Trying to do something useful with our second leftover day, we did the free walking tour in the morning, which was quite interesting. I found out that the reason why everything looks like it has not changed and only declined since the 50s is the invention of nylon. Merida and Yucatan had reached prosperity thanks to the production of sisal. Especially during the first world war there was a high demand of sisal to make sand bags. When nylon came up, sisal could not complete anymore; Nylon can be made in 2 hours, whereas the sisal plant needs 6 years to grow.
We also learned that there had been a great influence by France in Merida, leading to French inspired architecture and even a whole boulevard copying the Champs-Elysees (Paseo Montejo, where we were yesterday).
We saw the palace with big murals depicting different aspects of the Mayan culture and the Spanish conquista, the cathedral, and the main square and learned that in Mayan times equality between men and women existed.
Overheated, we walked back to the hotel after the tour because we couldn’t stand being in the streets anymore. The rest of the noon, until our flight left, was spent next to the pool. At 3:30, we finally left for DF, (frankly a little sick of Merida and the heat).
We arrived at DF at 9, went to have dinner at our neighborhood Coyoacán and waited for Job and Esmeralda’s mum to pick is up. They came at 11:30 and we went home to have a welcome back Tequila “quita penas”. Esmeralda came too after a while and we were reunited again. We stayed there talking until 1:20.
