- I'm Jordan and this is Maddie
and we're here in Oaxaca City, Mexico.
When most tourists come to Oaxaca,
they're generally staying in the Centro area.
- Ourselves included, our past two trips.
- Uh-huh, but we're actually gonna be checking out
some other neighborhoods,
and right now we're in the neighborhood called Xochimilco.
(cheerful acoustic music)
We just got to this restaurant called Ancestral,
that we really love, and we wanted to show you today,
but there's a 45-minute wait,
and it's midweek, I don't understand it.
- All of the times that we've come here
in the past three weeks, I've never seen it this busy.
- So maybe there's something going on today
that we're not aware of,
but we're gonna go find another restaurant now.
Maybe exploring Xochimilco will have to wait till later.
In some cities across Mexico,
everyone will stop for you at a crosswalk.
Here in Oaxaca, nobody stops for you. (chuckles)
(cheerful acoustic music)
- As we're getting closer to Centro, though,
we're walking by this beautiful aqueduct
or one piece that is still left of this aqueduct,
because it's no longer functional.
This used to be used to bring water
from the northern part of the city,
San Felipe Del Agua, to the center of the city,
hence why it's called Acueducto San Felipe.
- Acueducto de San Felipe.
- De, de San Felipe.
And now you can see, as we're walking by here,
some of these are people's homes-
- Yeah, that's really cool. - Some of them
are just streets, so like looking through this one,
is just a street that there's houses,
businesses, things like that.
I think aqueducts are so pretty.
There's something about arches,
especially made out of brick,
that's just like (kisses) ah.
- But what piece of trash is graffitiing this?
It pisses me off so much.
That aqueduct was actually built in the 1700s
and it was functional until about 1940.
Buenos dias! (woman speaking Spanish)
- Buenos dias. - Hello, buenos dias.
(man speaking Spanish)
(thermometer beeps)
(man speaking Spanish)
(thermometer beeps)
- Gracias.
(people chattering)
This place is called Mercado La Cosecha,
and there's all these different vendors around
that have these stalls, permanent stalls every day.
And you can buy tons of delicious food here,
so there's lots of great breakfast options.
- It's a great place to go if you want
a lot of typical food and drinks
and to be able to sample a variety of them.
(upbeat music)
(Jordan speaking Spanish) (people chattering)
- So these were 25 pesos each.
It's like a blue corn base
and then they put cheese on it and meat on this one,
and this one is a flower, and by flower,
I mean like they use actual flowers. (laughs)
These memelas are so good!
(upbeat music)
- Hello, buenos dias.
(Maddie and vendor speaking Spanish)
Gracias. - Okay, gracias.
- And to eat, I decided to get garnachas.
I'm obsessed with these.
It's an isthmus style of food,
and it's like a tiny sope or a tiny memela,
tiny huarache, (laughs) tiny, what are the other ones?
Panucho, but basically, a corn base,
a fried corn base, it's really crunchy.
Then it has meat on top, this is pork,
and then a red salsa, and this delicious crumbly cheese.
On top, you can put this pickled mixture
of cabbage and carrots.
These were 70 pesos, which,
the first time we got these, I thought was expensive,
but this is actually cheap compared
to the other garnachas we found around the city.
Let's give it a try.
(food crunching) (people chattering)
Mm, extra crunchy!
Big fan, big fan.
(upbeat music)
(Jordan and vendor speaking Spanish)
- I got this giant agua fresca.
It has mint and strawberry and it was 30 pesos for a liter.
It's so good. They use fresh ingredients.
- You know, the crazy thing is,
you can drink all of that liquid and eat a full meal!
This is so much liquid!
- Well, liquids don't fill me up at all.
- I don't get that. - I can drink as much
liquid as I want and I won't be full.
- I don't understand, like,
the anatomy of your stomach and digestive system.
And for me, that is totally not the case.
(upbeat music)
To drink, I decided to get this thing called tejate,
which is a very typical drink of Oaxaca.
It's actually pre-Hispanic, if I'm not mistaken,
made with lots of different ingredients.
It has this like foamy stuff on top
and they put a little bit of sugar.
It kind of has like a chocolatey taste.
(waiter murmuring) - Gracias.
- Mm, I love it, and then this size cost 20 pesos,
which is slightly more than you would pay
at a typical, like a bigger market here in Oaxaca,
but it's not a bad price.
- Well, that was really good, and I am stuffed.
They're pet-friendly here, so next time,
I think we'll have to bring Laska!
(Laska howls)
We need to get a squirrel for Laska.
(dog panting)
- [Maddie] Oh my gosh, seriously,
the squirrel's riding on (laughs) the back of the dog.
So cute! - (laughs) That's awesome.
(cheerful acoustic music)
(people chattering)
(Maddie and vendor speaking Spanish)
- Gracias. (grinder whirring)
So now that we're hanging out in Oaxaca,
we'll start making cold brew again,
and using some of the delicious
Oaxacan coffee from around here.
Right in between the market and the aqueduct
is this cafe called Volador,
and they'll grind it up for you
to whatever specification you want.
For cold brew, it's coarse, so they did that for me,
and this is 75 pesos for 1/4 kilo.
Jordan, can I take your photo?
- Please, I would like a photo shoot right here
where it says "No photo shoots."
- [Maddie] Okay, fine, how about over here?
You rebel, you!
How 'bout over here? (laughs)
You extra rebel, you! (both laughing)
(cheerful music)
So we're here in Oaxaca,
it's the end of December going on January.
At nighttime it ranges from like 40 to 50 degrees.
And during the day it's between 60 to 80,
so it can be a little bit difficult
to adjust your outfits during the day,
but I am absolutely loving the fact that it's cool at night.
We leave the windows open,
and I get to bundle up in the morning,
but we can be out during the day, enjoying ourselves,
and not frying to a crisp.
And I'm personally the most excited
that it's not humid here at all!
Or at least, I don't feel it.
The weather is amazing!
- [Jordan] Maddie, we're in southern Mexico.
How can it not be hot here?
- [Maddie] I'm confused by the question. (laughs)
- [Jordan] That was a weird question.
We're at like 6,000 feet of elevation or something,
so despite it being in southern Mexico, it's very nice.
- [Maddie] And despite it being so high in elevation,
like we were just in Orizaba,
which is lower in elevation than here,
but it was freezing, well, (chuckles) freezing for us.
- [Jordan] Yeah, it was colder than here.
- [Maddie] Yeah, so that is a little bit confusing,
but I absolutely love the weather here,
where we can go outside and do it ourselves,
and you don't have to take five showers a day
like in the Riviera Maya. (both chuckling)
- We wanted to let you know about a service
that we find really useful while abroad,
and that is a VPN.
And one of the things it does for you
is it allows you access to location-restricted content.
We can change our location from Mexico
to the US or Mexico to the UK.
What this helps with is, for example,
we were just watching "Gossip Girl" on Netflix,
and it just rolled over to the new year.
It's now 2021 today.
Poof, "Gossip Girl" is gone!
Super into the show and it's gone.
So I activate the VPN,
I tried going to a few different countries.
I tried India, that was a no-go,
and then I tried Japan and I found "Gossip Girl" in Japan,
so now we can continue watching the show with a VPN.
We're also stoked because we were looking up
our other options to watch "Gossip Girl,"
and we found it on Amazon
for the low, low price of $30 a season!
So it would have been $150
to watch the next five seasons there.
Or, we pay two bucks a month for a VPN.
If you wanna check it out,
our favorite is located at TangerineVPN.com.
That's our affiliate link, it will take you right there.
There's a really great deal going on for you guys right now.
It's 84% off plus four extra months free.
So if you wanna check that out,
head on over to TangerineVPN.com,
and use the code TANGERINE.
(upbeat music)
(footsteps clattering)
(traffic whooshing)
(Laska panting)
(people chattering)
(traffic honking)
(people chattering)
We're at this place called La Mezcalerita,
and I'm looking through the menu.
Lots of beer, tons of options for mezcal, and they...
I usually like to order cocktails,
and they have two options for cocktails,
a margarita or a mojito,
so I went with the mezcal margarita.
- And surprise, surprise, garnachas was on the menu,
so I got that for the second time today.
I'm literally obsessed with them.
Also, we were able to bring Laska,
because it's pet-friendly up here on their terrace!
- [Both] Salut! (glasses clink)
(people chattering)
- Well, these garnachas were decent.
Not my favorite of the ones we've tried in Oaxaca,
but it's 75 pesos, so not a bad price.
This is a great place to spend an afternoon, though.
The sun's been going down, it's a really cool ambiance.
It's a second-floor terrace,
so we've got some nice-people watching down there,
see the dogs walk by, my favorite thing. (laughs)
I like this place. (cheerful music)
(people chattering)
If you wanna see other videos we've made in this city,
on the end screen in just a second,
we're going to link a playlist of all the ones
that we've made in Oaxaca City.
Please subscribe to see our upcoming videos of 2021.
Wow, it's a new year.
- (chuckles) But one more thing.
(bell gongs) (Maddie giggles)
- And gong that bell so you'll be the first
to be notified when we release our new videos.
- And we will see you then. (cheerful music)
(singers vocalizing)