Get me to the church on time...

Our last full day in Oaxaca so we make our way to the jewel in the city’s crown; Templo de Santo Domingo which is by some distance the most handsome church in town. We’re not great ones for religious glitz (something the Catholics do so well) so content ourselves with a quick gander behind the huge front doors.

It’s the exterior of the building that does it for us. Dominated by two unusually high (for Oaxaca) domed towers and a large paved plaza in front of the entrance with landscaped borders containing maguey cacti. 

A lovely spot to enjoy a coffee before we move on to the other attractions in the Santo Domingo complex: The marvelous ethnobotanical garden and the Centro Cultural SantoDomingo de Guzmán.

You can only visit the garden as part of a two hour guided tour. At first we think this is a bit of a bummer but it was actually really informative and we learn far more than if we had muddled through on our own. 

The garden only contains flora that grows in the Oaxaca region but given that this includes tropical, semi-tropical, highland, rainforest and temperate areas we soon realise there’s no shortage of stuff to see.

As it’s a Saturday there is significant wedding action going on in this pretty corner of town. We’re having lunch when the first of many processions snakes its way past the café. What a show! Massive effigies of the bride and groom, a full band with drums, trumpets and tubas (what a racket!), dancing (of course!) and just general jubilant messing about.

Throughout the rest of the afternoon we get caught up in half a dozen of these affairs and the format is always the same. We love it that they try to personalise the effigies so they loosely take on the physical features of the happy couple. Mixed results on this front I think it’s fair to say.

Later, when we finally stop smiling, we buy our tickets for the the Centro Cultural SantoDomingo de Guzmán. Of all the many museums we’ve visited on the trip this is probably the most impressive. Housed in the friary that was originally home the monks attached to the church it’s a wonderful building crammed with traditional and contemporary artefacts. 

A bonus is the huge picture window that overlooks both the botanical gardens and plaza in front of the church. So we are treated to elevated views of more plants and weddings. 

A perfect end to a perfect day in this most magical of cities.