Carrizal thermal springs

Our guidebook has one sentence about nearby natural hot springs. It doesn’t tell you how to get there or what the facilities are like. We did a bit of searching online and found a website for the hot springs resort. It looked nice – natural hot springs, swimming pools, restaurant and gardens. It didn’t say how to get there via public transport. I didn’t feel like renting a car or going on a tour, so I did some further searching. There was an exchange in Spanish where someone was asking how to get there and someone else advised them to take any bus along the Xalapa-Veracruz highway and ask the driver to let you off at the road to the resort. From there, take a taxi or local bus. OK then, we’d give that a go. We took supplies and a cell phone in case we ended up in the middle of nowhere. We did something similar last year in the Philippines. Take a bus, ask the driver to let you off and walk to the springs (read about our adventures here).

We went to the main bus station and asked the man at the AU desk how we could get to the springs. He sent us to another counter and told us to ask for tickets to La Cumbre. We did at a cost of 23 pesos each. So cheap! The bus was good and the driver friendly. He gave us a shout after about 30 minutes, but we had already spotted signs for La Cumbre and for the hot springs. At the bus stop, there were taxis waiting so we got there really easily. No drama at all.

We spent 4 or 5 hours at the lovely springs. So relaxing! We went from hot water to cool water and even got used to the sulphurous pong. We did get bitten to death however. I have so many layers of insect bites now. I am constantly itchy and resisting the urge to scratch. I hope that wears off before I get home.

We wondered how easy it would be to get a taxi and bus back, but it was no hassle at all. We were home within the hour.