tacos

GHOSTLY figures dressed all in white walked quietly past me on a dark street – hundreds of them, each with a single flame illuminating a skull-painted face.

It felt spooky, even sombre, but then came the crackle of a sound system, the pop of a tequila bottle opening — and raucous laughter.

Say hola to Mexican tradition Day of the Dead (Dia de los Muertos), known to Brits through the blistering opening scene of the James Bond movie Spectre, kids’ film Coco or the “sugar skull” make-up craze that became a Halloween trend.

Capital Mexico City draws thousands of tourists annually with its skeleton-themed parades around November 2, but the underrated city of Merida also comes alive for the celebrations.

Set in the western Yucatan peninsula — a region more known for beach resorts such as Cancun and Playa del Carmen, plus the Mayan ruins at Tulum — indigenous heritage is strong in this city, and it shows.

Day of the Dead here is called Hanal Pixan (han-al pish-an), meaning “food for the souls” in Mayan, and sees families and friends gather to celebrate departed loved ones, honouring them with a home-made altar often covered in pictures and their favourite foods.

I visited Merida as its fiesta kicked off on October 31 with the Parade of the Souls.

This candlelit procession from the cemetery into town made for an eerie sight, but that soon changed when they cleared the way for a huge street party along Calle 64.

The long avenue was decorated with giant skeleton structures and millions of orange marigolds, while the pavements were lined with family shrines, each blasting reggaeton or ranchera music from speakers.

Shamanic rituals

It’s a great place to tuck into authentic Mexican street food because, as well as leaving the deceased’s favourite meal as an offering, families make it in bulk to sell to passers-by.

Try Yucatan’s specialties, cochinita pibil (slow-roasted pork), pan de muerto (a sweet bread made for the event) or a marquesita (if you’ve ever wondered whether Nutella and cheese taste good together).

Even beyond the festivities, this city is a foodie’s dream.

Keep things cheap by eating tacos al pastor on virtually every street corner for as little as MX$10 each (40p, take pesos to pay), or lunch at the sensational and great value Taqueria de la Union.

And no trip to Mexico is complete without a plate of chilaquiles (fried tortilla chips) for breakfast or brunch. Merida’s best are at Marmalade 47.

November 2 was the day of the main parade, and people began to line the streets early to get a good spot.

I was glad we did, too, or we would have missed the ever-changing flow of mariachi bands, traditional dancers and even pets in costume.

The Catrinas — people dressed as elegant, sombrero-wearing skeletal women — were the most eye-catching part of the evening, with unique outfits and elaborate face paint.

Unlike so many Halloween extravaganzas, this event was free of gore and heart- stopping scares, making it very kid-friendly.

It wasn’t all about the parades. Smaller-scale events took place across the city for almost a week surrounding Day of the Dead, from concerts in plazas to shamans performing Mayan rituals on street corners.

Plus, the end of the fiesta didn’t mean the end of the fun; we tracked down a speakeasy called Malahat tucked away behind a plaza, where what looked like a fridge door led to a mezcal cocktail heaven.

Colourful Merida is easily walkable and its array of crumbling colonial buildings are painted pink, yellow or blue.

Footsore? Why not wind through its kaleidoscopic streets in a horse and carriage?

The city is also a great base for discovering the Yucatan, where hundreds of cenotes (natural sinkholes) make magical swimming spots and, for a beach fix, the white sands of Puerto Progreso are 40 minutes away.

An hour more takes you to Chichen Itza, site of some of the planet’s most breath-taking Mayan ruins.

Its New Seven Wonders of the World fame usually eclipses Merida in these parts, and the busloads of visitors are mostly heading back to resorts in Cancun and the Riviera Maya.

But if you linger in Merida, you’ll find a soulful city with its own pulse — and this beats strongest around November 2.

JUST hearing the name Courchevel conjures up images in my head of ­gold-trimmed ski jackets, sheepskin-draped lodges and food prices that would frighten even Jeff Bezos.

That’s because when I first skied in the area, nearly 20 years ago, a round of drinks in the part known as Courchevel 1850 would set you back the price of a small flat.

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But these days you don’t need to be a Silicon Valley tech bro or ­Russian oligarch to ski the resort’s 150km stunning pistes.

I was staying in the small resort of La Tania, the perfect gateway to the French alpine jewel of Courchevel, where celebs and royalty from Kate and Wills to the Beckhams have skied.

La Tania is — in French ski resorts terms — a tiddler of a place and has only been an official part of the Courchevel region since 2018.

Since then this purpose-built ­modern village, which only came to life for the 1992 Winter Olympics, has become a fixture for families and those looking for a cheaper and quieter place close to the action.

That action being Les Trois Vallées — aka the “world’s largest interconnected ski area” — where from €69 (£60) a day you can access 600km of runs, which is the equivalent of skiing from Paris to Geneva.

A key selling point of Les Trois Valées is that unlike many of the French resorts that have been affected by warmer weather, snow is guaranteed.

A whopping 85 per cent of all runs are at an altitude of over 1,800m — and half of them are green or blue. Some peaks on the region’s SIX ­glaciers are even above 2,500m — great for when the season has been a particularly snowless one.

I was staying at the beautiful Chalet Jonquille, a snowball’s throw from the town and the bottom of the main lift and run by the ever professional tour operator, Ski Beat.

From the outside it looks like a traditional A-frame chalet but inside it was all open plan and modern with a hot tub on the balcony and a cosy cinema room downstairs.

I always judge a chalet on the food — if it’s not up to scratch it can ruin a ski trip. And I was not disappointed.

After a full day on the mountains every cell in my body is crying out for a scalding hot fix of tartiflette or some other heavy French cuisine — and a few large glasses of red. I got that in spades.

BIKINI-CLAD DANCERS

Helpfully Ski Beat prides itself on offering top-notch cuisine and red and white wine on tap in its catered chalets.

The homemade cakes served for afternoon tea were so good you might be tempted to cut short your time on the slopes, just so you don’t miss out on a slice.

La Tania may be small but it is by no means a sleepy backwater.

There are many bars and restaurants in the village where you can do everything from chowing down on local delicacies like fondue to dancing to a band until the wee hours.

The imaginatively named Pub Le Ski Lodge is exactly that — a charming ski lodge with a decent selection of beers.

Half a litre of Pélican blonde (7.5%) will put hairs on your chest and knock out any aches and pains in your legs, as I found to my pleasure.

It also serves snacks like French tacos (try them!), which at ten euros a pop, won’t break the bank. Dining piste side, it can make a cheap and cheerful lunch spot.

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Courchevel also has its own La Folie Douce (a famous party bar) up at Meribel, where you can watch bikini-clad dancers pirouette on table tops as EDM beats pound your ears.

It’s a fairly show-off crowd but utterly fascinating to watch as they guzzle Veuve Clicquot out of the ­bottle in their Balenciaga salopettes.

The Bouc Blanc, also at Meribel, is a cheaper option where plats du jours are a more reasonable 21 euros

Views here are superb and when the sun is out there are few greater ways to spend a day — beer in hand, watching the world ski by.

And if you’ve still got the legs, you can ski all the way back to La Tania.

Robert Barajas Jr. wakes up every morning at 2 a.m. to start making birria horneada — “ovened,” he says. “We used to make it in the ground, now we use conventional ovens in order to have that crispy taste.” It is never simmered, adds Barajas. His father started the business several years ago, serving birria de chivo much the way the family has been making it for three generations in Tecalitlán, Jalisco. Birrieria Barajas opened first as a puesto on Compton Boulevard and then launched a truck across the street, parked in front of Eddie’s Liquor every day but Monday, beginning at 6:30 a.m.

“When we started we wouldn’t even sell half a goat,” Barajas says. “By word of mouth and faith we started to get going week by week. There are a lot of people that make birria. But it has to be goat, and it’s supposed to have your special mole, a kind of rub, your own recipe. Maybe that’s why we have good clientele, because we make the rub, everything, every day.”

The most popular order is the plato birria de chivo con pistola, a bowl of the spicy, fall-off-the-bone goat meat bathed in consomé that comes with a shank and tortillas, onions, cilantro, radishes, chiles and lime wedges for composing your own tacos. Of course there are regular tacos, and there are tacos dorados, folded and fried, with cheese if you want quesabirria. Every order comes with a complimentary small fried bean taco, and the beans are a recipe from Barajas’ grandmother, who died earlier this year. “My grandmother told my dad to ‘give customers a nice gesture,’” Barajas says. And once a month Barajas Sr. still prepares montalayo, a fried ball of goat stomach with sausage-like tripe stuffing; order it chopped into a taco.