Mexico City. If anyone was looking for a model of purgatory, then I imagine that the traffic around the suburbs of Mexico City must be on the shortlist. Unbelieveable.
Yet we survived and made it to our first port of call: Mark, a friend of Toby's, offered us a bed for the night in his villa in Tepotzotlan, a few kilometres north of the city.
Tepotzotlan's church and plaza
The following morning we had breakfast in town then headed off for the hills. Despite a frost overnight by 10am the temperature was already headed towards 20ºC
First impressions. The landscape is HUGE. Mile after mile of highway with mountains bordering endless plains, themselves studded with countless billions of yuccas, in this case Y. filifera.
Not always as crowded as this, and sometimes swapped with Yucca faxoniana, but always there.