Retreats

Oaxaca is a pleasant city, bright and vibrant and friendly. But it is, nevertheless, a city. That means traffic and vendors and gente constantly coming and going. There are parks and open areas, but they are all small and dominated by couples going at it like there’s no tomorrow. The general pace of life isn’t rushed but it’s still not peaceful, and true quietness is hard to come by. However after much exploration I have found a few calm spots, and though I have only visited each of them once I would have to say that they are my favorite thus far.

The first is the city’s Biblioteca Infantil, or Children’s Library. It is a good twenty minutes north of the centro, tucked away inside a little neighborhood with many colors and few carros. Like the Instituto it has high, white walls over the top of which poke tree branches. From the front gate a little path runs downhill, narrowing as it goes and leading past rooms stuffed with books and tiny tables and chairs. At its end it suddenly turns a corner and brings you to an open area with stone benches and tall, flowering trees. Another path takes you to a courtyard decorated with kid-made art, a playroom, a computer lab and a small theatre, but the best part of the library is here in the garden, where you can sit, listen to the birds, and watch cute niños toddle past.

The second locación is Cerro del Fortín, a hill that rises west of the city center. At its base is a long staircase, cutting up past houses and tienditas to lead to a sketchy, graffiti-ridden tunnel beneath a major highway. On the other side of the tunnel is a giant auditorium, but once you pass that and the surrounding constructions crews you hit a tree-lined, brick path that winds further up the slope. Here is where the quietness starts. The roar of traffic fades and suddenly butterflies are everywhere. Further up is the planetarium, and just a bit beyond that a tiny observatory where you are at last met with a panorama of the valley. It was good to just sit and take in this view for awhile, to see how the city extends much farther than my familiar paths through the centro, and to remember how vast the heavens are. I love looking at the Oaxacan sky from inside the city, where it wraps around adobe walls and tile roofs, but out here on the Cerro, juxtaposed against the green hills, it is even more beautiful.