses of my brain, washing away the cells and replacing them with miniature knitting needles´´.

Pack, tidy, head into the day, the morning heat causing sweat to cascade down my forehead and into my eyes, small relief is pressing a 1.5 litre bottle of water hard against my lips. My travel clothing: jeans, hiking shoes, a jumper. Mountain wear for the carribean coast.

The bus a relief, cooler than the street, the AC sufficient. Yesterdays burn continues to irritate. Arrive in Tulum, a 30 second hostel walk, more sweat. Check in. 2 minutes after arrival i´m informed the last bus to the beach is about to leave. Drop everything. Jump on. Remember my ridiculous outfit, my shoulder bag crammed with pointless books, the only thing I need, my travel towel, left at the hostel.

Too late to turn back. Wander the beach in the jeans and the hiking shoes (thermal socks included). A dismal show in blistering dry heat. I abandon the beach, hit the roadside. Warmer if anything. 15 minute hike and more ruins. On top of cliff face, small but saved by the spectacular location, waves crash below. The lizards here huge, bigger than the jungle and less wary of humans. Luckily the excursion is short, 40 minutes, maybe less.

A taxi, the driver´s english passable at best, but he pumps his fist for England and shouts ´´God save the Queen´´ and this is no time to debate monarchy so I nod faux encouragement and think ´´Christ´´. Devour tacos in a roadside cafe. All of central Tulum is a roadside.

The hostel has a bizarre tab system: electronic tags to a computer screen to a receipt print out to an employee to getting whatever. Order a burger and get the raw ingredients and instructions on how to operate the outdoor grill. It´s not particularly cheap, and the lager so weak it´d take about 333 bottles to touch drunkeness so I don´t bother and chat to other people, all of whom going the opposite way, Cancun, Cuba, the States. Feel I am operating in reverse.

Playa Del Carmen

A hostel rooftop, a bar, a tiny pool, my plans on a thread. Sun cascades over roof tops as a caribbean breeze chills the terrace. Horrific dance music, fresh from late night radio 1, doing all it can to spoil the ambience. The place has a mini Ibiza feel. More English accents overhead in 10 minutes than the previous 18 days. The usual drivel. My 2 night stay feels overlong.

Spent the earlier portion wandering streets of valladoid, a slow burning goodbye. The need for excitement great another to consider and then immediately reject an impulsive Cancun move. The bus journey here a mess of grapes, seeds all over the seat and sweet juice soaking my trousers. Playa Del Carmen greets me with McDonalds. Play ´spot the american chain store´ momentarily. Too easy.

And here I am. Another beer. Talk to a Canadian guy, Martin, and we stroll the muggy streets together. Too hot for any kind of pace. Pay extortionate amounts for weak beer, hit a night club, the one saving grace the beachside location. The clientelle exclusively white, mainly american. More beer anyway. A stupendous fire show. Another beer. Somehow this keeps up till 4am. I´m not sure how. My wallet weigh in provides some clues.

Wake hungover. Stifling heat no shelter. A note on my backpack ´´organise your stuff´´. The origin unclear and I do not comply. Instead I smear liquid soap all over the dorm floor (an accident!). Gorge on grilled chicken and coca cola, then nothingness, basic level pissing around, till morning hits noon. At 1pm I´m finally beached. Stretch towel, apply lotion, soak sun, stare into the endless blue sky, but then it occurs that I can´t even swim without leaving stuff unattended.

And so instead it´s a sea long walk, the warm shallow waves lap against my footsteps, and relax my mood, then finish a novel in the sand. Bump into Martin on a crowded playa street, which is cool as I can finally swim in the calm mellow Carribean waves, but it´s more floating than swimming. Effort beyond me. And then I turn bright red and scream for the shade.

Cheap piles of chinese food, a shower, a shave, more rooftop beer, a routine. And then some hostel trip to another club. Much the same, but the air conditioning pumps freezing air, a relief to my glowing skin. And the shows here are weirder, a girl dances near naked, then a guy does nearly the same but with added trapeze. Head to exit.


Pointless quote for my own entertainment:

¨There is a crime here that goes beyond denunciation, there is a sorrow here that weeping cannot symbolise, there is a failure here that topples all our success´´

Chichen Itza

Early rise for a ruinous theme park jaunt. Bus at 7, then the road to ruin. Entry price triple that of other Mayan sites. As if they´re attempting to ruin me. Enough.

Sparse at the early hour, the Cancun tourist hordes yet to arrive. The main temple suitably dramatic against the cloudless sky. Hawkers everywhere. The ball court off limits, imagined sacrificial games fr another day. Dream of heads rolling down steps instead. Clamber around, hug old columns, observe the observatory. A huge water hole impressive, skeletons drag against the depths, but on the horizon the Americans scream in unison and we run for the hills as the sun bakes our skins.

An hour bus wait, a tree for shade and then away to the town. The most delicious tacos in mexico yet in a sparse small cafe, boiled egg addition wonderous. Then a dessert of fruit so rich and it´s hard to believe no liquour involved. And then another cenote, bat filled and a tree overhangs the surface, through a skylight, and the roots hang down until they touch the water. A few people mill around the bottom so I grab a rubber ring and nearly decapitate half of them. It´s dark, fish nibble my feet, and a child yells something at me repeatedly I don´t understand. Apparantly I look like a famous football player. I do not look anything like the footballer in question.

Hostel boomerang. Alone for the first time in a week. I go to a real restaurant for the first time. Splurge on two courses, mushrooms in a cream chili (inevitably) sauce. The food excellent, but I´m overcharged by 22 pesos. A scandal that immediately rights itself when the offlicense undercharges by at least 30 pesos. Feel karmatic, the world on an even keel once more.

A thunderous storm batters the windows, shutters swing, lights sway, and as suddenly as it starts it stops, so sit outside and talk to various nationalities. My favourites a retired dutch couple with whom I discuss Kurt Vile and Sufjan Stevens as tequila flows into midnight. A high of a sorts and then sleep in a deserted dorm as mosquitos circle my bed with intent.

To Valladolid!

Sunday in Merida is street markets and people crowd the square. This is a relative crowd, but the square is even on all sides. I skip breakfast so I can eat mysterious meat covered in chilli sauce & corrainder, then wrapped in flour tortilla bread (a rarity in Mexico so far, corn prevailant). Simple and satisfying. Then a bus ride to the beach, the Gulf of Mexico.

I recall seeing pictures of a great white attacking a diving cage in this sea not so long ago so don´t hang around, although I do swim briefly, the water warm, the waves rocky as is the beach. I witness speed boats accelerationg towards the coast, as if on a mission to decapitate the swimmers, food for the sharks. I´m safe in a covered hut, my feet buried in white hot sand, sipping ice cold beer.

And then the skies blacken, the heathens open, my dreams of shrimp tacos on the beach shattered. Run for the bus, the comfort of the mid-city. The journey takes the brunt of this new storm, and by the time I arrive back the city is damp, the air clean. Swallow some more tacos, this time duck. Nice weather for it etc. So spicy my tastebuds tingle.

Whirlwind hostel stop then bag-ladened walk to the bus stop, multiple wrong directions taken, and I sit in a bus station where even the staff look like they´ve either just got out or will soon be in jail. Hug my bags close, and avoid eye contact. And the bus arrives, second class in every way, and I bound to a seat, no thought of ettiquette, first come first served. Leave the terminal in bright daylight, arrive in Valladolid covered by a black shroud, but the journey wonderful, winding slow roads though small patchwork villages as the sun settles on the day.

Valladolid quiet. The hostel a ramshackle jungle lite delight. I need a beer, there´s a strict 5PM on a Sunday curfew, but the sardonic Dutch owner provides instructions to the one off-license in town that prefers to rebel. Small victories.

Sperlunking in Merida-ocrity

Breakfast is dry fake toast and bitter coffee, yesterdays fruit bowl replaced by empty space. Probably the mosquitos got it. Read about Cenotes, basically sink holes in the ground, 10,000 of them in Yucatan (A mexican told me this, and thus probably an outrageous lie).

The ride there is 3 staged, first a collectivo, then a mile bike ride on some hybrid pedal bike, the carriage strapped to the front so we will hit oncoming traffic first, and finally a horse drawn cart down a single lane rail. An old short mexican man drives the horse forwards with a constant whipping, and the tracks so uneven my teeth rattle and my nose itches from the vibrations, The path is narrow, tree lined and the gap between is illuminatd with bright green and yellow butterflies, far too many to count, like fairy dust as they catch the sun.

The first cave is a steep jump into clear freshwater, too deep to make out the bottom, and the cave quickly turns dark and eerie. Terror of prehistoric reptiles lying below makes breathing difficult, whilst bats swirl above. Still, it´s fun. There´s a second, higher platform, made with rickety timber and exposed nails, the jump lengthy and over rocky surface. My nerves fail, I don´t remember finding much solace in the long jump at school, but Jacob goes for it and creates an admirable spalsh.

Next up is a hole deep in the ground, a vertical ladder for 20ft then a 2 meter drop into the water. Similar setting, though the light is lower here. No hestitation. Run and jump, sink like a stone, grasp for the surface, deep breaths, climb up, rinse and repeat. And onwards again, a 3rd and final cave, more of the same. It´s a pleasent way to spend a sunny Saturday afternoon.

We return to a downpour, the streets are rivers of rainwater, knee-high and fast flowing. Dirt and litter dragged to the surface, the water murky and warm. A strange sight, a city without proper drainage? A filling tea of a huge burrito, and my Saturday effectively over, a break from alcohol and excitement for now.

Merida at tangents

Jacob, my American companion for now, manages to get robbed on the nightbus. Suspicions falls on the military, who performed a midride bag search, his money in the overhead compartment, his camera also gone.

The whole of South Mexico rings with tales of corruption. Funny and terrifying. The police more interested in making money from tourists than fighting crime. Minor allegations bought off with cash, drug busts for a backhander, an Irish Man mugged and beaten by Mexican cops in St. Cristobel for 200 pesos. An attempted entrapment only thwarted when the military step onto the police turf and can't decide how to split the earnings, jailing for drugs possession, the convictions crushed for 100 dollars - all off the record. Never, under any circumstances, ask a police for directions. Stay in large groups. Avoid, distrust, fear.

Paranoid rant over. Merida ''nice'', but not as beautiful as St. Cristobel or as alive as Mexico City. An inbetween town. Moquitos attack in earnest, the hostel providing fertile feeding ground, Deet a temporary solution that seems only to increase the ferocity of biting once the initial affects have worn off. It rains here too, but it's cooler in the evenings. I spend the day wandering city streets, with Jacob & Virginia, than just Virginia and then just Jacob. Nothing happens, eating hot pork torta's in a corrugated iron hut whilst the pavement glistens the highlight. The night is sedate, a Friday lacking in fun. A quick trip to ''Mayan Bar'', less cheesy than that sounds, the music Mexican dance-punk fusion, the only words I make out ''Maggie Thatcher''.

This reminds me of a crazy old American guy I met in the Mexican jungle after taking the wrong path home. He told me Thatcher was the greatest world leader of past 50 years, lauded the falklands war, drew maps and diagrams, nonsensical ranting about the role of Government, power structures plotted against the worlds seas, believed the NHS the worlds greatest evil. It ends with a 5 minute monologue in praise of Tony Blair. A truly baffling interlude.

More Jungle

Morning brings more showers and a tiny spider swings desperately on webbing in the electric fan breeze, never quite making the wall. The suspended frustration hypnotic. I'm awake later than intended, at least 10 hours of sleep, my first action to swig warm water, my second to bite into the cold remains of last nights burger, my hunger returning. The English girls were supposed to get up at daybreak but are still asleep when I flee to the ruins midmorning.

The ruins are set in Jungle terrain. On the path up I see huge lizards, running like dinosaurs on hind legs and frogs the size of toads. The heat here is wet and sticky, the sweat clings and clogs, and fabric dampens even when left to rest. I'm still weak from the yesterday without food, the climbs almost unbearable, the steps steep and bumpy, at each summit I sit and rest.

The highest point features a carving of a man smoking tobacco. A whistle breaks through the silence. A girl deciding to follow the ancient Mayan ritual told she can't. Call this progress.

Wander some more, photographs mounting. Then a forest walk to some waterfalls, over a rope bridge and above a crystal clear lagoon, illuminated in the bright midday sun, surrounded by 50 shades of green. A museum and return to the jungle hangout to read ''Grapes of Wrath'' in shade and later candle light, relaxing as the rain beats down, the falling water doing nothing to ease the humidity. And I could stay another night, but that would mean another day lazing around the jungle and I need to keep moving, otherwise I'll die like a shark. So a couple of beers, chat about magic, and it's a taxi into town and a night bus towards Merida, too tired to not sleep.

Jungle Blues

Fond farewells in the hostel courtyard, talk of Guatemala meet, turn down an offer of church ground smoking and instead walk into town, sunfilled at last. A collectivo to Osago, then again to Palenque, a nothingish sort of day.

The busses horrific, part 1 cramped into a space means dead leg, means no sleep, means DVT, and every bump sends my head crashing into the ceiling, brain cells falling by the road side, the bumps numerous.

Palenque is Jungle is weird creatures roaming is badly lit windowless wooden huts, the fan whir constant. I share with 2 English girls I meet on the bus, more excitement than it sounds, particularly as I am dehydrated and this turns to full on sickness, the urge to vomit too strong to eat more than a couple of chips. I drink litres of water but it's too late, for today anyway, and so I head to bed at 7 and stare at the ceiling awhile.

A mid-evening spider trauma, the beast small but as if on skates, out of nowhere, faster than my eyes can follow. Isobel, the nicest english girl saves me, trapping and expelling the vile arachnid. Then she gives me a tablet for sickness, but her guardian angel status is fleeting as she then mentions she's not actually sure if it's for sickness or diarrhea, and I don't need the latter, but anyway, the thought is a nice one. Then comes the darkness, fat rain drops crashing against the jungle canopy, louder even than the insect buzz, relentless. Close my eyes, cover my eyes, goodnight cruel jungle, goodnight.

St. Cristobel 2

A canyon ride first thing, my stomach in knots, my tongue like sandpaper. Jump on a bus full of strangers to the boat and I'm on the edge of my seat, not out of excitement, but because the girl next to me is the size of a small street.

Relief on arrival at the shore turns to lonesome panic. Attach myself to a French girl who speaks English in attempt to understand basic instructions on where I should go, and then the boat itself, a speed vessel thrill ride through sheer cliff walls, past crocodiles and howler monkeys, into the mist and out the other side. Almost beautiful, the litter ruining any illusion of paradise. The guide talks occasionally but the French girl is sat with her boyfriend, out of reach and instead I rely on eavesdropping an annoying loud American couple who shout out loudly things like 'can we have it in English please' until someone tells them.

Way back stop in a village for lunch, a one-stop town, I chance chicken mole once more, and it's sweet, spicy, much better than Oaxaca's advert and the French girl lets me try some chocolate and maize milk drink, served in a plastic bag, the straw not sufficiently wide to suck the bulky liquid up. And the bus again, finally sleep. The french girl gives me her facebook address at the roads end, and I feel strangely touched at random meetings.

Then the hostel, the book store, red wine, warming me up as a cold develops around my nasal passengers. One glass is never enough. We buy a bottle. And another. And some Mescal. Nap, shower, drink. Music throughout the courtyard, southern blues amongst. Then out, revolution once more, with some Americans. At 3 in the morning jumping up and down to old English punk songs it hits to me that I wasn't supposed to drink today, that tomorrow I need to move, and the cold is overwhelming me and it's a Tuesday in St Cristobel, and what was I thinking?

Nearly fall asleep in a late night off-license in between bites of hot dog with jalapenos and various sauces. Our pleas that they can still sell us alcohol because we're european and it's clearly past opening hours there on deaf ears.

San Cristobel

San Cristobel is a town, 2000 feet up in the mountains, and thus a little chilly (imagine England on a late, clear September day, not quite cold enough for frost but getting there). A printed hostel set of directions in badly constructed English gets me there first thing on a Sunday morning, dehydrated and my backpack getting heavier with each new destination.

The hostel has a lush green coutyard and lets me eat breakfast for free, and so I sip coffee, eat fruit, devour yoghurt, munch cerial. An American girl, Paige, starts talking to me, and she's lived here a few months so I ask her for things to do and she recommends a mayan village just outside the town, so we go together, something to do.

The village has 3 things of interest, a market, a church and a graveyard. The streets are awash with people, the market a weekend only affair. I eat strange fruit, a spiky red ball that peels to a translucent gel around a nutlike seed, a small yellow berry called something like Nance, which is sweet and bitter all at once, tasty in ice-cream, and then Tuna which is the fruit of Cactus, kiwi like, the juice tasty, but flesh speckled with small hard seeds that make me gag.

The church is a riot. Standard painted mexican building outside, a wickerman horror temple within. The floor covered in green leaves, the air thick with candle smoke and a low chanting pervades. Around the outskirts are grotesque figurines of catholic saints, framed with bright neon lights. Eggs and sacrificial chickens complete the scene. No photography allowed, the last person who tried it battered and broken.

The cemetery provides more grim entertainment, the graves coloured according to age of death, the path ending on the tops of dead people, haphazard and littered with empty drinks bottles. Children wander around carefree, selling braids to the tourists.

Back to town, I sip coffee, climb to a church, then visit several more for kicks, the interiors confused after a while, and then eat a corn cob covered in mayonnaise, cheese and chilli spice, at first heavenly but quickly sickly. Then home. Sleep. Wake.

Start again with coffee/yoghurt/fruit etc. Guillaume arrives. The canyon tour booked out, the crocodiles deferred till tomorrow. Another village, me, Guillaume, Paige, a couple of americans. A deserted highstreet, a chuch, nothing else. Paige talks to a shop keeper who offers us Posche (spelling invented), a schnappes type drink made with cactus and pineapple, and we all try and buy, then collectivo back to town, the hour before midday.

Snap to the hostel, bag drop, Marine pick up. along with a Norwegian peace corp, and it's wandering round colonial pastel coloured streets, strange beer in a zapista cafe, the rim covered with chilli spice, the drink polluted with bitter lime juice.

More ambling till we find Revolution, a bar serving two for one, the mountains around the city providing a perfect backdrop for afternoon drinking, sipping beer, the air a chill-breeze, and the afternoon turns through early evening into nightime and the hostel now abuzz, and we drink and drink and listen to american emo & I make a pasta sauce with mexican salsa, the unintentional heat softened with alcohol.

11:30, into town, Revolution again, the place now empty, deadly mescal providing warmth, and then an underground bar, where dogs roam inside and kids play outside, too young, a weird feeling. I dance briefly with a Mexican girl who knows how to salsa, my shuffle an embarrassment to the name of dance, then into the night once more. German teenagers tell me of their passion for English football hooliganism, their anarchist mission pointing to the Zapista movement, they just need to meet some. Then finally it ends with throat burn spirits on a pitch black picnic table, the world put to rights then flipped to wrong. The hour too late, time too fleeting.

Goodbye Oaxaca

Supposed to be meeting Guillame and Marine at 9:30 for Monte Alban ruins but it´s 9:15 and I´ve not managed to eat breakfast, and the French contingent are missing, and the only thing I´ve achieved of note is attempting laundry for the first, my Spanish skills a source of hilarity to the laundrette girl. Finally at 11 we leave haing picked up another 6 people from a further 6 nationalities.

Then it´s a spluttering colectivo to the mountain top, then a ruinous trip which starts off with yet more jokes at the expense of my Spanish, continues with a surrealist runnin commentary from one of the Dutch guys and ends with half the group lost whilst those with haste drink away the afternoon, torturing wasps in imaginative ways, us slowly burning up as the clouds part. An abortive taxi trip and a further beer later and we´re back and still drinking and eating too lightly, and there´s talk of naps but to sleep now would be suicide, and I´m supposed to be getting a bus at 9:30 but scrap that plan, a night bus no way to spend Friday night in Mexico.

More alcohol, forming a dull haze rather than vibrancy, getting drunk on 4% beer more difficult than it should be but the lack of food is helping, and at some point a large group of us head out to a club, where someone orders tequila, and mescal and then some more tequila and some innocuous Mexican soft rock band are playing.

Then there´s more tequila which nobody seems to be ordering or drinking, and hell, it´s 3 in the morning and the clubs shutting and the bar tab is in excess of what anyone wants to pay. The dutch guy is panicking over the mafia and the two gorillas handling the bill look kind of serious, so we put in all we have, which is about 1000 pesos short and then somehow we suggest that we will settle up tomorrow and this rather weirdly is agreed, no matter how unlikely a circumstance this seems, and we burst out into the street, our bones still intact. There´s a movement onwards but physically and mentally drained I head back home.

And then it´s 8 in the morning and a different Dutch guy wakes me by jumping to the floor from a bunk bed, and with glazed eyes tells me he´s fucked and then collapses into my bed, straight passes out, and I can´t exactly sleep, the bed was hardly spacious in the first place and so I attempt to wake him but to not avail and then I notice the floor is wet and the Australian guy a bunk over says ´´erm, I think that´s piss on the floor´´ and it turns out the Dutch guy has got the bathroom and the dorm room confused, and a hangover is no state to be cleaning up someone elses urine but we stem the tide at least, with kitchen towells and toilet roll and then I escape to breakfast.

The day is empty and flat, and the first bus out of this town is pretty much the last bus too, and it doesn´t leave till 9pm so I have a day to waste. Between 8 and noon I achieve nothing at all of note and I try to order pizza with Guillame and Marine but it´s beyond us, and so a crowded market for Chicken Mole (which is strange, but helps with the vague hungover sickness) and a bus ticket and a t-shirt and then a lazy afternoon listening to guitar on the roof top, sipping beers all day long, people flitting in and out of view like the clouds passing through the Sun.

The first English guy I speak to in Mexico turns out to be a former member of Cajun Dance Party (which is a weird aside, but I don´t actually know any CDP songs to start singing, saving us both embarassment), and then it´s french politics and right wing opression and still the beer pours, half heartedly as the clock ticks down, and then a final beer, a final farewell, a short taxi ride and then a long bus ride.

The drunkeness hits me and each toilet trip threatens to expose my stomach contents, the bathroom air stale and warm, and so I try to sleep but instead just drift in and out of consciousness, vivid, weird dreams puncture the journey, and then it´s Sunday morning and it´s St. Cristobel and and and

Woah-aca (part 2)

Feeling strangely fine the morning after. Hostel breakfast includes eggs to order & the coffee is drinkable and tastes of something. Find a Swiss couple I spoke to the previous night and recakk agreeing to follow them on some mountain trip I´m not quite sure I understand the logistics of, but they are also recovered from the club exploits and we set off onto the smog-ridden highway, in a taxi that costs pennies to travel for 35km.

From taxi, to a converted backlass van, bundled onto harsh metal seats without a cushion or seatbelt, and then packed up the mountain. The van judders and shakes, the terrain rocky and unsteady and this lasts for 45 minutes, my back repeatedly smashed into the casing, the spectre of my hangover threatening to emerge afresh.

We arrive, somehow without losing any occupants to the mountain, and walk through the deserted freshwater pools high up, the ground covered in tiny streams, spiralling over bright yellow rocks, and then I swim in the murky water, alone, and with panic, despite the shallow pool dimensions, the mountains edge less than a foot away.

A lunch of tacos made in a mountain hut at bargain prices and then the descent that I somehow nearly sleep on, despite being no less jarred, and then some mediocre ruins and the largest tree in the entire world (according to a sign - I check later, and it has a genuine claim based on trunk circumference), and flavoured Mescal in pouring rain.

I end my day on the hostel roof, sipping beer with Guillaume and eating the most amazing steak tortilla, BBQ´d steak taken away that I chop into strips and smother with fried onion and guacamole and, of course, chili, whilst a foreign language film plays incomprehensibly in the back ground.

Woah-aca (part 1)

A midnight bus ride through winding hideaways on a deathroad all the way to Oaxaca, flashes of blue and red lights through the window, the air conditioning churning through the night, disturbing my sleep and making me regret the thin cotton t-shirt when a winter jumper would be more more appropriate. Arrive in pitch black 6am darkness and hang around the bus station till dawn, getting to my hostel a whole 8 hours before the scheduled check-in time. They don´t care, I don´t care, and so I leave my bags and take an early morning stroll around the colourful but wet Oaxacan streets.

Crave coffee and eggs, and my wish is met, the coffee served in a bowl as if soup, the eggs scrambled with chorizo and black beans on the side, the now familiar sight of corn tortilla besides, strips to dunk in the spicy gunk.

A nap and then more strolling, grabbing bearings, an a4 hostel map my only hint of what to do. The centre is alive, a hive of lingering locals and tourist soaking sunlight through trees heavy with green leaves. There is some kind of political rally happening that the Spanish leaflet I´m handed does little to clarify. I decide probably worth disposing of before the next police check, lest I become radicalised.

A tourist lunch of pork and green beans in a creamy spicy stew. I eat grasshoppers on market streets, assuming the red insects to be chillies, the taste sweet and not unpleasant, and wings stick between my teeth. And then it´s late afternoon and with late afternoon comes the rain and with the rain comes the covered hostel terrace and 1.2 litre bottles of beer at 30 pesos a piece, and then a terrible club playing dreadful pop-dance music, comfort in the 10 peso a drink bar, and I drink like there´s no tomorrow, a fact which seems more likely when my last memory of the evening is a couple of Brazilians tilting my head back to free-pour vodka straight down my throat.

Days 2 and 3...

...go like this:

Wake up on a sunstruck Sunday Morn. Trip Advisor suggests Chapultepec, the biggest green space in Mexico City. Zoom through the underground and arrive to lakes full of sailing boats but it's tragic to be rowing a playboat solo around a lake designed for children, and I instead wander into a zoo designed for grown ups.

I see Lions, Giraffes and Zebras, I see birds imported all the way from England, I see a Giant Panda lying spreadeagled, as if floored in a late Saturday night brawl. I see an empty cage where the Polar Bear should be.I see about 100 copulating couples and 300 family outings. I see a taco stall with lurid red/green chilli sludge and indulge, then head up a huge hill for panaromic views, mainly of parkland, and a National History Museum. I'm thoroughly disappointed that the museum is not full of stuffed animals before rereading the museum title. And then a hard rain comes and enough is enough and it's a crowded, damp subway back to my hostel hideaway.

There I meet a Swiss German called Nils, we walk City Centre markets until a Mexican woman tells us we it'll be dark soon and the area is not safe for tourists. I laugh. We head back.

Hostel beers with a Belgian Guy and Australian guy later and it's a group outing on deserted Mexico streets for tacos (pork, corriander, sprinking of fresh lime) and more beer. And suddenly it's late and I'm not quite sober and other people are talking about prostitution and brothels and I am pretty sure this is my cue to disappear and sleep hard and well and wake fast, without hesitation, and it's Monday.

Breakfast is a rainbow of S.American and European nations, all very friendly. A Venezuelan girl teaches the Belgian guy a Spanish chat up line I memorise. It's that kind of conversation.

I postpone a Pyramid tour till tomorrow, and walk a walking tour that starts with a hospital (zero bruised pandas) and ends in front of some elaborate brilliant white building that I forget the purpose of because I'm starting to feel delirious in the hot heat, and the cake shop didn't help, and neither did hearing Keane on a Mexico rooftop but really it's Altitude or Street food or Exhaustion or Dehydration or Belated hangover. Any or all of. I decide on altitude - the others are all self inflicted and I am blameless and I have a headache, I feel sick, my limbs are dead weights through tar and I'm veering like a punchdrunk pendulum between chills and sweats.

It's over, I give up, I cancel a trip (afternoon drinking session) to Xochimilco, and lie in my bed for 18 hours, leaving it only for water and failed 'do I feel better' tests, hating the world especially when my one venture outside, in sandals and a t-shirt during a hot phase, ends with my catching a rain storm and feeling worse than ever. And stop.

Day 1

The debit card rescue takes place first thing. Another daring escapade on Mexico City public transport, where nothing actually happens and all I feel is serenity. The bank retrieve my card for me, smiles all round. Back in the game.

It occurs to me that a guidebook for the city would have been nice. I miss the hostel walking tour due to my airport revisit and then, in a further demonstration of my mental faculties, I lock my passport and visa in a secure locker then somehow reset my padlock combination. 10 minutes later and I've successfully broken into my own stuff. Ethical questions of damaging hostel property aside, what is point of such a device if a law abiding citizen like me can break in so easily? I resolve to carry my passport on my person and resist the temptation to clean out the dorm.

For the next two hours I wander the neighbourhood with little concept of what I'm actually seeing. everything is huge. I locate the Zocala. A gigantic cathedral here, a huge national palace there, and surrounding markets that disorientate and excite in equal measure, a cacophony of noise. Then, after some careful consideration, I decide the best thing to do is to return to the hostel and type ''10 things to do in Mexico city in google''.

Turns out #1 is to hang around the Zocala all day. My 2 hour fly through was clearly the mark of inexperience. I return and enter the religious building for entertainment, the cathedral interior a gold plated testimony to opulence. I've possibly been in more impressive catholic buildings, but I don't remember where (nb they wouldn't let me near the Vatican and associated buildings on my Rome trip). It's also Mass so I get the bonus of seeing a Mexican priest cast holy water over the congregation, like in the movies.

I follow this dose of Catholicism with a romp through some pagan (well, aztec or something) ruins. I'd be more specific but the signs were all in Spanish. It looks pretty cool anyway. Then I hit the National Palace, for murals, history, presidential portraits, and, in my favourite room, a display of the remains of long dead famous figures in Mexican history.

On my return into daylight all hell has broken loose. A seemingly endless drunken procession of boys dressed as girls and girls barely dressed at all passes before me. Sensory overload. I flee to the hostel, pausing only for a semi-traumatic attempt at ordering torta in a street-side eatery where no one speaks English and pointing gets me nowhere.

The hostel, again, is without pulse. The stories of tequila being poured down the throats of patrons with each ringing of the doorbell a gross exaggeration. I order a beer anyway, as the Gold cup final is on in the bar area. Turns out I'm the only one drinking. The game is a 4-2 thriller that Mexico win, but even the livewire Mexican barman wearing the green colours of his home country is too busy necking his girlfriend to cheer when the 4th goal, a sumptuous chip into the top left corner, arrives. Tired, haze before my eyes, I head bedwards.

Day 0

I arrive in a Friday night blur, airplane tyres screeching against rain-sodden tarmac, life flashing before my eyes, although this has pretty much been the case for all of the previous 11-plane stricken hours.

Customs is a breeze, but then comes the panic at being halfway round the world, alone in a city of 9m people with nothing to guide me but a scrappy piece of A4 with printed hostel directions. My first mistake is leaving my debit card in the ATM and realising 5 minutes too late that the card was missing, lost in the bowels of the machine.

Cest La Vie I exclaim, my 5 hours of Spanish clashes deserting me. The bank is shut so I attempt to get a taxi using my Credit Card in a telephone machine. Unbelievably (to me) the machine actually requires a Mexico specific phone card, not any old card that will fit in the slot.

A well dressed Mexican man with greying hair and a kind face explains this to me, then first attempts to get me a card from the newsagents then tells me to get the metro instead. I show my gratitude by entering a state of paranoia, visions of the man sending me to the jackals that inhabit Mexico City's subway whilst cackling manically into the airport lounge. I've been awake for the last 18 hours and I have no energy to think for myself. I decide to chance it.

A mumbled exchange with the ticket office attendant, the enormous queue behind me nonplussed, later, 3 pesos (15p) lighter and I'm on a packed train, my dulled senses not helped by the seeming random introduction of mobile 1-man DJ's playing eclectic megamixes of alien music at teeth rattling volumes throughout the carriage.

I spend the ride with my huge backpack next to a tiny mexican boy, terrified of knocking him off his seat with any movement, and so at the destination swing my backpack well clear of the child, and straight into his mum's face. ''Excuse Moi, I mean Perdon'' I mumble, unintelligibly and straight out the subway station, following the crowd through exit gates, entering the cold night, breathing deeply on to a poorly lit street.

Strange characters huddle around street vendors, words I don't understand fill the air, menace lurks on every corner. There's no street sign but I figure hanging around is akin to holding my arms out wide, wallet in one hand, wads of cash in the other, and yelling ''Let Me Have It Boys'' in Spanish. So I walk in a random direction as quickly and confidently as I can muster.

It dawns on me after 3 minutes of this nonsense that I'm on the wrong side of the street entirely. I turn and walk even quicker the other way, hoping the huddled criminals-in-waiting won't notice the 6 foot white man with a bright red rucksack is clearly bonkers lost in a strange city.

The next junction and relief. The street name matches that on the paper in my hand and no knife has yet passed through my kidneys. 4 blocks later and I've reached my destination. The hostel is dead, deader than I feel. I care not a jot as I slouch to my room, slam off the lights, climb into my bed and say bye to the long-long day.