Oaxaca, Mexico · A 7-day journey led by Kayleigh During
Archaeology & Culture of the Zapotec Valleys
The Zapotecs called themselves Ben ’Zaa, the Cloud People. Mole ground by hand in a village kitchen. Cochineal crushed to crimson in your palm. Palace walls built from thousands of cut stones laid without a drop of mortar. And on the sixth morning, the gates of Monte Albán at eight o’clock, with the whole valley underneath you.
The trip
One valley, a thousand years, and the people still working in it.
Oaxaca is a valley you taste before you understand it. Chocolate ground in front of you in the market aisles. Smoke off the grills. Mezcal that smells of the earth the agave was roasted in. Then the stone: ballplayers carved mid-game two thousand years ago, a rain god’s face still holding its colour in stucco, geometric walls fitted together without mortar and still standing.
Six nights in one hotel in the historic centre, and every morning you go out into the valleys. One whole day belongs to Teotitlán del Valle, where you shop the market with a cook, grind a mole in her kitchen, and watch a weaving family turn an insect into crimson. The last morning belongs to Monte Albán.
Fifteen guests. Two bilingual guides. Kayleigh During with you the whole week.
Monte Albán, saved for last
A mountaintop levelled by hand from 500 BC, and the seat of a state that ran these valleys for a thousand years. You reach it at 8am on the sixth day, having already walked the towns it governed.
The loom and the hearth
A whole day: grind a mole with Reyna Mendoza, then watch cochineal turn crimson at the looms.
Tomb 7
Mixtec gold, a turquoise-mosaic skull and rock-crystal goblets — seen before the sites.
Grecas and a ball court
Stone mosaics cut without mortar, and one of the largest ball courts in Mesoamerica.
Pools on a cliff edge
Mineral springs above petrified waterfalls, fed by Zapotec canals 2,500 years old.
Who leads it
Kayleigh During
A history educator and the voice behind History With Kayleigh, Kayleigh brings ancient sites to a wide audience and travels with the group for the whole week.
Two bilingual local guides travel with her throughout. In the family kitchens, workshops and villages the group splits in two, so every visit stays personal.
Who built it
Ben ’Zaa, the Cloud People.
- They levelled a mountaintop by hand from around 500 BC and ran the Central Valleys from it for more than a thousand years.
- Their writing is among the oldest in the Americas — the carved slabs at Monte Albán and Dainzú carry dates and names still being read.
- Mitla’s walls are built from thousands of cut stones fitted without mortar, in fourteen different geometric patterns.
- Tomb 7 held Mixtec gold, a turquoise-mosaic skull and rock-crystal goblets — among the richest burials ever found in the Americas.
- Zapotec is still spoken in these valleys, and the weavers you sit with in Teotitlán are their descendants, working the same dyes.
The route
One base, and the valleys around it.
Six nights in the same hotel in the historic centre. Every day is a loop out and back — the farthest is Hierve el Agua, about an hour and a half away.
Day by day
Seven days, working up to the capital.
Zócalo, markets & Santo Domingo
You land by early afternoon and we meet you at the airport. The first walk waits until the heat drops. The Zócalo under its Indian laurels, ringed with cafés and somebody always playing. The cathedral. Then the market aisles: Benito Juárez, where chocolate is ground while you watch and chapulines come by the scoop, and 20 de Noviembre, where the grill aisle is so thick with smoke you walk through it blind. The walk ends at Santo Domingo. Its vault is so heavily gilded it looks lit from inside, and across it climbs the family tree of Saint Dominic, every branch a painted saint. Welcome dinner, and the week begins.
Night: Oaxaca City · Meals: Dinner · Driving: about ½ h
Tomb 7, the Tule Tree & Lambityeco
Begin at the Museo de las Culturas as it opens, in Santo Domingo’s former monastery, with Tomb 7 — found at Monte Albán by Alfonso Caso in 1932, and among the richest burials ever found in the Americas: Mixtec gold, a turquoise-mosaic skull, rock-crystal goblets, carved bones. It is the best possible introduction to everything you will see this week. Then east to the Árbol del Tule, a cypress with one of the stoutest trunks on Earth, and into San Jerónimo Tlacochahuaya, a plain village church whose every vault Zapotec artists covered in flowers, angels and birds. At Dainzú, carved slabs show ballplayers in helmets and gloves, caught mid-game more than two thousand years ago. After lunch in Tlacolula, Lambityeco’s great stucco masks of Cocijo, the rain god, still keep their colour.
Night: Oaxaca City · Meals: Breakfast, lunch, dinner · Driving: about 2 h
The Etla market & handmade paper
Wednesday is market day in Villa de Etla, and the stalls are famous for quesillo and tlayudas — this is lunch, standing up, among the cheese and the comales. In San Agustín Etla, watch paper made by hand from plant fibres at the workshop founded by Francisco Toledo, then visit CaSa, the arts centre he created inside an 1883 textile mill above the valley. Back in the city by late afternoon, with the rest of the day yours: the Zócalo, a mézcalería, or nothing at all before five more days of valleys.
Night: Oaxaca City · Meals: Breakfast, lunch · Driving: about 1 h
A whole day in the weaving village
A whole day in Teotitlán del Valle, the Zapotec weaving village at the foot of the Sierra Juárez. You begin in the morning market with the cook Reyna Mendoza, whose family are weavers too, then grind, toast and stir a mole in her kitchen for a long, shared lunch. In the afternoon a weaving family shows how crushed cochineal turns crimson, indigo gives blue and wild plants dye wool gold — and how a rug grows on the great treadle looms. Before heading back, the colonial church, whose foundations still show the Zapotec temple beneath it, and the community museum.
Night: Oaxaca City · Meals: Breakfast, lunch, dinner · Driving: about 1¼ h
Yagul, Mitla, Hierve el Agua & a family palenque
Out early, while the light is still low on Yagul: a palace of six patios, one of the largest ball courts in Mesoamerica, and a fortress on the hill above for anyone who wants the climb. Then Mitla, the Zapotec place of the dead, where the palace walls carry grecas — fourteen different geometric patterns built from thousands of hand-cut stones, each one fitted without mortar, holding for six hundred years. Then up to Hierve el Agua, and here you take your time. Mineral springs have been running over this cliff for so long that the water turned the cliff into a frozen white waterfall. You swim in the pools at the top, looking out over the whole valley, and the Zapotec canals that fed them were cut 2,500 years ago. A short steep path drops to the foot of the falls for the sure-footed. The day ends late at a family palenque in Santiago Matatlán, where agave hearts are roasted in earth pits for days and the smoke gets into the mezcal and never leaves.
Night: Oaxaca City · Meals: Breakfast, lunch, dinner · Driving: about 3½ h
The capital, last
You have spent five days in the valleys the Zapotecs ruled. This morning you go up to the place they ruled them from. Monte Albán opens at 8am and you are there for it, before the heat and the buses: a whole mountaintop levelled by hand from around 500 BC, the Great Plaza laid out across it, the carved Danzantes, and Building J set at its strange angle to everything else. The original stones are in the site museum. Afterwards, down the hill to Cuilapan, where Dominican friars began a vast church in 1556 and stopped in 1570, leaving a roofless, columned basilica open to the sky; then Zaachila, the last seat of the Zapotec kings, where steps lead down into tombs carrying stucco owls and human figures. Last stop is San Bartolo Coyotepec, where Doña Rosa’s family shapes black clay without a wheel and burnishes it with quartz until it shines like metal. Back in the city for the farewell dinner.
Night: Oaxaca City · Meals: Breakfast, lunch, dinner · Driving: about 2 h
Departure
A final breakfast and time for goodbyes, then your private transfer to Oaxaca airport, about 25 minutes away and timed to your flight.
Night: — · Meals: Breakfast · Driving: about ½ h
The order is set by real opening days: the Museo de las Culturas closes Mondays, Etla’s market runs only on Wednesday, and Zaachila’s archaeological zone opens Thursday to Sunday. Monte Albán is deliberately last. Order and timing can still shift with conditions on the ground.
What you get
What’s included.
Included
- Six nights in a centrally located hotel in the historic centre
- 17 meals — 6 breakfasts, 5 lunches, 6 dinners, welcome and farewell dinners among them
- Airport transfers on Days 1 and 7
- Private air-conditioned van with driver
- Two bilingual guides throughout
- All entrance fees: Museo de las Culturas, Árbol del Tule, Dainzú, Lambityeco, Monte Albán and its site museum, Yagul, Mitla, Hierve el Agua, Cuilapan, Zaachila, and the Teotitlán community museum
- The full day in Teotitlán: a mole class with Reyna Mendoza, and a natural-dye and weaving demonstration
- Handmade-paper workshop at Taller Arte Papel and a visit to CaSa, San Agustín Etla
- Black-pottery demonstration with Doña Rosa’s family in San Bartolo Coyotepec
- Family palenque visit with lunch and a mezcal tasting
- Bottled water on excursions
Not included
- International and domestic flights
- Travel insurance (required)
- Meals not listed, and alcohol beyond the tastings
- Gratuities for guides, drivers and hosts
- Craft purchases and personal expenses
Your dates are set — April 5–11, 2027. Once you book you’ll get a pre-departure PDF with the detailed schedule, packing list, hospitals and emergency contacts. Anything you want to know before then, just ask us.
Or email info@thecommunitygarden.org with a question first.
An adventure and an education
Learn from the people who live here.
Four of the week’s days are spent in workshops and kitchens rather than at a rope line — and the group splits in two so every visit stays personal.
Cook a mole from scratch
Shop the morning market with her, then grind, toast and stir it in her own kitchen in Teotitlán until it is lunch for all of you.
Crush cochineal into crimson
See how the insect gives red, indigo gives blue and wild plants give gold — and how a rug grows on a treadle loom.
Black clay, no wheel
The technique her family made famous in San Bartolo Coyotepec: shaped by hand and burnished with quartz until it shines like metal.
From the valleys
What the week looks like.
Eleven of the places you will stand in, eat in, and come home talking about.
Book your place
Reserve with a $1,000 deposit.
A $1,000 deposit books your place on the April 5–11, 2027 departure — a small group, capped at 15. The price is $2,500 per person sharing a twin or double room; a room to yourself is +$600. The balance is paid before departure.
If plans change: if we cancel the departure, your deposit comes back in full. If you cancel, it carries as credit toward a future trip.
Deposit checkout is secured by Stripe. Booking for two? Adjust the quantity in the cart. Questions before you commit? Email info@thecommunitygarden.org.
Where your money goes
A foundation-led excursion.
The Community Garden is a U.S. 501(c)(3) nonprofit, and the profits from this journey go into our programs, directed wherever the need is greatest. Traveling with us funds the work.
Know before you go
Everything you need to plan.
Dates, altitude, packing, activity level and respectful travel
What to pack
- Sturdy shoes with good grip
- Sun hat, sunglasses and high-SPF sunscreen
- Light layers for the evenings
- Swimwear or a change of clothes for Hierve el Agua
- A refillable water bottle
- Small pesos for the markets
Respectful travel
The valleys are home to living Zapotec communities. Ask before photographing people, and buy direct from the artisans. Tripods, drones and professional filming at archaeological sites need INAH permits, which we arrange for hosted departures.
Your dates
April 5–11, 2027, after the Easter school holidays, so the sites are quieter than usual. Please land in Oaxaca by 1pm on Day 1; morning connections via Mexico City or Dallas work well. April is dry, with occasional haze from seasonal fires.
Altitude & climate
Oaxaca City sits at about 1,550 m (5,100 ft), and Monte Albán is some 400 m higher. April is the warmest month: sunny days around 30°C / mid-80s°F, and mild evenings. Sun protection is essential.
Activity level
Moderate. Full days from about 8am to 5pm, with 4–7 km on foot spread across the day’s sightseeing, and no hikes. Steep stairs at Monte Albán; the climb to Yagul’s fortress and the path down to Hierve el Agua’s falls are both optional. The longest day in the van is Day 5, about 3½ hours in total.
Group size & guides
A maximum of 15 guests, travelling with two bilingual guides. In family kitchens, workshops and villages the group splits in two, so every visit stays personal.
Rooming
The $2,500 price is based on two people sharing. Travelling solo and happy to share? We’ll pair you with another guest of the same gender at no extra charge. Prefer your own room? Add the single supplement of $600 for the week.
Photography via Wikimedia Commons, images cropped: Panoramica Monte Alban by DavidConFran (CC BY-SA 3.0); Hierve el Agua 06 by LBM1948 (CC BY 4.0); 2013-12-27 Oaxaca Markt 02 anagoria by Anagoria (CC BY 3.0); Templo de Santo Domingo de Guzmán, Oaxaca-2 by Nanahuatl (CC BY-SA 4.0); Escudo De Yanhuitlán by God.extincion (CC BY-SA 4.0); Templo San Jerónimo Tlacochahuaya interior by Roman Israel (CC BY-SA 4.0); Gran Plaza (8283560357) by Rob Young (CC BY 2.0); Gallery of the Danzantes, Monte Albán, Oaxaca 2025 by MAHC-oaxaca (CC BY 4.0); InsideMarketVillaEtla by Thelmadatter (CC BY-SA 3.0); CaSa by Eiulene (CC BY-SA 3.0); Telar y tapetes-Teotitlán del Valle-Oaxaca-Mexico by User:Gengiskanhg (CC BY-SA 3.0); Tintes naturales by Carla Regina Torres (CC BY-SA 4.0); Mole negro de Oaxaca con arroz by ProtoplasmaKid (CC BY-SA 4.0); Juego de pelota en Yagul by García Anaya (CC BY-SA 4.0); Mitla 03 by LBM1948 (CC BY-SA 4.0); Cascada petrificada de Hierve el Agua en Oaxaca by Holamanueldiaz2 (CC BY-SA 4.0); 043 Mezcal (4) by Ljuba brank at Slovenian Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 3.0); Tumba 1 Zaachila by El Ágora (CC BY-SA 3.0); Barro negro by Inakiherrasti 05 (CC BY-SA 3.0); Greca de Mitla by Erick Osorio (CC BY-SA 3.0); Árbol-del-Tule-Oaxaca-Mexico by User:Gengiskanhg (CC BY-SA 3.0).