Explore Mexico with me

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 54

2010-08-24T06:05:00.000-07:00

The train ride back to Los Mochis.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 53

2010-08-19T06:05:00.000-07:00

The last stop we made on the tour was possibly the most breathtaking. In more ways than one!

There were several look out points, protected by broken down post and rail fences. The smart ones among us stayed behind these fences. Of course, there are always tourists who just have to get up to that edge. Fools, all of them.

At any rate, the views into the canyons were awe inspiring.

If you click on the below picture to enlarge it, you can clearly see the pathways below that are used by the local Indians for getting from one canyon to another. These people do a lot of walking!

Here's a shot of one of the out looks that is protected by the aforementioned fences.

And zooming out on it, we can see why!

This was our tour guide for the morning. He walked out to this rock to show us how it wobbles back and forth when you stand on it. And he had on slippery cowboy boots. I gave this invite a pass, for sure!

The rock you see that is two in front of the figure, is the one our guide was standing on and rocking back and forth. See why I declined!

Zooming out gives you an even better view. Scary stuff.

True to his word, we left this place and ended our tour with 20 minutes to spare before the train arrived in Diversadero to whisk us back down to sea level at Los Mochis.

All in all, a very good trip to the Copper Canyon. I would like to go again in the Fall. We were there for the dry season. I would like to see it with the rivers and waterfalls running and all of the foliage green. I bet it is even more stupendous then.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 52

2010-08-17T06:05:00.000-07:00

The morning of Saturday, June 2, found us up and about quite early. We packed our bags and headed downstairs for the included breakfast at our hotel. We were to catch the train back to Los Mochis today. Reversing the route that carried us upward just a few days before. We were slightly loathe to leave the area after only so few days. We felt like there was much more to see in this unique corner of Mexico.

While we checking out, the hotel clerk asked us if we would be interested in a private tour of the area by car. He assured us that the tour only lasted 3 hours and we would then arrive in Diversadero in time to catch the train there. We figured, why not? A chance to see more and 3 hours less of a train ride. Win, win!

Our Spanish speaking only guide picked us up in front of the hotel and off we went. He was very knowledgeable about the area and filled us in as we went along. He was able to point out every different variety of tree and bird that we saw. I asked him what animals were indigenous to the area. Wolves, coyotes, birds of prey, snakes, lizards, that sort of thing. It looked like bear country to me also so I asked him specifically about bear. He laughed. He said that there used to be a lot of bear in the mountains but that the Indians ate them all up long ago!

He took us to several canyons that are not on the regular tour routes.

The views were all spectacular.

Along the way, we saw some other piles of rocks that had been named by the locals. Any guesses as to what they called this formation?

They also had a particularly descriptive name for this V shaped opening in the rocks.

All in all, we stopped and visited three different canyons but saw many, many more.

One of the canyons had such a spectacular point of interest, that it deserves its' own post. The picture above is a hint at it.

We were very glad that we took the time to take this extra, last minute tour. It left us with a good feeling and we felt that we had truly gotten to see what the Copper Canyon is all about.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 50

2010-08-12T06:05:00.000-07:00

Lake Arareko is a pristine little thing. It sits on ejido land (communal property) that is home to about 400 families of Tarahumara natives. This area is full of caves, waterfalls, deep canyons, rock formations and about 200 square meters of forested land. It is all breathtakingly beautiful.

We were set loose to just walk in the forest and around the edges of the lake. It so reminded me of where I used to live by Taylors Falls in Minnesota. Pine trees, rock formations and clear water.

Enjoy the view with me.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 51

2010-08-09T14:50:00.000-07:00

The next stop on our tour was the Cascade Cusare. These waterfalls plunge over 30 meters (97 feet) to the rocks below. Unfortunately, we were there in dry season and there was just a trickle of water falling down one side of it.

We had packed our lunch before we set out on this trip and so dragged it along with us to the waterfalls. We had visions of sitting on the rocks and watching gallons of water plunge over the falls as we munched on sandwiches. Well, we set on the rocks and munched sandwiches alright, but not to cascading water. It was a sound of a different sort that we were forced to listen to.

The girls that had caused us so much grief with their pubescent giggling and screaming on the train had picked the same day as we to visit the falls. They were everywhere. Shouting back and forth amongs each other and squealing like little piglets. We changed position twice to try to get some quiet in this pristine environment but there were just too many of them. We finally gave up and just put up with it.

We had had to walk about 400 meters (433 yards) through a rough, rock strewn, log clogged and slippery path to get to the falls. And, like at every other place where tourists congregate, the vendors were there. But these were different. No less pesky, but different. They never said a word. Women sat at strategic points along the path and as you passed, children would temporarily block your way while the women silently held out their good towards you. Once you said "No gracias", the children would sit back down. It was kind of creepy.

And we saw other children. They were scattered along the trail and among the trees. Shy, curious children, eager to get a peek at foreigners. Or anybody who was not a Tarahumara. They would poke their heads around the truck of a tree where they were hiding. Once they knew you had spotted them, boing, back behind the tree would go their heads. And there was a third class of children. The kind that upset me the most. The ones who follow along behind or beside you, clutching at you and begging for "dinero por favor". (money please) I can only assume that they were from a nearby village and did not belong to the women vendors. Cruel as some of you may think it is, I never give money to begging children. It only encourages this behaviour. Although the Tarahumara indians are a poor people, they are not destitute nor starving. This kind of thing should not have been allowed and was not necessary for their survival.

After leaving the falls, we were taken to a museum of local paintings by Jesuit priests. I found them totally lacking and dull. And, of course, all dealing with only one subject. Jesus saving the Indians.

Once back in town, we had dinner, strolled around a bit and then hit the hay. The next day would see us taking an unexpected tour and then catching the train back to Los Mochis.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 49

2010-06-10T06:05:00.001-07:00

The next morning was one of those beautiful Mexican days. Bright sunshine and a sky so blue that they haven't even been able to name a crayon after it yet.

Since we had booked an all day tour of the area, our first order of business was to find some kind of grocery store/shop and purchase some food for our lunch. Meals were not provided in the tour and we would be nowhere near any restaurants or food stands. I hate tunafish and that was all that was on offer in cans. I settled for cheese sandwiches and chips. Any port in the storm!

Creel is built in layers coming down the gentle slopes that surround it. Our first stop was to a "true" Tarahumara home. It is not uncommon for the Tarahumaras to take over a cave and make it their home. They live everywhere in the mountains so why not avail themselves of the shelter Mother Nature has provided. This home, punched into the highest slope above Creel as no exception. A family had taken over a small, dark cave as their habitat.

Inside the low ceilinged room were several beds and one table with a few homemade chairs. All cooking was done outside over an open fire. The yard was basically packed dirt with the remains of rough living strewn everywhere. No garbage pickup here. Just toss it onto a pile. Maybe. At least in that general direction. There were a couple of pigs in a makeshift corral/pen and chickens were kept in cages, not allowed to free range. The reason for this, we were told, is because the coyotes are not afraid of people and will come into the yard and eat the chickens if they are free.

I did not take any pictures of this home. I just felt like it was too much of an invasion. As we left, I realized that maybe I should not have felt that way. The man of the house was waiting at the gate and it was required to give him a tip before he would open the gate to allow you to leave. For some reason, that really pissed me off. A request for an offering I would have gladly given, but I didn't like the extortion feel of the way it was done. He got one peso put in his basket. My little protest.

Our van, consisting of the guide, the three of us, a very disgusting Mexican couple who made fun of everything they saw and a lovely Swiss girl, next pulled up to the gate marking the entrance to Indian land. Not a reservation mind you. But true Indian land that had been occupied by the Tarahumara Indians for centuries. There we were charged an additional 15 pesos each to enter.

Our first stop was to this Jesuit Mission Church. Our guide could not tell us if it was widely used, a relic of a time gone by or even if the Indians were Catholic, Protestant and heathen. I think he needed to do a bit more research before leading tours. At any rate, it was a fascinating piece of architecture standing out like a sore thumb in this desolate landscape.

The interior.

The view from the church parking lot. It was a very depressing landscape. Dusty hardly fairly describes it.

Another overview of the land. These are community structures, not homes. Including the schoolhouse on the far left.

A closer look at the school shows it to be of similar construction to most rural school houses in Mexico.

This is a typical home on the land. Nothing fancy, for sure. While we were there, a little boy, maybe 8 years old, came running out of the house, waving something at us. When he got to us, he was offering handbraided friendship bracelets for sale. Five pesos each! A great bargain. B bought one but only had a ten peso coin. The sad little boy reported that he could not sell it then because he had no change. He could hardly believe his good luck when B told him to just keep the extra 5 pesos for himself! He tied the bracelet on B's arm and turned and high tailed it back to the house. His bracelets held high and peeling laughter. As I write this, that was 3 years ago. Still a strong memory and guess what? B is still wearing that bracelet! Guess it was worth all of the 10 pesos he paid.

The main tourist attraction, and the primary reason we had taken this tour, was to see the rock formations that litter the landscape here. Each one with a name. Can you guess the names?

If you guessed frog rock, you were right. This one is called balancing rock. With good reason!

What appears to be snow in this next picture is actually ground up stone dust. The local kids used pieces of cardboard as sleds and gleefully slid down again and again. Just like their Northern neighbors do in snow.

With the viewing of the rocks over, we piled back in the van and headed down the road to our next stop, Lake Arareko.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 48

2010-06-08T06:05:00.000-07:00

Exactly two hours after getting back on the train at Diversado, we pulled into Creel.

As tourist towns go, Creel is small with a population of 5100. But the elevation is 2338 meters, or 7670 feet. The town is surrounded by majestic pine trees and the smell of pine is everywhere. During the day, it is a hot, dusty place. But that totally changes after dark. It gets cold there. Very cold. Heavy blankets on the beds and jackets were required.

Not knowing where the hotel was that we wanted to get to, we grabbed a taxi at the train station and went all of three blocks! We stayed at the Casa Margarita (27 out of 30) which included breakfast and dinner in the room rate. As I recall, we paid $30 US for a private room with two double beds. It was a pleasant room, certainly ample for our needs. The hotel also books tours of the region so we went ahead and booked one of their tours. Easy peasy.

Next we set out to explore the town a bit. There was not much to see. We went into a few shops because I always tried to buy a t-shirt from every town we visited. We were flabbergasted at how cheap everything was. Or at least cheap by the prices we have been used to paying throughout Mexico. We stopped for a coffee at one of the small restaurant/coffee shops that dot the main street. This town caters to tourists, mostly of the backpacker variety.

Further along and we discovered the Museum de los Tarahumaras. These are the indigenous people that have lived in this area for years. These are some of the poorest Indians in Mexico with over 40% having no income at all. They wear homemade shoes fashioned from old tires and held together by leather thongs. With the dust and dirt that they live amongst, they also have some of the dirtiest feet I have ever seen in my life.

Tarahumara girl and boy waiting at the train station in Diversado.

These are the Indians that are known worldwide for their ability to run. They have a game where two teams compete. They kick a small ball, about the size of a croquet ball, in a foot race that can take them as many 160 km (100 miles) through the canyons and rough terrain of the aptly name Sierra Tarahumara.

They are also expert basket weavers. We bought a few, they are everywhere for sale. Some of the most intricate hand work I have ever seen in my life. Truly an ability to be admired. I must say though, they seem to undervalue the amount of work and skill required to make a basket because they were not expensive at all. They are also known for their pottery, called Mata Ortiz. Beautifully formed pots of all sizes and decorated with dried cat gut. True works of art as well as functional.

Tarahumara girls trying to sell baskets to passengers hanging out of the train windows.

On our way back to the hotel, we decided to stop at a cash machine because I was running low on cash. I pulled out my wallet and that's when it hit me. I had left my ATM card in the machine in Durango! I freaked. After my panic attack subsided, we went back to our room and I called HSBC's emergency number. They checked and nobody had used my card! Thank goodness. They immediately cancelled it. They had no problem issuing me a new card but I wouldn't be able to pick it up until I again reached a big town. And that would be La Paz, which was still three or four days away. Nothing to do about it except worry for a few days!

With that stressful little chore out of the way, we went downstairs and enjoyed the dinner that was included in our room rate and then headed straight back up to the room to get some much needed rest and sleep.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 47

2010-06-03T06:05:00.000-07:00

THIS POST IS NOTHING BUT VIDEOS OF THE TRAIN RIDE AND SCENERY. SKIP IT IF YOU ARE NOT INTERESTED.

The train ride was an adventure like I have never had. Sure, I had ridden the fast, flat trains in Europe but they didn't prepare me for what I was about to experience on this ride.

We first passed through flat, brown scrubland. Full of candlestick cactus and skeletal looking trees with no foliage. We did not whiz through this area. We would gain a little speed and then, inexplicably, slow down again. No rhyme or reason for it. Unless, just maybe, it was because a freight train shares this one track and they have to adjust their time so we don't all collide head on!

We gradually started to climb into the foothills, which didn't last very long. We were soon in the mountain ranges themselves. The track was carved out of the side of these mountains and, at times, the view out the window was straight down. Scary stuff. We passed to quickly or I would have taken pictures of old boxcars that had somehow come off the track and skidded down the mountain. Some were hung up on rocks, some had made it all the way to the bottom. Vivid reminders of just how treacherous this route. could be.

The track between Los Mochis and Chihauhau contains 87 tunnels that cut through the mountain. Some very brief, some so long you are blinded when you again enter into the daylight. So, let's take a ride for awhile!

A view from the tracks sliced into the side of the mountain.

Crossing one of the many bridges.

Look how the terrain just drops away from the tracks.

Passing by a town somewhat off in the distance.

The bleak and barren hills in the dry season.

Dropping away again.

Watch your head!

It took me two days to get Blogger to upload all of these videos. I hope you enjoyed them.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 46

2010-06-01T06:05:00.000-07:00

At last, safely aboard the train and on our way to Creel. Some ten hours ahead of us through some of the most majestic mountains, gorges and streams to be found anywhere. I had ridden plenty of trains in Europe, but never one in the mountains before. This was going to be some trip!

We were fortunate enough to have a map of the track posted at the front of our car. The route is in red on the map below. We started at the bottom, near the coast, and were going to get off at Creel. You can see it on the map, just a little ways past that loopy curlycue thing.

On the map, by where it looks like is says "NORA", you can see a big S like curve. At that point we actually had to circle around a piece of the mountain. It was just too big, I guess, to rip a tunnel through it. And that curlycue thingy! I puzzled about that until we actually got to it. What the track is doing is actually wrapping around the mountain as it climbs from bottom to top. It was one long curve, let me tell you!

The start of the trip out of Los Mochis was slow. I think I could have gotten out and walked faster. We traveled 16 miles in 2.5 hours! We went past a long area of, what shall I call them, shacks? Deplorable housing conditions next to the tracks. I have seldom seen poverty that severe and that close up. I did not take any pictures. I felt like an interloper, or worse, just for staring at the people going about their early morning business.

The terrain started out flat and we gradually began to see mesas and hills in the distance. I was tingling with excitement at the adventure ahead. I love trains!

There are no safety regulations on the train. At least none that are enforced. We were allowed to stand between the cars, hang out the windows and lean off the side. Whatever we wanted to do. It made things great for photo jounalism!

As we entered the lowlands, we passed by this gorgeous lake. Reflecting the surrounding hills like some kind of aqua mirror.

Did I say passed by? We actually traversed a long bridge that spanned one end of the lake. It was a big lake.

And then the foothills started.

Then the foothills fell away as we climbed our way ever higher. What you are seeing in the below picture is our first glimpse into the Copper Canyon. It is actually a series of seven canyons that come together at various points and intersect all over the place. Very easy to loose your way inside them. And these canyons are deeper than the Grand Canyon. Hard to imagine. The big difference is that there is no Colorado River running through them to help you actually pick out the bottom.

The picture above was taken at our only stop on the journey at Diversado. This is about seven hours after we left Los Mochis. And it was here that we got our first glimpse of the Talahumara Indians that populate this region.

There were makeshift kitchens set up and food was served to those daring enough to purchase it. I was not one of them. I'm not usually a quesy eater but none of it looked good to me. In fact, I doubt that I could have eaten anything at all. My insides were all jittery and felt like slush from all the jostling on the train.

Another view taken leaning out of the train. Shows the river gorge, mostly dry this time of the year and looking back at the cars behind us.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 45

2010-05-27T06:05:00.000-07:00

The Hotel Corinthias (27) was everything we expected and more. Nice, clean rooms, friendly, almost overly helpful staff and inside, secure parking for the car!

One of the problems we were facing and had not yet worked out, was where to leave the car while we were at the Copper Canyon. When we asked at the hotel if there was a possibility of leaving our car there while we were gone, they said yes! Of course, we had to pay for a night's lodging in advance for when we got back. But we would have to pay that anyway. Problem solved and one less worry on our backs.

For dinner that night, we visited a quaint little Chinese buffet. The food was excellent. They even had one of my favorites, Sweet and Sour Soup. I almost didn't even want to bother with main courses. It was that good. Of course I did though! Once we eaten our fill, it was back to the hotel and in bed early. We had a very, very early start the next day and a long day it was to be too!

One of the perks offered by our hotel was free taxi service to the train station! At 770 pesos per night, we were certainly getting our monies worth! We arrived at the train station at 5:00 AM while it was still dark out. The waiting room was very tiny with a serious lack of sitting space for the throngs of people there waiting for the train. And there were vendors or things offered for sale. I was surprised by this as Mexicans are very ingenious in making a buck wherever there is a crowd to spend money. There wasn't even a vending machine in sight. But we were in luck.

Or so we thought. Across the parking lot was a small booth, complete with iron bars over the front window. One placed one's order, the clerk got it, you paid and stepped aside for the next person in line. We ordered three coffees. What we got was three Styrofoam cups of hot water and three packets of Nescafe instant powder. No cream, no sugar, no spoon. Oh well, it was hot anyway. It was cold that early in the morning. And did I mention the mosquitoes? Swarms of them. It was awful.

Back across the parking lot, sipping our coffee and B and I chain smoking as we waited, we noticed a large group of teen aged girls being dropped off by their parents and congregating in little groups. They were as loud and obnoxious as any group of 12-13 year old girls can be. We hoped that they would not be in our car. And they weren't. They were, however, in the car behind us and had to pass by us in order to get to the dining car. Which they checked frequently to see if it was open yet. Each time leaving the door open, letting in blasts of cold morning air. Finally we had had enough of getting up from our seats and closing that door that L said something to them. After that the door got shut.

And why did we have to shut that door? Because, for some reason, the ticket agent who sold us our tickets either lied to us, was clueless or just wanted to surprise us. We had window seats in the first two rows of the car.....on the right side! Which meant that the mountains, rivers and valleys would be on our side of the car for the 10 hour journey that stretched ahead of us!

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 44

2010-05-25T06:05:00.000-07:00

Los Mochis was a surprise. It was more like a typical mid-size American town than a Mexican one. The streets were wide, tree-lined and laid out in a sensible grid pattern. Street signs were everywhere and it was easy to locate everything. I was very relieved to see this. I was still feeling a bit stressful from the encounter with the coupon guy earlier.

Trying to stick to our budget, or at least get back on it, we checked into a lower priced hotel. Big mistake. Our first clue should have been that the place was all torn up and being remodeled. Everything was dirty and dusty, but, like travel weary fools, we checked in anyway. I think mostly because there had been such a bad atmosphere in the car for the past few miles, nobody wanted to argue about anything so we all just said "Fine" to this hotel.

My personal "schedule" was off during this entire trip. I'm the type of person that needs to relax over a cup of coffee in the morning to get the 'ol system moving and cleaned out. I rarely had a chance to do this as we had to be on the road early most mornings. This day of travel had been no different. As a result, whenever we checked into a room, I usually made a bee line for the toilet. Imagine my chagrin at this hotel to discover, a bit too late, that the toilet would not flush! By hook and by crook (no other details are necessary here) I was able to finally get everything down and exited the bathroom madder than I had been in a long time.

We decided to check out a different hotel. But first, we had errands to run and wanted to leave all of our luggage in a safe place.

Our first stop was the railway office where we had to purchase tickets for the train ride to Creel and the Copper Canyon. We had been told (and read) that a window seat on the right side of the train was imperative if you wanted the view. Alas, even though we were a day early in buying our tickets, all of the window seats were gone. And we could only buy one way tickets. At 800 pesos each. The saleslady told us that we could purchase our return tickets on the train the day we came back. Knowing just a bit about the way Mexico works, I was a little leery about this. But what choice did we have but to believe her?

Our next stop was in Topolobampo, 24 kilometers south of Los Mochis and located on the Sea of Cortez. We wanted to get our tickets for the overnight ferry ride yet to come. We would be going to Baja California South, specifically La Paz, upon our return. There we were met with the news that tickets could only be purchased on the day of departure. Another wasted trip.

Back in Los Mochis, we advised the grumpy and uncaring desk clerk that we were checking out. We waited for him to ask why but the question never crossed his lips. In fact, he said nothing at all. Just kind of gave us a dirty smirk. As we left the hotel, luggage in hand, the staff that was working that day had all gathered in a group by the door and giggled and smirked at us as we walked out. It was really weird.

Our next hotel was the complete opposite kind of experience.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 43

2009-04-09T07:00:00.000-07:00

We were about 40 minutes off the freeway when we passed through a little town called Rancho Viejo. Just a hole in the wall kind of town. On the right hand side of the road we passed a number of little cement buildings, much like a single stall car garage. These had all been converted to diners. We randomly chose one for lunch and parked in front. We were in for a surprise.

Of all the diners in that town, we just happened to stop at the only one run by an American woman! She was married to a Mexican man and followed him back to his home town to live. She was starved for somebody to talk to in her native language. We invited her to sit down with us and had a very nice conversation with her while her mother-in-law prepared our lunch. I think we got special treatment because our lunch, while I forget exactly what we had, was delicious and bountiful! Almost with a sadness we hadn't expected, we finally had to say goodbye and get back on the road. I vividly remember her standing by the road waving to us for as long as she could.

Not long after that, our good cheer induced by our lunch came to an end. To say it was hot that day is to not adequately describe the weather. It was horrible. And to add to our misery, the road turned into a dusty, bumpy, bumper to bumper mess of road construction. For miles we were forced to creep our way inch by inch forward. At times the backup was so bad I actually shut the engine off to give it a break. It was not a fun time.

After what seemed an eternity, we were finally back on good pavement and passing through downtown Guamuchil. I think I overreacted to something that happened at one of the interminably long stop lights. I was guilty of cultural stupidity.

We were still about 10 cars back from the stop light with all of our windows open. I noticed a man walking down the lengths of cars, handing something to the drivers. When he got to me, he showed me a pile of coupon books for local businesses. I graciously told him "No Gracias". He thrust the documents through the window into my face anyway, almost hitting me. I was tired of driving by then, tired of being hot and tired of being in the car. I swiped his hand away from my face and again said "NO GRACIAS!". With that, he tossed the flyers into the car onto my lap and walked away. I angrily picked them up and flung them out the window onto the grass beside the road. Both B and L at that point started to tell me how rude I was by doing that. I lashed out at them to SHUT THE FUCK UP! They both fell silent.

Shortly thereafter the man returned, picked up the flyers and angrily walked in front of my car and started to write down my license plate number! I was having none of that. I thought he was going to report me for littering or something. For throwing the trash he threw at me out onto the street. I inched the car forward in an attempt go keep him from seeing all of my plate number. He jumped back out of the way and headed for my window. I rolled it up and gave him the finger. With that, the line moved and I was safely on my way through the light.

I found out afterwards that these guys just hand the flyers to you and if you want to keep them, you have to pay them for them. If not, you just hand them back to them when they come back down the line. I didn't know that. Otherwise I would have just taken them and handed them back to him. No problem. It was his attitude about it that pissed me off so badly. Pushing them into my face and then throwing them onto my lap.

Even though I felt somewhat justified in treating rudeness with rudeness, it left a sour taste in my mouth that lingers to this day when I think about it. Needless to say, the rest of the drive to Los Mochis was completely in almost total silence.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 42

2009-04-07T07:00:00.000-07:00

Once on the freeway known as MX 15. Our route that day took us through Culiacan, Guamuchil, Guasave and on to Los Mochis. It was only about a four hour drive and, with a couple of exceptions, was uneventful and actually boring.

From Mazatlan to Culiacan is about 220 km, or 138 miles. All fast freeway. Except for all the bikes on the freeway that day. There was evidently a bike marathon going on and imagine our surprise when we saw flashing lights up ahead and discovered a covey of about 30 bikes in the right hand lane. These guys were fortunate. They had an escort of police and private vehicles, all flashing their hazard lights.

We thought we were pass them and had just speeded up to the speed limit of 68 MPH when I had to hit the brakes and slow way down again. Another group of bikers. This time without an escort. Just out their all on their own. At least they stayed in the right lane.

This freeway is not flat. It is a series of gently rolling hills. Not steep but to large to see over until you crest them. A rather dangerous place to be on a bike without an escort. We were to eventually see many more. Some small groups, some individuals. I was glad to finally cut off the freeway to the secondary road which would take us through Culican and back onto the freeway on the other side.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 41

2009-03-31T12:30:00.000-07:00

The next morning, following the signs to Culiacan and Expressway MX15, we made our way out of Mazatlan. We had noticed that the tires were getting a little low so we stopped at a Pemex gas station to get gas and filled the tires. We also grabbed a cup of gas station coffee to slug down on the way.

We weren't far down the road when the car started to feel sluggish and heavy. We all know that feeling. The one that says "Your tire is going flat." I pulled over to the side of the road and we had a look. Yup. The tire that had looked a little low and that we had just put air in was now almost flat. There was enough air to drive for a little ways though.

We drove a bit further down the road and saw a sign for a vulcanizador, or tire repair shop. We pulled over and patiently waited for the owner to finish what he was doing and saunter over to us. He took one look at the tire and said "You want me to fix that?" Kind of a duh question.

He jacked up the car, took the tire off and disappeared back into his workshop to have a look see.

Take a look at our wheel. Remember, the car at that time was just barely two years old. That's what constant exposure to sea salt laden air will do.

While we were waiting for the verdict, I had a little peek into his "warehouse". I would be shocked if any part you needed was not in there somewhere.

Shortly thereafter he came out and motioned us to follow him. He showed us the tire and the huge screw that was stuck in the tire. He said he could patch it good as new so we told him to go ahead. The whole process took 20 minutes and cost us a whopping 50 pesos.

The whole visit with this guy took considerably longer. He wanted to chat. He had noticed our Quintana Roo license plates and had about a thousand questions regarding Hurricane Wilma. He had heard the island had broken into two pieces, that people had been swept out to sea, all kinds of nonsense like that. We were more than happy to set him straight as to what the real damage was.

Finally we were back on the road and heading for MX and our next destination.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 40

2009-03-19T07:00:00.000-07:00

With L navigating and me gritting my teeth in the crazy traffic, we located the hotel we had earmarked in the Lonely Planet. It was right across the street from the ocean and had a pool. Perfect. It was the Hotel Sands Arena (18 out of 30) and adequate for our needs for one night. Even though it was $80 for the night and we had an interior, basement room.

We unpacked and immediately went for a relaxing swim/float in the pool. It felt really great after being in the car for almost 8 hours again. Six of those hours negotiating through the mountains. After our swim, we walked across the street to check out the beach and, for the first time on this trip, dip our feet into the Pacific Ocean.

I was not overly impressed with the beach. Maybe because I come from the pristine sand and beaches of the Caribbean, but this beach struck me as dirty. Swarthy may be a better word. It was certainly not garbage laden or anything like that. It just did not have a friendly feel to it and the beach was littered with small jelly fish carcasses. Something we were to encounter several times on this trip.

For dinner we tried the famous, or infamous, chain of restaurants, The Shrimp Bucket. I highly do NOT recommend this restaurant. What a rip off. We each ordered a bucket of shrimp, which was actually served in a bucket. We saw them being delivered to other tables and it looked like a good deal. I had the coconut shrimp. When it arrived, at a cost of $16.50 (in 2007 dollars) I was shocked. The stupid bucket they were served in had a false bottom and you did not get a bucket of shrimp at all. What you got was nine badly cooked shrimp. Like I said, a total rip off.

So, grumbling the entire time, we returned to our hotel rather early and headed for bed. We had a long drive ahead of us again the next day.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 39

2009-03-17T07:00:00.000-07:00

We gradually finished our descent out of the mountains and entered onto the flatlands leading to Mazatlan. We passed through two Military check points along the way.

The first one was easy. They just waved us through. The second one was a pain in the ass. It was set up where one road ended at a T and you could go right or left. We wanted to go right towards Mazatlan. Every vehicle on the road was directed off to the a dusty side road that ended in three "stalls". You were directed into whichever one was empty. Once was empty. These guys were very thorough and checked everything. They even lifted off the plastic cup that sits at the base of the gear shift and checked in that space. I didn't even know there was a space under that thing! (to this day, that thing keeps popping off) When our turn came we were ordered out of the car and told to stand off to the side. Like we experienced a few years back outside of Zacatecas, we were made to stand in a group and were carefully watched by two guys with machine guns. A wickedly nervewracking experience, even knowing you have nothing to hide.

All checked out, we were given mere minutes to reassemble all of our stuff that they had unpacked and were finally on the homestretch to Mazatlan. Along the way we encountered a most amazing sight. It was an urban dust devil. We saw many of them in the flat fields this trip and trips past, but never one in a semi built up area. It was very impressive.

We were actually going to be in Mazatlan twice for this trip. It was our pivot point on the Pacific after arriving to the coast from the central regions. First we would be heading north from it and then passing back through on our way down the Pacific Coast.

We arrived in Mazatlan, passing by the Golden Coast exit, which is the tourist zone. No way did we want to end up there. We were planning on staying more central or downtown. As we inched our way along Avenue del Mar, I spotted a Dairy Queen. I squealed in delight at the thought of having a Blizzard and made note of its' location for future reference. Much of the drive, once you reach the ocean looks like this:

Believe it or not, that is the only picture I have of our first time in Mazatlan!

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 38

2009-03-10T07:00:00.000-07:00

Time to leave the interior and head for the Pacific coast! Today's drive was going to be a rough one. We were going to be heading for Mazatlan, taking Hwy 40 through the Sierra Madre Occidental mountains. It was only 188 miles (300 kilometers) from Durango to Mazatlan but it was to be a test of my stamina as a driver. And one without power steering to boot. I can tell you, by the time we reached the flat lands outside of Mazatlan, I thought I was going to have to put my wrists in splints. Twist with all my might to the left, then twist back again to the right. Shift up, shift down. It was a beautiful, panoramic drive but a grueling one also.

We pulled over here at one of the few places available for this and took a quick potty break. This was located on a cliff edge in one of the straighter sections of road.

What looks like smog in this picture is actually smoke.

The hills were afire all around us. Spontaneous combustion possibly? Sometimes we couldn't even see into these vallies. Once we had to creep cautiously forward through some really thick smoke. I had visions of running the fire in Tabasco. We did encounter flames occasionally along the side of the road, but nothing of that magnitude.

About half way through, almost everybody who drives this road stops at this point.

Why? Because this is the best advantage point to see the range of mountains that is known as the Devil's Spine.

Very impressive. I never did figure out if those brown lines are trails used by people, animals or what.

Remember I showed some of the road hazards of driving in Mexico. Well, here's another.

That horse was just plodding along, in the middle of the mountains. No settlements or farms anywhere around. Who knows why.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 37

2009-03-05T07:00:00.000-08:00

The hotel we were staying at in Durango is listed as one of the finest in the guide books. It is located in a 19th century building with huge rooms, a grand staircase and a restaurant that is popular with the locals.

We were very intrigued by the restaurant. They offered a partial buffet each night, boasting 18 salads and 21 meats. So our last night in Durango was a no brainer as to where to eat.

The restaurant was located in the interior of the hotel, surrounded on all sides by the upper floor walkways. It was possible to walk around and look down into the restaurant, which was semi elegantly laid out. Semi elegant to me is cloth napkins!

There was a huge table sat up in the middle with the salads going all the way around. There was a quite a choice and variety. We sampled many of them but were saving ourselves for the 21 meats. In retrospect, I don't know what we were thinking. I don't think I could even name you 21 different kinds of meat. Let alone 21 that I would consider eating!

We were not allowed to choose our meat. Nor was it display for us to pick from. Each course of meat was brought to our table by a wonderfully friendly waiter. Large pieces of meat were served shishkebob style, skewered onto a sword! The waiter hovered over your plate and slid off as much meat as you wanted.

First out was chunks of pork. Delicious. Then came chicken. Followed by chunks of Filet Mignon. Then another kind of pork, more beef and more chicken. Then came a piece that we didn't recognize.

It was long and squiggled its' way up the sword. We asked what it was. The waiter just smiled and said we should give it a try and see if we could guess. My delighted smile at the meal so far quickly turned to worry lines on my brow. I am not a great fan of mystery meat. But then, nothing ventured, nothing gained.

He slid two pieces each off the sword and almost swashbuckled away, leaving us to figure it out. The taste was not bad. Rather bland except for the seasoning and charcoal grilled flavor. But the texture! Oh my. It was like eating meat flavored sand. Very rough and grainy. We unanimously decided that it was not all that bad but we didn't want any more of it.

The waiter returned and asked for our verdict. We told him our thoughts and then he informed of us of what we had just eaten. Beef esophagus! I admit, I would never had tried it had he told us what it was. But I'm glad I did.

After that we asked for more servings of pork and Filet Mignon please!

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 36

2009-03-02T06:47:00.000-08:00

The area around Durango has been used as a backdrop for many Western movies. Among the movies were The Sons of Katie Elder, Treasure of the Sierra Madre and Wagons East. It was during filming of the latter that comedian John Candy had his heart attack and died. There were many more Westerns made here featuring John Wayne, Dolores del Rio and Dean Martin. I just can't remember them all.

So it was no surprise to anybody that I rushed them through breakfast the next morning. We were going just outside of Durango to visit a real Western movie set! I couldn't wait.

This movie village was only a few miles out of town with a backdrop of mountains to make it feel even more westerny. We arrived in the parking lot and had our choice of spots since there was not a person around. Only the feeling of ghosts from past visitors. We walked over to the ticket booth and interrupted the young man sitting inside. He reluctantly laid aside the joint he was smoking and took our money. I think it was 5 pesos per person.

We walked down a long lane, adorned with markers stating the names of the movies filmed there, the year made and the major stars. I was thrilled.

Here's the start of the main street.

Midway down looking to the end of the street and the "graveyard".

I was expecting a lot of fake front buildings but was pleasantly surprised to see that they were actually 3D buildings. I was unpleasantly surprised to discover that you could not go inside them. They were probably just big empty squares anyway.

They even had these rail tracks laid out with a couple of cars on them. You can't tell from this picture but I was hanging on for dear life as the car joggled from side to side, bouncing me along. I was pulled out of my cowboy fantasy when B yelled, "Get off that you dork!"

They even had a gallows set up for cattle rustlers and the like. Sometimes they got the wrong man and the innocent were hanged. I was going to say the innocent were hung, but that is an entirely different story.

Of course my last wish was not for world peace. It was to be buried right here.

With my luck, they would have just thrown me into the sagebrush and left me to the coyotes.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 35

2009-02-26T06:54:00.000-08:00

Ah, Durango. Land of the cowboy, high desert and westerns. I was really looking forward to visiting this town. It was one of the major places on my list to visit.

To get there from Aquascaliente, our route took us through large, rolling hills and buttes in the distance. The kind you expect to see a group of Indians on horses looking down at you from. Just before they bombard you with blazing arrows. Beautiful, breathtaking, high desert scenery. But there were also unrelenting stretches of pavement that stretched out in front of you as far as you could see. Not so nice.

On the way we stopped at a convenience/gas station in the little dusty town of Nombre de Dios. (In the name of God) We thought it was aptly named. We bought pre-packaged sandwiches and Cokes and sat on the curb of the store to chow them down. Many of the locals who came and went while we relaxed and ate gave us a passing nod or a quizzical stare. But none interrupted our little cowboy lunch. I doubt very much that they see a passing gringo very often.

We located a great hotel in downtown Durango, the Posada San Jorge. (30 out of 30) After we checked in, we went to dinner at Pizza Calderone and then stopped for ice cream. We wondered over to Plaza de Armas, the beautiful town square and sat and watched the children playing, young couples doing as much as they could with watchful parents around, and life in a quiet big city hustle and bustle around us. It was most pleasant and a nice way to end the day.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 34

2009-02-24T07:44:00.000-08:00

The next day L and I set out to see the sights of Aquascaliente. The first place we headed was to the bullring.

The Plaza de Toros Monumental is located in the Expoplaza. It is a rather bleak, cheezy plaza that prominently features a boring shopping mall. But on one side is located the splendid bullring. It is notable for its' modern colonial treatment of a traditional bullring. It was a magnificent bullring from the outside. We were there in the off season so it was not open. I would have loved to see the inside.

The outside was graced with these marvelous statues. I think they may have been bronze. At least they were made to look like it.

The detail was stunning.

This was really funny, if not just a little disrespectful. Somebody climbed up there and put a popcorn box on his head.

Then we were off to the Palacio Municpal, city government offices building. The foyer walls are huge and covered with murals painted by a Chilean artist. They were stunning and depicted various significant historical events of Mexico. Unfortunately, I can't find any of the ton of pictures I took of these. I think I may have lost one of my picture CD's. Probably left it in some hotel room.

Then on to the small museum of Jose Guadalupe Posada. He lived from 1852-1913. He is Mexico's most famous engraver artist and is famous for his engravings depicting political events. Most of his engravings are of skeletal figures. I think you will recognize some of these. This bride being his most famous.

This one is Pancho Villa.

The political statements being made in most of these was lost on me. Especially this next one. I get what he is saying, but not about what or to whom. Notice that there is a figure buried in this pile of shit and a grasshopper climbing up the side. There was no plaque explaining it.

Next we are off to the heart of cowboy country, Durango!

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 33

2009-02-19T06:45:00.000-08:00

I'm not sure what happened with my ace navigator as we left Guadalajara behind. Or rather, tried to leave it behind. We found our way out of the downtown area with no difficulty and made our way to the ring road which encircles Guadalajara. We decided that we were heading the wrong way. We needed to get to the exit to the freeway which would lead us to Aquascaliente.

After travelling quite a few miles, we decided to turn around and head the other way. Big mistake. It took us almost two hours to get all the way around Guadalajara and to the exit we needed. If we had stayed going in our original direction, we were probably only a matter of miles from the exit we needed. At least we got to see a lot of the area outside of town.

We arrived late in Aquascaliente. It was starting to get dark. By Mexican standards, Aquascalientes, named after its hot springs, is not a small city. It has a population of 658,000. So you would think finding a hotel would be no problem.

We wanted to stay downtown, close to everything and within walking distance. We took the first hotel that matched that bill, since it was getting late. We only planned to stay a couple of nights anyway. We chose the Hotel Colonial (9 out of 30 points!) and were directed to the indoor parking area. So far, so good. Our car would be off the street anyway. The clerk waited for us to park our car and then walked over to our door. Our door opened into the parking garage!

It was a tiny, cramped room with two beds. A single and a double. If you wanted to, you could reach over and touch the person in the other bed. They were that close. The bathroom, while clean, was even tinier. Sitting on the toilet was an endeavor since one's knees actually brushed against the wall in front of the toilet. I tell you that for a reason.

We didn't even bother to unpack but instead headed out for dinner. I don't even remember where we ate. After dinner we walked the three blocks back to our hotel but stopped first for a coffee at the park directly across the street.

I had never seen or heard of a park like this before. Evidently they are quite popular in northern and central Mexico. It was a mariachi park. All kinds of mariachi groups hang out there and people drive up and pay them to come over to their car and sing. Weird but quaint.

While we having our coffee, B announced that he wasn't feeling well and went across the street to our room. L and I finished our coffee, paid the bill and sauntered back. As soon as we entered the cramped little room with no windows, we knew what the problem with B was. It kind of reminded me of this guy.

Poor B. He spent the greater part of the night in that small bathroom. Alternately throwing up and having bad diarrhea. Poor us. We had to listen to and smell it all night. We did not tease him though but offered our sympathy and to get him as many drugs as he needed. I think L was remembering his bout with illness in Patzcuaro because he was especially helpful.

Even though we plied B with as much medication as we thought he could handle, he was trapped in that room for three days. Needless to say, he saw almost nothing of Aquascaliente and we ended up staying there for one more day than we had planned.

Having the extra time, and wanting to get out of the room so B could rest, L and I took off the next morning to start exploring. One of the first things we passed was this funny little locked courtyard.

I stuck my nose right up to the gate in order to get a better look. These things were creepy. Even though they were merely statues, I could vividly imagine them coming to life at night. Thus the locked gates.

I found this one particularly scary. In a good way though.

We continued on with our tour and actually saw some interesting things. I'll share more of them with you next chapter.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 32

2009-02-17T06:45:00.000-08:00

The next morning we were up and packed in time to go downstairs for breakfast. We were, after all, staying at a B&B!

Breakfast was an elegant affair. Much fancier than I am comfortable with nowadays. We were seated at a very formally set table in the dining room. Lace tablecloth, cloth napkins, salt cellars, the best silverware and glassware. We sat down and introduced ourselves to the couple already there.

They were an elderly couple from Texas and I instantly took a dislike to them. Later I found out that B and L did too. It just so happened that he was celebrating his 80th birthday. I found them both to be nosey, pretentious and bordering on rude with their personal questions. Mostly at a situation like that, people tend to discuss safe topics. Certainly not religion, life styles and finances. And we were especially bored by her stories of all the places they have been and things they have seen. Because they can afford to travel. Barf me out with a spoon. We did not linger over breakfast. We had places to go anyway.

Our next stop was to be the city of Guadalajara. By freeway, it was only an hour away.

We pulled into Guadalajara and made our way through downtown with me driving and L navigating. Not as easy as it sounds. Guadalajara has four million residents and I bet over half of them own cars! We located all four hotels that we had earmarked as possibly being suited to us. Read: within our budget.

From where I had parked, B and L could reach all of the hotels and went to give them a look see while I patiently waited in the hot car. They came back forty minutes later and gave the report. Without fail, each one had been sleazier than the one before. So out came the Lonely Planet again and we started looking for other hotels to check out. But then I made a tentative suggestion.

"Do we really need to see Guadalajara? I know, I have wanted to come here for a long time. But, you know what? I am sick to death of cathedrals, museums and especially big cities. I would be just as happy to move on."

I was shocked by the quick and unanimous agreement that came from my travelling companions. We decided that we would just head on out to Aquascaliente.

Below is all I really saw of Guadalajara.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 31

2009-01-15T07:46:00.000-08:00

Before pulling out of Uruapan, we consulted the map to decide where we should go next. We were now off our set itinerary and needed to find a place we could get to within the remaining daylight. It didn't take us long to decide. Lake Chapala it was!

On the way, L consulted the Lonely Planet and, using his cell phone, started calling some of the places listed for lodging. We finally settled on the Lake Chapala Inn (27), a bed and breakfast located right on the shore of the lake. It was an elegant place, more like an old home than a hotel. It was owned and run by a sweet, but eccentric, 80 year old woman. Her biggest eccentricity was that she descended the stairs backwards. Strange.

We had a beautiful large room on the second floor and we felt like we had landed in the lap of luxury. The room opened onto a large sitting room area that overlooked the lake. It was here, while having a peaceful evening cocktail of Cuba Libres, that we first opened the bag of Fritos Corn Chips that I had received as a gift, saved, and brought along on the trip. This one bag was hoarded and rationed and ended up lasting until we crossed the Sea of Cortez!

We were appalled by Lake Chapala. From reading blogs of people who live in the area, I had expected a beautiful, picturesque lake. In retrospect, I guess it was sort of pretty, but not worth a return visit. Most amazing was the water level. It was way down from where it should have been. Reason being that the nearby large city of Guadalajara is siphoning off lake water to appease the needs of the one million or so residents.

You can see this drastic reduction in the water level in the pictures below. What is green and the brown road should be underwater.

The green stuff in the pictures above is some kind of floating weed. The wind blows differently from day to night and that stuff gets blown from one side of the lake to the other. At night the boats you see in the middle of it are actually anchored in clear water. This weed blows in overnight and they have to paddle and prod their way out of it each morning. I don't know if it was because of those weeds or not, but there were millions of annoying bugs out and about in the evening.

For dinner that night we decided to take a taxi to a restaurant called Tomas'. This place was not listed in our guidebook but there was an article about it in one of the local rag sheets. It was touted as one of the best and most popular gringo hangouts in the area. The menu was typically American with steaks, burgers, fries and onion rings. We hailed a taxi and off we went.

It was located on a side street, about a block off the main street that goes into town and the lake. It was dark and dingy inside. The service and food were very good though. The write up about it had been correct about the menu. As for it being a very popular hangout, maybe we were just there at the wrong time.

Before we hailed the taxi for dinner, I was able to get these shots of sunset over the lake.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 30

2009-01-06T07:58:00.000-08:00

Up early and packed, we headed out to the street to grab some breakfast before we took off. As long as we were going to be a few moments, I engaged one of the guys who walks around with a bucket and brushes and who will wash your car for 30 pesos. Since he was at it, I had him detail and vacumn it also. It sure needed it after that dusty drive yesterday! Set me back a whopping 70 pesos, with tip. Car all clean and packed, we all clean and packed, we left Patzcuaro behind and got onto Route 43, the fast tollroad to Uruapan.

It was another beautiful, panoramic drive to Uruapan through the hill country. Our drive encompassed a total descent of 300 meters (325 yards). We entered the town via narrow, dirty cobblestone streets. We were struck by the fact that everything around us looked, well, dirty. The streets, the buildings and even the people. We wondered if there was some kind of water shortage in this town. It was like everything was covered with an old, ground in kind of dirt. Not appealling at all.

We consulted our ever handy Lonely Planet and located a few hotels. Quite near the Parque Nacional Barranca del Cupatitzio. (say that really fast!) I squeezed the car into an available parking spot and waited while B and L went looking at hotel rooms. While they were gone, I watched people moving to and fro and mused about what there was to see and do in Uruapan.

There was the above mentioned park which purportedly had some lovely paths following the riverbank of the Rio Cupatitzio. Mmmm, sounded like lots of walking to me. There was the "world's narrowest house" and a textile mill. In the surrounding area and day trippable, were the waterfalls of Tzararacua with its' 557 slippery steps or an hour ride down on a wooden saddle. No thanks to either. Or the ruins of Tingambato. I'm always up for looking at more old stones but this one didn't sound all that great.

So, after we had checked four different hotels in our price range, we had a group meeting. The concensus was unanimous that we should just cross this ugly city off our list and move on.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 29

2008-11-25T08:36:00.000-08:00

Our last day in Patzcuaro wasn't really spent there. It was spent exploring the environs. Specifically the town of Santa Clara del Cobre and Lake Zirahuen.

Santa Clara del Cobre is a cute little town and, like the name implies, they specialize in all things copper. Although no longer active, this town had working copper mines starting in 1553. Nowadays the main attraction is the over 50 workshops dealing with the production of copper items. From key chains and mini pots to huge statues and home decorating items. This town is absolutely copper crazy.

The inhabitants here evidently take great pride in their copper heritage. Witness this pick up truck.

And the town square.

We actually got a tour of one of the smaller workshops. We were graciously and expertly shown the entire process of raw copper melting, firing and molding of the finished product. They actually handed us the hammer and let us pound away on a piece. Good stuff.

Our guide for this process was all of 19 years old and told us that he had been working in this particular shop for four years! I'm not sure how much he got paid but he undoubtedly spent the majority of his income on hair gel! We left a 20 peso tip and about 10 minutes after leaving the shop we saw our guide returning to the shop carrying four Cokes. We supposed that they used our tip money to buy refreshments. Another example of how close to the bone most Mexicans live.

We found a nice little street side restaurant and had BBQ chicken for lunch.

Although I would highly recommend a visit to Santa Clare del Cobre, I would not recommend you take the time or trouble to visit our next stop, Lake Zirahuen. Advertised as a clean, clear, deep lake, it was anything but. There are no beaches to speak of and it is crowded with small resorts right to the waters edge. And the road to get there is weird.

At one point, the paved road stops and we were detoured around the side of a hill on a poorly made emergency dirt road. Not fun.

We eventually got back around to the good road and drove until it ended. We walked to the waters' edge, yawned, got back in the car and returned to Patzcuaro.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 28

2008-11-21T08:27:00.000-08:00

The guided tour of Patzcuaro was a hoot. We were the only tourists on the bus and our guide did not speak any English. Yet we signed up for the English language tour. They graciously explained that the tour guide was not available and offered us a 50% discount on the tour! We did not bother to tell them that we would probably be able to understand the Spanish one as well!

Since we were the only two tourists on the tour, the tour guide insisted that we sit right behind the driver of the mini bus so that we could hear her better. She needn't have worried. Amazingly, and much to our dislike, she used a microphone loudspeaker system within the bus that about broke our eardrums! Never mind. She had given us tour sheets in English explaining everything we saw. We did our best to tune her out, read our badly translated sheets and enjoy what we seeing. Guess what? I did not take any notes of the tour and don't remember a single thing that we saw!

Tour over, we returned to the hotel to gather L for a somewhat early dinner. Around 7PM. We decided to go to one of the fancier, more upscale restaurants listed in the Lonely Planet. We needed a good meal and did not want to take any chances of L getting sick again.

We were escorted to a table by the waiter. The table was covered with a cloth tablecloth and the requisite hurricane lamp with a candle lit in it. The opulence of the restaurant stopped there. I don't remember what I had to eat, but it was not noteworthy. In fact, none of us enjoyed our meal at this place. (why do I never remember to write down the names of restaurants!) Besides the food being expensive and BAD, we were served wine out of glasses with chips on the rim, the china was cheap and did not match and also had chips. And we were given paper napkins! Before you think I am a snob, know that I use paper napkins in my own home. But I do not serve nor eat from plates and glasses with chips in them. For the price they charged for food, I would have thought they could have gotten their shit together a bit better.

We left the restaurant feeling cheated and underfed. We crossed the park and each had a vendor cart taco and then went to bed. Tomorrow was going to be a busy day of visiting the surrounding area.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 27

2008-11-18T11:29:00.000-08:00

It was evident that we were going to have to spend another day in Patzcuaro. L was on the road to recovery but in no shape to travel. So we decided to have a leisurely look/see of Patzcuaro and set out to explore.

Most we just played the role of sight-seeing tourists and shoppers. We visited every little shop and shopping plaza we could find. One was a candle shop and I went a little crazy buying candles to bring back to the island. Some I gave away as presents, some I kept. Lots of little knick knacks to choose from and the shops were truly interesting. Unlike here on the island where every shop seems to sell the same thing, each shop here was unique and interesting.

We went into a little tucked away plaza at one point and found some places. One specialized in wooden items. While B and L shopped, I sat on a little wall outside the shops. It didn't take long for a little old man who looked to be in his 80's came and sat down beside me. I don't think they got Gringos in this particular shopping area very often. We had a nice little shop but I was amazed that he had no idea where Isla Mujeres was. Nor Cancun. Nor the state of Quintana Roo. I drew a map in the dirt and he was amazed that we had travelled so far.

One of the many interesting window treatments in Patzcuaro.

We visited the market on the hill next to the church. I was not overly impressed with it. I understand that it is a busy place around Day of the Dead, selling tons of flowers. There was not much going on in May however.

We finally ended up in place called House of the Eleven Arches. It once was one of Mexico's first hospitals, then a Dominican Convent and now just a maze of various shops. It was quite fun to wander from hallway to hallway, up and down stairs to see what was on offer. Although we found some interesting shops, of greater interest was the architecture itself.

This was a typical floor within. The pieces of slat had been laid on end instead of flat. What a lot of work! But it certainly made for an interesting pattern.

One area still had one of the old wells full of water.

There were staircases everywhere. At times it felt like we were in school with Harry Potter where the staircases move at will!

One of the eleven arches.

There were these little staircases everywhere and each one more interesting than the one before.

L was really worn out by this time so we took him back to the hotel where he could rest. B and I decided to grab the trolley that gives city tours. So off we went to get our private, guided tour of downtown Patzcuaro!

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 26

2008-10-23T07:31:00.000-07:00

After dropping off L's medications and making sure that he took them, B and I headed out for dinner and to leave to sleep in peace. By now it was 8:30 PM and we decided to stop somewhere for a drink first.

We exited our hotel and right next door was a restaurant/bar with live music inside and tables on the wide sidewalk. Like in most colonial cities, the sidewalk was covered and entered from the street via a series of arches. A very pleasant space to just sit and unwind and watch the local life of Patzcuaro in the park across the street. We ordered drinks and did just that.

Finally we decided it was time to get something to eat. We had already chosen our restaurant. It was listed in the guidebook as a botana (snack) bar. With every drink you order, you get an assortment of snack food. Unfortunately, when we got there it had already closed for the evening. No problem. We would just walk around until we saw a restaurant that struck our fancy.

We walked the entire Grand Plaza and found not one restaurant open! It was only 10 PM! We quite often forget that basic Mexico is not Isla Mujeres. Here nothing closes until it has too. But in basic Mexico, regular open/close hours are kept. Disappointed but not hopeless, we made our way the few blocks over to Plaza Chica. Again, same story. We did happen upon a restaurant that was evidently closing but there was still one occupied table on the sidewalk. We prevailed upon the waiter to please ask the cook to make us something. Anything. We were not going to be fussy at that point!

The waiter disappeared into the kitchen and came back and said we could still have soup and a breaded chicken breast. Bring it on!

We had a throughly enjoyable little meal and a nice conversation with the waiter while we ate. He didn't actually sit down at the table with us, but he might as well have. We love talking to wait people and bartenders. One really gets the feel of a place quickly and they always have excellent suggestions for out of the way places to see or eat at. This one was no exception. He told us that we had to go visit Santa Clara de Cobre. So, a few days later, we did.

But first we had to get L well.

Summer Car Trip 2007 - 25

2008-10-21T07:57:00.000-07:00

Something woke me up from my nap. At first I couldn't figure it out. Then it dawned on me. It was the sound of vigorous vomiting coming from the bathroom, which was just off the bedroom. B was already awake and had a concerned look on his face. He looked over at me and said, "L is sick." Well, duh. I had already figured that one out. There was nothing we could or should do at that moment except wait for L to open the door and come out. Which eventually he did.

Poor L. The only thing he could figure out was that he probably had a bad case of food poisoning. He was having symptoms from both ends. While we were on our walk about town earlier, he had purchased a piece of pizza from one of the vendors lining the square. It looked fine. He thought the problem was probably from the hot sauce he added to it. I bit my tongue and did not chastise him. He knows better than to use any of the sauces offered at such places. Especially if they look like they have been out all day, subject to who only knows what.

In between L occupying the bathroom, B and I were able to get cleaned up to go out. It was a little after 7 PM by then. L was not feeling any better and it was decided that he should stay in. I doubt that he could have eaten anything anyway. After some discussion, we decided that B and I should search out a pharmacy, describe L's symptoms to the pharmacist and put ourselves at his mercy. So off we went.

Luckily, directly across the square from our hotel was a little pharmacy. When we walked in, every face in the place turned to stare at us. Even though it was not an unfriendly place and there were some smiles on faces, it still was an uncomfortable feeling being stared at like that. We finally got our turn to talk to the rickety old pharmacist on duty.

We described L's symptoms as best we could and he asked a ton of questions. All the while nodding his head in sympathy and understanding. He named off a whole litany of medications that we needed and it was our turn to nod our heads in agreement. Once we were all in agreement as to what was needed, he announced that he would type up the prescriptions right away. With that he disappeared in the back and brought out one of the oldest manual typewriters I have ever seen.

He placed the typewriter carefully on the counter, rummaged around until he found some prescription papers and carbon paper so that he could type three copies at once. Then he started to type out the prescriptions and directions. One. Finger. At. A. Time. We had time to read every flyer regarding every health issue known to Man while we waited.

When finished he handed us the prescription and directed us to the back window, which was the cashier. We walked back to that window, prescriptions and money in hand and waited. Evidently this was a one man operation because, much to our by now unamazement, the pharmacist shuffled his way back to the cashier booth and took our money, provided the obligatory multiple PAID stamps to the documents and directed us back to the counter.

Back at the counter we again waited for him to come forth and collect his copy of our prescriptions. Which we dutifully gave to him. He then found the various medications that we needed from the shelves, handed them to us and gave us a detailed explanation of how, when and how often to take them. Which was also typed on each prescription. We said our polite thank yous several times to him and to the crowd that had now gathered waiting their turns as patient as could be.

We made our way back across the square, collected our key and made our way back up to our room to deliver the medications and directions to L. Guess what he said when we walked in?

"What took you so long?" !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 24

2008-08-07T07:19:00.000-07:00

We were anxious to get out of Morelia and continue on our way but we had some housekeeping details to attend to first. We had to find a laundry and try to get some clothes cleaned. We thought we might have a hard time finding a laundry service in Patzcuaro. Clothes delivered with a a promise of an 11 AM pick-up time, we headed off to find breakfast.

We grabbed breakfast at a cute little cafe in one of the cities side parks and B and I settled in for a second cup of coffee while L headed out to Immigration. He had to renew his tourist visa while we were in a city with such an office. Unlike most of the restaurants we had been to in Morelia, the staff at this one were friendly, courteous and knowledgeable about their menu. Of course, how could you not know about bacon and eggs? I really liked the logo of the restaurant on the t-shirts they had on and asked to buy one. Unfortunately, they had none for sale. I don't think I've mentioned this before, but I try to buy a t-shirt from each town we visit. My idea of a souvenir!

L finally returned, we picked up our laundry and headed out for Patzcuaro. It was an easy drive of about an hour. I don't remember much about it until we got to the outskirts of Patzcuaro. At that point we were getting glimpses of the lake and the road was lined with pine trees. The scent coming into our car windows was heavenly. The road into town passed many little businesses and a few homes while gently increasing its' grade. We finally found ourselves at the top of the hill that leads down into town and followed the signs for El Centro.

Patzcuaro is not a large city. Not small, but not large either. It's street are old and in the center of town, all one way. We had our list of hotels we wanted to check out but couldn't get to them! The way around the town square was blocked off by some big bus and road blocks. Just all of a sudden one had to turn in the opposite direction and we were off, traveling away from where we wanted to be!

We were finally able to find our way back to the Plaza Grande and Aldama Street. We parked right on the square and were shown a room in the Hotel San Rafael (24). The fact that they had off street parking sealed the deal! It was kind of Plain Jane on the outside, but take a look at the interior courtyard.

Here's a better look at one of the many lounging areas circling the courtyard.

The bathroom vanity in our first room. Copper is very big in this area.

Our first room there was okay. Just okay. Nothing to write home about. But when we turned on the TV and it didn't work, something had to be done! So the desk clerk got his big ring of keys and we started a tour of the hotel. Second room. I don't think so. Third room. Getting there. Fourth room. A winner! This was really a three room suite if you counted the huge bathroom. There was a large sitting room as you entered, then the bedroom with two double beds and the huge bathroom. It even had a bathtub!

Having settled in, we started out on a little walking tour of the city and to get something to eat! We ended up at the town's other plaza, Plaza Chica, more formerly known as Plaza Gertrudis Bocanegra, after this chica.

She is a local heroine who was hanged in 1818 for her part in the independence movement. She looks like she was one strong lady!

We had a light lunch and headed back to the hotel for a light siesta before cleaning up for dinner.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 23

2008-08-05T08:04:00.000-07:00

Before we leave Morelia behind, I'd like to share some random photos of things that caught my eye as we walked around. Most need no explanation.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 22

2008-07-31T09:09:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure what it was about Morelia that I didn't like. It was clean. It was bustling. The architecture was at times exquisite but at all times interesting. The people were friendly. The town square was beautiful and well used. Streets were well marked. Lots of sidewalk cafes and eateries. But still. I have thought about it a lot since we left there. Maybe it was all just a little too big city for my tastes. I just don't know. If somebody asked me if it were worth a visit, I would highly encourage it. I just don't think I will ever go back there.

Town square, early evening.

Lots of street performers in the large square adjacent to the Cathedral. These were visitors from nearby Patzcuaro, doing the Dance of the Old Men. Even though they are really young men! This dance has a very interesting history and, if I remember, I will go into when we actually get to visit Patzcuaro.

While walking around town our last night there, B had to go pee. We ducked into this doorway to see if there was a public toilet available. There was, but also there was this staircase.

An unexpected little gem in a plain old building. Nothing to distinguish it from any other doorway on the street. It was one of the most beautifully crafted things I had ever seen.

So, almost time to put Morelia to bed for tomorrow we head to Patzcuaro!

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 21

2008-07-15T12:05:00.000-07:00

If there is a room in Hell reserved for people who try to find a decent hotel room on a budget while travelling, I think we were in it in Morelia. Every hotel that we went to within our budget range was full! We finally learned that there was a marathon being run the next day here. Thus almost all rooms were booked. It was a frustration experience, to say the least.

We finally ended up at this hotel, Hotel Plaza Morelia. (8)

And believe me, the one night we spent there was indeed a night from Hell. Our room had two windows, none of which looked outside. One opened into an air shaft and the other looked down to the lobby. The hotel was full of Mexican tourists and they were loud. And rude. And thoughtless. They partied in the hallways all night long, running from floor to floor, knocking on doors, shouting between floors to each other and leaving their mess everywhere. And I'm talking about adults, not kids on Spring Break or something. There was absolutely no consideration for anybody else staying here.

We complained about midnight to the front desk. The clerk just shrugged his shoulders and said they paid for their room. We were left to our own devices....which weren't many. L kept alternately opening the door and yelling for them to be respectful or just yelling SHUT UP! in Spanish into the air shaft. Needless to say, after a long, hard day's drive, we did not get much rest.

The next morning our first priority, after breakfast, was to find a new room. If we couldn't find one, we had decided to just move on. Luckily, we did manage to secure another room at the Hotel Concordia (14). So on to visiting Morelia!

Without a doubt, Morelia is one of Mexico's shining stars. This beautifully preserved colonial city, founded in 1541, was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1991. And deservedly so. I mean, take a look at it's cathedral.

It is centrally located downtown, right next to the main town plaza. Which means lots of people visit it. Unfortunately, the interior was closed to the public the day we visited.

It is also beautiful by night.

We did a walking tour of the city, following the directions from a handout given to us at the second hotel. It was very well laid out and informative. But exhausting!

At one of the buildings, which was hosting a corn festival, I found this intriguing statue. Maybe more at home in Guanajuato where Cervantes is celebrated as a hero.

Interesting from afar, but even more so from up close. That's when you get the full impact of the fact that this piece is made up entirely of spare vehicle parts!

It was while on this walking tour that I saw the dirtiest person I have ever seen in my life. A young man, possible in his 30's, was sitting in a doorway. Obviously homeless but not begging. He kept his head down as I passed and never looked up at me. He was not dressed as one normally thinks of as being dressed. He had wrapped himself totally in rags. Like a dirty mummy. Except he did not have enough rags to cover his whole body. His feet stuck out into the sidewalk and they were black from years of encrusted dirt. His face, hands and exposed body parts all looked the same. But the most incredible thing about him was the stench that lingered everywhere around him. It smelt like a slaughterhouse. I was both repulsed and fascinated. I would have loved to known his story, what brought him to this condition.

Tour over, we returned to the long row of covered restaurants across from the square, had a nice lunch at a sidewalk table and headed back to our new room for a much needed siesta!

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 20

2008-06-26T07:34:00.000-07:00

Although a long drive by any standard, the rest of the drive to Morelia was uneventful. We entered the excellent freeway system just north of Toluca and it took us all the way to Morelia. This is also the main freeway that runs from Mexico City to Guadalajara and it is very well constructed and maintained.

Some of the sections of the freeway were long downhill grades. Not especially steep but really stretched out. Something that I found interesting and scary at the same time were the emergency stop lanes. Not pull overs but stop lanes. They were always located on the far right, or the mountain side of the road. There were signs everywhere telling motorists to yield to honking horns and to get out of the way of anybody trying to get over to this lane. These lanes are red and are designed to stop a vehicle if ones brakes give out. At the bottom of the downhill grade, the lane stops being pavement and turns to deep, loose sand, then tar, then sand again. This then leads steeply back uphill as soon as possible. Hopefully any vehicle that had to use this lane was able to stop before reaching the end of it. If not, they would just keep going and, like a ski ramp, go shooting off into whatever valley and destiny awaited them. It was incredulous how many deep tire tracks there were in the sand. Most be a lot of trucks that loose their brakes. I was really glad we did not encounter any.

Before we made the short southern drop down to Morelia, we started to see this huge lake off to our right. I kept expecting it to disappear but it just went on and on and on. We could look down and see long fishing boats, similar to pongos but with smaller sides and a large flat area in the front. We could see fishermen laying prone on these flat areas and pushing/pulling themselves along with the aid of a long stick. Sometimes there would be a line running between a bunch of poles placed in the water. If so, they would grab this line and pull themselves along. I have since learned that this lake is very shallow, as lakes go. This lake is so large that it even has its' own set of currents. They looked like large roads crisscrossing the lake.

Here's a picture from GoogleEarth of Lago Cuitzeo, or Lake Cuitzeo.

There is a yellow line in the middle of the lake that drops south. This is the road we took down to Morelia. When I later researched this lake on Wikipedia, I discovered that it is Mexico's second largest fresh water lake. Any guesses as to which lake is #1?

Whenever we had to cross a speed bump, it was the typical vendor situation. People use the opportunity given to them to make a quick sale as cars slow down to cross over them. Today's speciality was straw baskets and jicama. Every region has their own speciality. We also started seeing more and more men sporting cowboy hats and boots. I was really looking forward to getting into Mexico's cowboy country, and it looked like we were starting to enter it here.

(Mexico's largest fresh water lake is Lake Chapala)

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 19

2008-06-24T07:27:00.000-07:00

Saturday, May 19, 2007. Another travel day. I am getting so that I like them as much as actually reaching our destination. We are in a part of Mexico now that I have never seen before and I am exhilarated with each passing mile we travel.

Today finds us on our way from Taxco to Morelia, Michoacan. Today we headed north out of Taxco on the secondary route, MX 55. We were travelling through the same type of country that led us to Taxco. Beautiful, jaw dropping vistas when the mountains opened up to show us what they contained. Some of the valleys stretched outward below us for miles before being lost in another craggy turn of the mountains.

I would have really enjoyed this stretch of the drive but for two things: the scorching heat and the endless amount of delays for road construction. Lanes closed down to one with a flagman at each end. Waits so long that it was possible to shut off the motor, get out of the car, stretch my legs and have a cigarette or two. It was frustrating because this was just the first little leg of this day's trip. We finally made it to Ixtapan de la Sol where we were able to pick up the freeway system to and around Toluca.

Getting through Toluca, or rather the outskirts, was an adventure in patience and endurance. I failed the first part big time. I was hot. Very hot. Even with the windows open in the car there was little relief from the heat. Any breeze that was generated from driving was like the breeze that hits you when you open your oven door to check on the cookies you are baking. I was sitting at one interminably long stop light, about sixth back from the light (after having already sat through what seemed like 43,875 changes of this light) when this dude comes walking by the car. He was carrying a big stack of sales flyer booklets. As he approached the car, I leaned my head towards the open window and very politely said, "No Gracias". He paid no attention and tried to foist them on me. I repeated myself. At that he tossed the stupid things into the car onto my lap and sauntered away! To say this pissed me off is a vast, vast understatement. I picked them up off my lap and gave them a gigantic fling out the window onto the grass that came up to the curb.

What I didn't realize is that before the light changes again, this same guy comes along and collects them from you again. Only to give them out again to the next batch of cars that moves up in line. What's that all about???* So when he gets back to me, I angrily wave my hand at him and gesture to the pile of pamphlets now lying on the grass. He sputters a bunch of Spanish at me, I think including Puta Madre, and gathered them up. Then he came back to the open window and starting hollering at me! I rolled up the window and ignored him. Then he walked to the front of the car and made a big show about trying to write down my license plate number. Except he couldn't because when I saw what he was doing, I inched forward until he couldn't get between me and the next car. With that, the light changed and we were on our way.

During this whole process B from the backseat, and L in the navigator chair, never said a word. Not one. But as soon as we started moving again they sure opened their mouths! Mostly with how rude I had been to toss the stuff out in the first place and then the subsequent encounter. I thought it was rude beyond measure that this dude tossed the crap into the car onto my lap, even after I politely told him no! I finally told them to SHUT THE FUCK UP and just that loudly too. Silenced ruled for many miles after that. Except for navigational instructions.

* if you want these flyers and the coupons they contain, you are supposed to pay him. If not, you just hand them back.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 18

2008-06-19T19:45:00.000-07:00

Taxco is built on the side of a very steep hill. I suppose technically it is part of a mountain chain but it doesn’t feel like it. There is another high hill right across from it that is not as developed. There is a large country club like resort up there. There is a road up there, but even more fun, there is a cable car!

We had to take a taxi from the town square down to the valley between these hills in order to catch the cable car back up the other side. There are only two types of taxis in Taxco, both of the Volkswagen variety. The first is the combi (rather like the old hippie vans) which you have seen a picture of. The most common though is the good old VW beetle. Except that all of them, all of them, mind you, have had the passenger seat taken out! When I asked, I was told this is to make if faster for people to get in and out. I suppose if you are a taxi discharging passengers on a steep hill, you don't want to be sitting on your brakes for very long! It was like a circus act where all the clowns get out of a car, except in reverse! All three of us had to crowd onto the back seat. Well, mostly. L had a good part of his body stretched out into the passenger area!

The ascent up the hill was breathtakingly gorgeous and allowed us a great overview of the city. I thought we had seen pretty good vistas of it as we walked around, from level to level. The views that I had had of the city up til now had not prepared me for how spread out and packed this city really is. It was quite impressive.

Like I said, the houses are really packed together.

We got off at the top and paid for the ride up. Why we were not allowed to purchase tickets before getting in the car remains a mystery to me. We did have to purchase tickets in advance to get back down though. The main reason that this cable car had been put in was to allow a fun access to the Hotel Monte Taxco at the top of this mountain. It is a self-contained, overly pretentious resort that contains a pool, tennis courts, gym, steam rooms and a nine-hole golf course. They were cleaning the big ball the day we were there.

We wandered around a bit and then got back in the car for the equally impressive descent. We directed the cab to take up back up to the town square with really no plan in mind. L started talking to him about silver factories and did he know of any. Turns out that he did!

He dropped us off at a small building somewhere downtown and drove off. We rang the bell and were ushered into a small showroom of jewelry. We asked if we could tour the "factory" and they said sure. The whole thing took place over three floors in a very, tiny, tightly put together building. Unfortunately, none of the pictures I took turned out clearly enough to see what was what. But we did get to see how the molds were made, how they are poured, cleaned, sanded, scrubbed and polished into the items you see in the stores. The best part?

We had stumbled into the factory that was making special orders (lots of them!) for sale on the QVC network in the USA! Too funny.

With the setting sun in our eyes, we headed off to dinner and then to bed. Tomorrow was another travel day.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 17

2008-06-17T06:58:00.000-07:00

Taxco de Alarcon. What a city! A city not for the feint of energy, that's for sure. Before we start our tour, a little history of this unique city.

First and foremost, Taxco is (was) a major mining city. The very first silver mine in Mexico was established here in 1531. By the Spanish, of course! Nowadays the mines are all but exhausted but the silver jewelry industry, founded in 1929 by William Spratling, lives on and thrives. I read somewhere that there are over 300 silver stores in Taxco, and I believe it. Yet I only bought one bracelet and a pair of earrings as gifts.

Taxco is built on a very steep hillside and the houses are crammed together. At times even overlapping one another. Finding your way around this city is difficult, to say the least. Just look at this city map!

Thankfully, having been here countless times before, L knew exactly where we were going and expertly guided me through this maze of streets to our hotel, Los Arcos (27). It was a beautiful old building and, like most of the buildings in Taxco, encompassed several different layers. Not floors, but layers. Here I am looking down into the beautiful central courtyard. Our room was actually one floor above me. The stairs were not directly in line, like a stairwell either. First they were on one side of the building, then the other. Sometimes there were only five steps, sometimes 25, from level to level.

It was worth it though to have ended up with such a beautiful room. Three! beds, great view. I loved the knotty pine furniture. So unlike anything I had seen in Mexico up to this point.

The city planners of Taxco had done one thing right when constructing their interwoven, maze of streets. As in most towns, the zocolo, or town square, is where everything happens. Realizing this, each major road was encoded so as to lead you to the square. All you had to do was get on one of these streets and follow it and you would arrive at the square. For instance, this artery had a solid striped line down the center.

Here you get a vague idea of the steepness in the streets. It rained one day and I vividly remember having to shift down to first gear to get up the street. The scary part was that my tires lost their grip on the slippery cobblestones and we started to slide backwards. Hitting the brakes did no good. I only saved us by some fancy clutch work. My heart was racing at this experience.

Another road, another route. Another way to distinguish it.

Did I mention that the streets are narrow also? And notice how all of the names start with a red letter and the rest of the wording is in black. I'm not sure why they do this, but it was the same when we got to Patzcuaro also.

The town square, where everyone eventually winds up.

This is the view from our rooftop terrace, looking up towards the town square and the amazing church, Parroquia de Santa Prisca.

This is one grand church. It fronts onto the town square and was built during the seven year period of 1751 to 1758. It is done in the Churriqueresque style with lots of ornate bas-relief covering it. Interestingly, it was not built by the Spanish, as were most cathedrals of this time. Although the architects were Spanish, it was financed by Jose de la Borda, a private citizen who had made his fortune from the local silver mines.

We toured the inside but I have no pictures. Everything is done in gold leaf, including the altars. I'm sure it was stupendous once upon a time. Now it is dark, dirty and depressing. All it needs is a good scrubbing to bring back the luster of its' golden day. I wonder why they don't make any attempt to clean it?

After touring the church, we tried to catch one of the numerous combis (as seen in the picture of the town square above) to visit the Spratling Museum and school that trains local artisans in the art of working with silver. We soon discovered that they were packing sixteen people into combis made for ten people. No thanks. It would have been hot, sweaty and uncomfortable to say the least. We could do without seeing this museum. Instead, we made our way back to the square and sat on one of the lovely terraces and drank coffee and watched the people and traffic ebb and flow out of the square. Much nicer!

After coffee, we were on to our next adventure. The cable car ride to the top of a neighboring mountain.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 16

2008-06-10T13:49:00.000-07:00

While in Oaxaca, we had parked the car on the side street next to our hotel. I noticed that every night a hot dog vendor would set up right in front of my car. At the time I thought that it was nice. He was protecting my car from grafitti or what not. When we actually started loading stuff into it the morning we left, I was appalled. I had not given a thought to all of the grease that was being generated and then blown back on my car. It was a greasy, sticky mess.

We got some buckets of water from the hotel and a rag and at least washed the windows. A total washing would have to wait for awhile.

We made our way out of Oaxaca and onto MX 190. We first had to go north and skirt the bottom of edge of Puebla before dropping back down into the city of Taxco. That's the way it is in Mexico. You sometimes need to go miles and miles out of your way because there is no direct highway link between major cities. We had planned to be on the road most of the day today.

The scenery, as usual, was fantastic. We travelled from the vallies of Oaxaca ever upwards into the Sierra del Sur mountain range. We would be crossing over the northern tip of them but mountains are mountains!

As we were driving along, I spotted this familiar billboard far ahead. One only sees it in central Mexico and a bit along the Gulf Coast. I never saw it in northern Mexico or the Pacific Coast.

It's an ad for Magno Osborne Brandy. An easily recognizable logo if there ever was one!

The range of mountains that we were passing through were much more gentle than most mountains. Perhaps because we were on the northern fringes where they first start to rise up. At any rate, they were not that bad to drive through. At times the grandeur was so great that I could hardly keep my eyes on the road.

These "fence post" cactus were growing everywhere. They looked like giant toothpicks stuck into the hillsides.

We crossed over several bridges over valleys. But none so spectacular as......

this one! It was really high and a beautiful piece of construction. There was a pull over area at the other side and, needing a break anyway, we pulled over to get a closer look.

Don't tell me Mexicans can't build roads. This was as fine a piece of construction as I have seen anywhere. It was simply awesome in its' scale.

A couple hours or more down the road, we decided to pull over again. There was a nice overlook and a few bushes which made convenient urinals! While enjoying the view, I spotted movement on one of the neighboring hills. If you closely, in the middle of the mountain trail, you can see a guy being followed by two donkeys as they descend the slippery, rock strewn trail.

From there to just below where we were standing took them about 20 minutes. It would have taken me hours, if I walked it at all!

Believe it or not, his house was just to the right of this picture.

More travel shots as we made our way to Taxco.

One thing that impressed me during this entire trip was the evidence everywhere of Mexico's attempts to keep the air we breath clean. I saw sites like this over and over and over and.....

A Special Picture Only Post

2008-06-05T11:52:00.000-07:00

Before we get back into the car and head off for our next city, I have some pictures of the lovely city of Oaxaca that I want to share with you. I don't think an explanation is needed. Just enjoy.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 15

2008-06-03T07:18:00.000-07:00

Our next stop on this day long guided tour was at a mezcal factory. Even though they did produce a drinkable mezcal, I think the factory we visited existed purely as a tourist attraction. There were other groups and buses of people when we got there. We were ushered from process to process. We followed the group ahead and we were in turn followed by another group.

Mezcal is a distilled spirit made from the agave plant. It is not to be confused with tequila, which is made only from the blue agave. Mezcal can be made by any other agave. The agave plants are harvested in the field. The workers go around with machetes and chop off the leaves. The resultant plant is called a heart or a pineapple. These things are big and heavy. They are piled up at the factory, waiting to be cooked.

Here B illustrates how big these hearts are.

These hearts are then placed in an oven and cooked for 3-5 days to allow the natural sugars to come out.

These rock hard baked hearts and then taken to the grinder. Here's the grinder at work. Yup. It's a horse that walks around that circle, turning that stone, for hours on end. Should he dare to slow down, his keeper is ready, willing and able to give him a good swat with that stick. This horse was meaner than a cornered snake and there were signs all around not to get too close...he bites. Small wonder that he has an evil disposition given his lot in life.

When his keeper has to stop for a break or to refill the wheel well, he stops this horse on the other side. Well out of reach of stupid tourists who would try to pet him as he walks by. People, the sign means what it says. Get bitten then. Maybe you will learn.

Here's a picture of the broken up hearts, ready to be put into the grinder.

Can you tell this whole process fascinated me? Mostly, though, I was feeling terrifically sorry for this poor horse.

The pulverized mash is then carried by pitchfork full to the cookers. The distilling process takes place and voila! you have Mezcal.

For an in depth summary of this process, go here.

The finished mezcal is then put in barrels to age and ferment more. There are three types of mezcal:

Añejo ("aged") – aged for at least a year in barrels no larger than 350 litres.
Reposado ("rested") – aged two months to a year.
Joven or blanco ("young" or "white", often marketed as "silver" in English) – colorless mezcal, aged less than two months

What they had mostly on offer at the factory was the blanco. Quickest turn around to sell to tourists. They did have the other two kinds available, but they were very expensive. The final stop on the tour was, of course, the sample table and store.

All visitors are allowed to sample as many and as much mezcal as they want. Samples are served in those little plastic cups like you put condiments in at fast food restaurants. It comes in all flavors and colors. I had two samples and stopped. I instantly had a headache from this almost raw tasting booze and wanted nothing more to do with it.

B bought three small bottles. Two for our house. He wanted to be able to offer the real thing to our Mexican friends when they stopped over to visit. One was a gift. We were later to very much regret our decision to buy any of this stuff.

Tour over, we loaded back into the van. We pulled out of the driveway, made a left turn onto the main road and immediately turned into the next driveway! This was the restaurant next door. We were not aware that the tour involved stopping for lunch or we would not have packed our own. L joined the young couple from France at their table, we joined the Argentinian girl at her table, since she was the only other smoker on the tour. The ladies from DF sat at their own table, as close to the kitchen as they could get! We had some kind of enchilada, being not very hungry at this point.

Lunch over and we headed back to Oaxaca to be disgorged from this stifling hot van. But not forgetting to not see a speed bump on the way home! The driver went over it so fast and so hard that I was bounced up out of my seat and banged my head on the roof of the van! Not a word of apology flowed from the drivers' mouth either.

Later on in the evening we found an out of the way family run restaurant and had a pleasant little meal. We had the restaurant all to ourselves. After dinner we strolled around a bit and I bought even more of the fantastic home made french fries from the street vendor. We ambled our way back to our hotel and fell into bed as three exhausted travellers should do...at 9:30 PM!

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 14

2008-05-29T07:31:00.000-07:00

Next up on our agenda were the ruins of Mitla, located in the town of San Pablo Villa de Mitla, about 26 miles southeast of the city of Oaxaca.

Our route took us through the flat, dusty hot roads in one of the valleys that ring the Sierra de Juarez.

We once again had to cross a different section of indigenous land. I was particularly impressed with how they made fences out of cactus. Ever since I saw this, I refer to this type of cactus as fencepost cactus. They are cheap, easy to maintain and certainly keep the livestock in the yard!

Although the area of Mitla has been occupied since time immemorial, the ruins we see today were built during the post classic period of 900-1519 BC. In the typical Spanish style, most of the buildings were taken apart and a Catholic Church was built on the spot, made out of the bricks and blocks of the previous culture's building.

This view out the door of one of the main buildings shows two things: how far they could see into the valley and thus be warned of approaching marauders and how small these people must have been. These doorways were all only about four feet high.

The different chambers were long and narrow. I was impressed that the interior of the buildings was as well and intricately decorated as the outsides were.

Besides a Blogger at work, we see here the columns that once supported the ceiling.

More shots of the outside of buildings. Notice that some of the original color still remains.

These motifs were so drastically different from what I am used to seeing here on the Yucatan Peninsula. The Mayans here used more gods and hieroglyphics in their decorations.

One of the more interesting features available to the tourist at these ruins is the burial chamber. There is a hole in the ground of the central square around which all the buildings are placed. There are steep, narrow stairs that lead down to a tiny opening in the wall. Maybe 3' x '3 at the most. This is actually the opening of a tunnel that you either have to crawl along or do a duck walk. This only lasts a short distance (though it seems longer when you are in it!) and then you can stand up. Well, not for me. But if you were 4' 2" or smaller, you could have. Most of us had to walk around crouched over to view the various burial chambers. There were three of them, arranged in a T formation. There were still cement caskets in them but I seriously doubt that any priest still was in them. Who knows though.

After a very hot but decidedly interesting visit, we loaded up in the van again and headed out for the next stop......a mezcal factory!

To get a slightly more in depth overview of the history of Mitla, go here.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 13

2008-05-26T08:22:00.000-07:00

With our rugs wrapped and safely stored in the back of the van, we were off to our next stop. We were headed for Hierve el Agua, or literally, The Water Boils. To get there, we had to cross the lands of the indigenous people, the descendents of the original Zapotec who populated this land.

It is interesting in that each village owns the road that goes through it. Each one has a gate at the beginning where a duty must be paid to cross the village land. This must be done as it is the only road to the site. Once past the villages, the road starts to wind up the mountain. It is a new road, carved out of the side of the mountain with dirt literally pushed up to form the road. It was not a pleasant journey. Especially since we were in the very back seat and were ordered to close all windows due to the dust being created by the drive. It was scenic but at times a bit spooky.

After what seemed an endless amount of time on this road, we were deposited in a big, rough cut parking lot above the waterfall. From there we had to make our way down an old spillway that was littered with rocks of all sizes. It was not an easy descent and I was already dreading the walk back up. Once down, I forgot all about having to return back up this spillway. There before us was the splendor that is Hierve el Agua.

That isn't actually water you are seeing. It is minerals deposited here by the water to form these huge formations running down the cliffside. It sure looks like water though.

As you can see, it is possible to actually walk out onto this formation to enjoy the view. It was a long, difficult trail to get over there so we gave it a pass. The guy in this picture is most likely not sitting in water. These formations are like rock.

Our guide told us that until 1986, these remote formations were known only to the local people, due to their remote location and difficulty to access. Before then there were no roads leading to it. One had to travel by foot or donkey. And, since these are mineral waters, really no reason to go here except for the view. Evidently in 1986 some advertising executive from the Corona beer company was told of this place and visited. Corona then did a magazine ad here with a picture of a giant bottle of Corona sitting where the guy is in the above picture. They had it foaming over so that it looked like the beer foam was running down the mountain. The rest, as they say, is history.

Where we were, there is a huge semi-flat area where the water pools and it is possible to swim in this warm, mineral laden water. It goes right up to the edge of the new waterfall being formed by the minerals. It looks dangerous but there was actually a pretty good wall so that if you were in the pool you were not in danger of falling off the cliff.

Still, I would not walk where this guy is walking. There is water spilling out of the pool, making it very slippery.

Overview of pool area.

Here you can see the wall that holds you and the water in.

What did I just say about not getting too near the edge!

The mineral laden, warm water forms funny little ripples as it slowly erodes the rock.

Here's a close up. You can actually see the mineral deposits. They are the little white bead looking things.

Play time over, we made our way slowly and painfully back up the dry riverbed we had descended an hour earlier. Or at least it was painful to me. We waited in the shade of a big tree next to the van for the rest of our group to make it back. We started to break out the lunch that we had packed but never got a chance. Just as we finished passing out sandwiches, the driver appeared and yelped for us all to get back in the van. We had our revenge though!

Once inside and underway, we broke out the chicken salad sandwiches on homemade bakery rolls and started to chow down. Everybody got a whiff and I'm sure their stomachs were growling. We kept getting stared at but nobody seemed angry. Jealous maybe because they had not thought of it. Too make it even worse for them, after the sandwiches were consumed, I broke out the last of the peanut butter chocoloate chip cookies that I had made for the trip!

We retraced our route back through the villages and made it back to the main road. Our next stop: the ruins of Mitla.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 12

2008-05-22T07:14:00.000-07:00

The next stop on the tour took us to Teotitlan Del Valle, the famous weaving village located about 15 miles outside of Oaxaca. As you approach the main part of the village, you pass house after house with rugs, blankets and sarapes hanging from their porches. Great banners of color and design waving in the breeze, inviting you to stop and fondle. Since we weren't in control, we did not stop at any of these but instead proceeded to the factory where we were given our tour.

We were ushered into an anteroom where they had chairs set up in a semi-circle around baskets of natural materials. The center of attention, however, was the giant loom sitting at the mouth of the semi-circle. Very similar to this one. (photo from the net, getty images)

The first thing they did was show us how the natural fibers were carded to blend all the fibers together and make a roving for spinning. The carders were passed around and everybody was given a chance to try their hand at it. People were amazed, no, shocked, when they could not do it. It looks so easy in the hands of a pro. There was only one person in our group who was able to do it and actually produce a roving to spin.....yours truly!

Since I had now had a roving in my hand, I was invited to the spinning wheel to see if I could actually make yarn out of it. Guess what? Piece of cake, even though I had never used this type of spinning wheel before and had to do it left handed. I guess I paid attention and learned my lessons well at the foot of these people.

Next we were given a "class" on native materials used for dyeing. I think everybody else was getting bored but I was mesmerized. Among some of the things were marigolds, bark, indigo and the cactus mold which turns the red demonstrated on the palm of the Argentinian girl. (she still had the stain on her hand the next day when we bumped into her downtown!)

This is the moldy cactus. The white stuff is plucked off and squashed. They use either lime juice or baking soda to increase or decrease the intensity of colors. Depending upon the plant, it may also totally change colors. I wanted a demo of all of this but it was not to be. We had to get out to the workroom.

We gathered around one of the master weavers for our demo. Notice that I pushed everybody aside and scooted right in where I could get a good view! I don't think anybody else really found it as interesting as I did anyway. The guide is showing us how wide of a piece he works on before bringing the shuttle down to pound the rug.

Here are a few pictures of the yarn, spun into singles and dyed, waiting to be used in the weaving process. Remember, all these colors are natural.

They really put a tight spin on the singles. I don't know whether it is on purpose or not. I would be embarrassed if I spun singles with such a tight twist.

Weaving demonstration over, it was time to hit the showroom! Which is also the salesroom. The first thing you see is this potpourri of small coaster size "rugs". These are actually practice pieces from the trainees. They use these to practice making different motifs, among other reasons. Although interesting, we passed these by.

Here's what we were after. Rugs! We ended up buying three, similar in color and design to these:

The amount of rugs on display was staggering. We are lucky we were able to even narrow the choices down and get the ones we did. Rugs, rugs, rugs everywhere! Every conceivable color, design and size. From these intricate ones include the Tree of Life....

...to just plain geometric designs. I love the fade on this one. The weaver told me that it was woven from one long continuous piece of yarn. I believe that it was all spun from the same fiber, but not that it was all one piece. I will bet my life that there are knots in it somewhere!

Here's another type of rug weaving. This one is done in pieces and beaten down with that small hand beater you see lying on it. The light brown square thing. Talk about a time consuming piece of art!

I have to thank the other members of our tour. They patiently stood around and watched us look at countless numbers of rugs being spread on the floor for our approval or dismissal. It took quite a while and cut into our tour time. But not one person complained and they all congratulated us on our purchases! Nice people.

With everyone safely back in the van, we pulled and headed for our next adventure....Hierve el Agua.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 11

2008-05-20T08:00:00.000-07:00

Hard for me to believe, but it was a little over a year ago, May 15 to be exact, that the events I am going to tell you about took place. I wish I were doing the trip all over again. But with maybe a little variance in the route. So.....

We were once again up early and had consumed breakfast and enough coffee to keep us awake for hours. Everybody who had signed up for this tour met outside the tour office. Our driver appeared and we were escorted to a three seater mini van. Of course, the really cute girl from Argentina got to sit up front next to the driver. Best seat in the van. The rest of us, a couple from Germany, two ladies about our age from Mexico City and the three of us, were left to figure out our own seating. The middle seat was wider because one of the seats raised up to let the passengers into the last seat. We took the hot, no air movement back seat. And off we went.

Our first stop was the giant Arbol del Tule. This is the world's largest tree, located in the village of Santa Maria del Tule, a short drive from the outskirts of Oaxaca. Once there, we were disgorged and given a time limit for our visit. The first thing you see is this sign.

This tree is impressive to say the least. Scholars think that it may be as old as 6000 years, but many more believe it to be around 3000 years. Still, impressive. It is also called the Tree of Life because there are so many animal looking figures hidden among the limbs and gnarls. I don't think I captured any in this picture though.

I read somewhere that this giant, ancient tree is in danger. The surrounding population has grown and the increased need for water is depleting the ground source this tree depends upon. I think UNESCO needs to step in here and try to do something to preserve it. I doubt that the Mexican government would give any resources to doing this.

Another picture of the whole tree.

To read more about this fascinating tree, go here.

After walking around and around this tree and enjoying the gardens nearby, we had time to walk next door to the government building. I was fascinated by these palm trees.

They are so huge I could hardly believe that they are real. That's me posing in front of the middle one, to give you some scale. Remember these trees. We will be talking about them later on again.

We were ushered like little tourist sheep back into the van and headed out for our next stop, the Teotitlan del Valle. This is the famous valley area just outside of Oaxaca that is full of weavers. The main reason we had wanted to come to Oaxaca. While waiting to hear about that, enjoy this little trailer of the mountain road we had to travel that day.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 10

2008-05-15T10:36:00.000-07:00

Next up on the day's activities was lunch. But not just anywhere. L announced that he was taking us to the market and we would eat there. I saw this parked outside and almost lost my appetite. It's a familiar site to me now around Mexico, but it was a bit shocking when I first saw it.

Oaxaca was the first place I ever saw women carrying loads on their heads. Amazing sense of balance.

On our way to the market we stopped in several chocolate shops. They are everywhere around the market. L had told me we would be visiting chocolate stores in Oaxaca and I was really looking forward to that! Oaxaca is famous for its' chocolate, but, as I was to discover, not the kind I was thinking of! I was expecting store upon store selling the most delicious array of chocolate candies one can imagine. Wrong! What they sell is powdered chocolate for hot chocolate and chocolate pastes for making mole sauces. What a disappointment. Needless to say, I let L know my opinion of his having led me on. I was met with one of those "Who? Me?" type stares. I bought nothing.

I have been in Merida's downtown market many times, but it is nothing compared to the one in Oaxaca. I truly wish that I lived someplace that had a market like this. It was basically two huge rooms; one with food items and the second with stuff. Like shoes, trinkets, blankets, you name it. It was for sale there.

L led us around to one of the side entrances and we were immediately in some kind of long, narrow food court. One side was lined with eating stalls. Bare boards with benches pulled up to them. The other side was lined with open fire pits, covered with grills. The grills were sizzling with cooking meat and roasting spring onions and an assortment of chiles. The smell was overwhelming delicious.

Once seated, a waiter brings around a basket of assorted spring onions and chiles for you to choose from. There was only one kind of meat, arrachera, and you ordered that by weight. As in, I'll have a kilo please. Once we had put together how much of whatever we wanted, the basket of goodies was whisked away to be cooked for us. Actually charred to blackness is a better way of saying it. This was all then returned to us on a huge, round basket, covered with butcher paper. By the time it was delivered, the paper was already soaked with grease. There was a basket of huge tortillas and an assortment of other goodies: pico de gallo, radishes, guacamole and jalapeno peppers.

One literally tore apart the meat with your hands, loaded it onto a tortilla with an extra that you wanted and gobbled it down. The chile we ordered came back to us charred, spicy and delicious. It was a unique, fun and educational experience. Afterwards L told us that he was hesitant to take us there. Whenever he had taken his tour groups there, they refused to even consider eating there and usually ran from the building, thoughts of salmonella and botulism racing through their brains! I have been appalled by many things about Mexican cuisine but have learned to not judge a book by its' cover. I will try most anything once. I do, however, draw the line at eating anything to do with the head of an animal or any internal organs, like stomach lining. (although I have tried some of the things and found them not to my liking. Thus I know enough to give them a miss!)

Lunch over we took a short tour of the market. I am never too pleased to pass through the butcher sections of these places. I don't especially care for row upon row of hanging carcasses in various degrees of slaughter, piles of pig heads, racks of unknown body parts and stacks of chicken feet. I really despise the seafood section also. Fish just plain stink when layed out in rows in a hot room.

Thankfully, we passed from this area very quickly and entered the market proper. There were baskets of every chile pepper grown in Mexico, piled high and every degree from fresh to dried. Flowers, flowers, fresh flowers everywhere. Beautiful, aromatic and cheap! I would have tons of flowers in my home everyday if I had access to such a place. More women's clothing on display than 100 women could wear in a year. Shoes piled and displayed everywhere. The famous black pottery of Oaxaca, too many places to choose from. The thin, hammered aluminum art pieces were everywhere and depicted everything you can imagine.

The last thing we passed was the grasshoppers. Great baskets of dried grasshoppers, sorted by size. It is said that if you eat a dried Oaxacan grasshopper, you are assured to return to Oaxaca one day. Guess I'm never going back. I had good intentions, but upon seeing them, I just couldn't bring myself to try one. Just a bunch of dried, dead grasshoppers. Not all that appealing.

Lunch and market tour completed, it was back to the hotel for a much needed siesta. Later on in the evening saw us going out for dinner and wandering around. We stopped at a vendor booth and I had two helpings of the best homemade potato chips I have ever had. (I raced back to get another order after finishing the first one!)

Off to bed early. Tomorrow was going to be a full day with even more tours. Including the one that B and I were most anticipating....the rug factories!

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 9

2008-05-13T07:40:00.000-07:00

Our second day in Oaxaca was tour day. Time to see all of the sights. But first we had a job to do. We were not happy in our first hotel choice so had decided yesterday afternoon to take a look around and move. When we toured the Hotel Monte Alban (23) we knew we had a winner. We found a room at the top of the stairs that had three beds! And the price was well within our budget. The best part? It was right on the zocolo! The whole town square was just outside our door.

Take a look at the restaurant that we had to pass through to get to the stairway to the rooms above. That's me, writing notes in my journal. Something I tried to do everyday.

We had a hearty breakfast and then headed out to get to the bus for our ride to our next destination: The ruins of Monte Alban.

It was a 20 minute bus ride, up through the twisting and tight streets that line the hills around Oaxaca. Houses literally piled on top of each other, one person's porch was the roof of his neighbor. The city has grown up the various hillsides, having used up all available land in the valley. We never actually left the city behind. As we climbed, it climbed with us. Around each sharp curve the poverty climbed also. The houses kept getting poorer and poorer. But the view back to Oaxaca City itself was incredible.

We arrived and the bus pulled into a huge parking lot at the base of the ruins and disgorged us into the blaring hot sun. I was dismayed to discover that we were not actually at the ruins. We had been dropped off about 1/4 of a mile below them. We still had to negotiate a steep, paved, hot road up to the ruins. (L had failed to mention this part when describing this tour!) We finally leveled out and proceeded to the entrance. But first we had to run the gauntlet of vendors lining the route. They were not all that aggressive, but still irritating in the blaring sun. Especially one who was actually selling conch shells. A bit far from the water for that. But the best was the guy selling little plaster replicas of Chichen Itza pyramid! A bit far from the Yucatan for that too!

We paid our admission and were immediately assaulted by guides offering us their service for the 1.5 hour tour. I found them to be rude but understood they were only trying to make a living. We gently but firmly told them all no thanks. L had been here like a gazillion times before and knew enough to lead us on a self-directed tour.

Monte Alban stands on a flattened hilltop, about 1300 feet above the city of Oaxaca. It is one of Mexico's most ancient ruin sites, dating from as early as 200 BC. Most of what the tourist sees, and what remains, dates from around 300 to 700 AD. You can read lots more about Monte Alban's fascinating history here. Here are some pretty pictures of the place for you to look at.

We spent over an hour exploring this marvelous site and enjoying the 360 degree views of the valleys surrounding this site. We finally made our way back to the entrance and decided to tour the attached museum. It was somewhat interesting but contained mostly the usual things. Pictures of the site from days gone by. Pictures of explorers and scientists who uncovered the site. Various artifacts uncovered here, as well as various bits of jewelry. The most interesting area to me was an area full of skulls, jawbones and teeth. They showed the self-mutilation that had been carried out by the residents of Monte Alban. These included drilling holes into the skull and through the teeth. Teeth were actually rasped away until they formed various designs. All in all, a bit gruesome but the kind of thing you can't look away from.

We caught the noon bus back to town. L had another adventure lined up for us and was about to spring that on us!

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 8

2008-05-08T14:02:00.000-07:00

Reluctantly, we left the beautiful Iglesia de Santo Domingo and proceeded next door to the Museo de las Culturas de Oaxaca (Cultural Museum of Oaxaca). Prior to entering the museum itself, you have to pass through the stone cloister. I’m not sure if nuns and/or priests still live there or not. All we saw while there were armed guards. Passing through these wide, echo filled hallways, we entered the museum itself.

This museum is a wonderful place, showcasing Oaxacan artwork and artifacts from pre-Hispanic to contemporary times. Some of the exhibits are done as dioramas, recreating things like kitchens and dining rooms as they would have looked in a time long ago. Of course, what everybody wants to see is the Mixtec treasures exhumed from Tomb #7 in nearby Monte Alban. The treasure dates from the 14th century and was found in a tomb once used by the Zapotec people and then usurped by the Mixtecs.

Behind Santo Domingo and the museum was a beautiful cared for and manicured garden. We could see it from the museum windows but there was a separate entrance out back. We tried to gain admittance but one can only tour the gardens with a guide. Of course, we were too late in the day to catch any remaining tour. Maybe tomorrow then!

We had dinner at one of the many restaurants that ring the zocolo itself. We found a perfect spot for people watching and, after checking to make sure they served the one item in Oaxaca I had to try, we sat down. I had read about and was dying to try one of the many local specialties, the tlayuda.

The tlayuda is basically a large tortilla that has been deep fried to a crispness. It is then covered with refried beans, meat and cheese. Of course, it is smothered in the tasty, salty, string cheese of Oaxacan cheese. The trouble with eating it was that it had to be eaten by hand. One bite into it and the whole thing shattered and fell to smithereens onto your plate! No problem. Just pick up the larger pieces and eat them one by one! The added benefit of doing that was that it gave you plenty of time to order another beer. Mmmm, maybe that is why they were developed in the first place!

A very pleasant afternoon and evening behind us, we made our way back to the hotel and I fell into bed a happy camper.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 7

2008-05-06T06:22:00.000-07:00

Before visiting the Church of Santo Domingo, L led us down the street to see the town square. This is where the big teacher strike took place that literally shut down tourism in Oaxaca for awhile. The square was still resplendent with graffiti and a total lack of any grass, due to the thousands of people who had camped in or passed through the square in the process of protesting.

I was suitably impressed by the square. Actually, there are two of them, adjacent to one another. One was very similar to ours here on the island, just a big open space. The second one was more typically Mexican with the requisite bandstand and topiary lined aisle ways. The bandstand was quite the piece of work. It was round and actually elevated with stores down a few steps beneath it. They ran the entire circumference of the bandstand, like catacombs with trinkets for sale. I did not personally descend to this level so I am not sure what all was down there. From the entrances, all I saw was tacky tourist gift shops.

We left the pleasant zocolo behind and headed up the street to the Church of Santo Domingo.

What a splendid piece of architecture.

Here’s part of what the Lonely Planet has to say about it:

It was built mainly between 1570 and 1608 as part of the city’s Dominican monastery. The finest artisans from Puebla and elsewhere helped with its’ construction. Like other big buildings in this earthquake-prone region, Santo Domingo has immensely thick stone walls.

The exterior of the church is imposing, to say the least. Fronted by an impressive courtyard filled with rows of agave and surrounded by Flamboyance trees.

A welcoming plaza, it was filled with many local people, enjoying the warm afternoon and the tranquility of this place.

If the exterior is imposing, the interior is downright overwhelming. Every square inch of the ceiling is covered with gilt encrusted vines, twining their way around intricate designs and painted figures. All done in bas relief. It was almost sensory overload, trying to take it all in. I kept getting a kink in my neck from looking up!

We wondered around this church, dodging the million or so other tourists there that day, exploring the various rooms and vestibules. I just wish they would close it down for awhile and spend some time dusting and polishing everything. It would be so much more stunning if the golden gilt shone as in its’ heyday.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 6

2008-05-01T10:05:00.000-07:00

We drove on for a couple of more hours, stopping occasionally to take photos or just to stretch our legs. At one such stop, a pull over space actually, we spotted this giant water tank. They must have used it while building the road or something and then just left it lying there. It was surrounded everywhere by trash. Garbage, not trash. I think people just threw whatever they had accumulated in their cars onto the pile of garbage here. Pity really because the views from this stop were impressive but somehow diminished by all the garbage around.

Back on the road heading towards Oaxaca and we encountered the first of many Mexican stop signs along the road. Believe me, when you see these, you either stop or proceed with much caution. (the cow picture from yesterday was supposed to go here! oops)

We finally arrived in Oaxaca City itself and I was glad to be there. As cold as it had been crossing the mountain range, it was now the opposite in heat. It was a scorching day when we arrived and a Sunday to boot. L had been here many, many times in the past and expertly guided us to the area of town where we needed to be. We found a parking space still several blocks from the hotel he wanted to check out and I pulled in. B and L got out to go check on hotels and stayed put and guarded the car and smoked a few cigs to catch up on the ones I had missed while driving and not able to take my hands off the wheel.

The first few hotels that he checked were full so we consulted the Lonely Planet and a map of the city and were off once again. We finally settled on the Hotel Principal, (14) which was about five blocks from the town square and the center of town. The interior courtyard was very pleasant and seemed very old.

Our room faced a wide street which was not very busy at all. Especially considering it was one of the main arteries leading to the town square. As I looked off our tiny balcony, I was struck immediately by how little vegetation there was. Not a tree or shrub on the street. At first I thought this was going to be a dismal city if they had no trees or other vegetation. I later discovered that trees were everywhere, just not on our street!

I did see a street sweeper and found his broom highly amusing.

After getting ourselves somewhat settled in, the piece of business was to set out exploring. First stop: Iglesia de Santo Domingo.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 5

2008-04-29T07:51:00.000-07:00

The next leg of our journey was to take us to Oaxaca City. B and I were looking forward to this stop. We have long wanted a hand woven carpet from there. And just to see this city that we have heard so much about. Unfortunately for L, this was one of the cities that his tour groups stopped at so there was to be nothing new for him here.

Mexican stop sign!

To get to Oaxaca, we had to traverse the Sierra Luna mountain range. We found the road we needed, MX 175 and headed south. Although the road was in fairly decent repair, it was a grueling 225 kilometer (140 mile) drive that took us 6.5 hours. It seemed like we were climbing the entire way. This was to be my first experience with driving hairpin turns during this trip. Unfortunately, it was not to be my last.

Enjoying the mountain view, and probably a pee too!

The view we were looking at

By the time we got to Oaxaca, my wrists felt like they were broken. I don’t have power steering and the constant racking on the wheel took its’ toll. Not to mention the constant shifting from of the first three gears. I never got faster than third gear! (about 60 kph - 40 mph)

The drive was stupendous however. The scenery was gorgeous. The flat plains of the gulf and the river area around Tuxtepec gave way to the verdant hills of the Sierra Luna. Everywhere I looked it was lush hillside after lush hillside. Amidst the trees and bushes was the occasional banana tree. The entire countryside was alive with green.

Almost to Heaven, inside the clouds

As we climbed, we started to leave the junglely hills behind and the flora started to change to include pine trees. The smell of fresh pine coming into the car was delicious. To a point. After awhile it got to be a bit overpowering. Like when you clean your bathroom with one of those pine scented cleaners. Smells great to start but by the time you are finished, you just want to gag.
Eventually we reached what I thought was the top of the mountain because the road now started to descend. Not steeply but I seemed to be going down now more than up.

After three hours of driving, we came to this little cabiny like roadside restaurant. It was the first glimpse of civilization that we had had for hours. Naturally we decided to stop for breakfast.
I pulled into the deserted parking lot and the first order of business was to change our clothes. That high up in the mountains was chilly, to say the least. We changed from shorts to long pants and I even broke out my hoodie. It was a sight to see, adults sheepishly shedding their pants between two open car doors and quickly pulling on another pair before another car or truck came along. I don’t know why we were so embarrassed about it. Well, I don’t think it was as much embarrassment as we didn’t want to be perceived of as being disrespectful. Compared to some of the things we saw people doing along side the road, we were quite mannerly!

We entered into this quaint but very rustic restaurant of sorts. The front room had four tables in it. At the open back of the room was a step that went down into the kitchen. This consisted of a huge fire burning hearth where everything was cooked in huge skillets or iron pots.

We all ordered coffee which was ladled out into a bowl and brought to us to sip. Talk about strong, hot coffee! It was almost impossible to hold onto since there was no handle. But it sure warmed you up fast. After a quick meal of eggs and homemade bread, we were back on the road.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 4

2008-04-24T14:05:00.000-07:00

We arrived in bustling Tuxtepic in late afternoon. Tuxtepec is a spit of land that juts out into the river that flows through there. It is a dirty city with trash everywhere. We were immediately not impressed.

The area around Tuxtepec is famous for one thing. It is to this area that the likes of Bob Dylan, The Beatles and Timothy O’Leary, reportedly, Walt Disney, flocked in the 1960’s. They came here to partake of the local hallucinogenic mushrooms, under the guidance of Maria Sabina, the high priestess of all things mushroomy.

The road from Acayucan to Tuxtepic quickly detiorated and became a two lane mess. The road was clogged with local trucks transporting raw sugar cane and signage was few and far between.

We stopped and checked out a few hotels but finally ended up getting a room at La Bruja. (6). It was a tiny room with two double beds squashed up against each other and just off the tiny pool area. And this was the better of the three hotels we looked at. Although the pool looks inviting in the picture, believe me, it wasn’t. It had all kinds of debris floating in it and some that had been there so long it had sunk to the bottom. Our room was just to the right of where this picture was taken.

We went looking for a restaurant that was recommended by The Lonely Planet but could not find it. I must admit, we did not look very hard though. This city was just so filthy, full of bad drivers and rude people that we just wanted to spend as little time as possible here. We did find a rather nice place on the main street. Tiny but clean. It was called Arracherra Grudo. You ordered your meal by weight. Arracherra is a both a cut of beef and a way to cook it. We ordered half a kilo and it was served with beans and tortillas. Not a gourmet meal but certainly tasty and typically Mexican.

After dinner we decided to walk across the street and check out the local Italian Coffee Company. These shops are all over Mexico and part of a chain. As such, the menu in each of them never varies. The quality and service do, but not the menu. We each had a coffee and returned to our tiny room early. We wanted to be up early to head out for our next stop. We retired to our beds and fell blissfully asleep. For awhile. Around 11 PM, all hell broke loose outside our door.

A large group of noisy teenagers, who had evidently been drinking, decided to invade the pool and have a private party. They brought along their boom box and even louder voices to match. Lots of merrymaking going on and lots of shouting. It was impossible to sleep. This was going on about 15 feet away from our door. Around midnight, L opened the door and yelled at them. Shortly thereafter the party broke up. This was to be our first experience with hotels where the management could care less what the guests do. They got their money but certainly did not guarantee that you would get any sleep. You were simply paying for a bed for the night.

The next morning we could not find a place for breakfast and had to settle for a quick cup of instant Nescafe at the local PeMex gas station on the way out of town. And glad to be going too! It was just on the outskirts of Tuxtepec that I saw my first set of smoke stacks. This was to become a familiar sight, stacks shooting clouds of black or white smoke into the air. I doubt that they adhere to any type of pollution standards.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 3

2008-04-22T12:07:00.000-07:00

Saturday morning in Ciudad del Carmen, we had a nice little sleep in. We actually took time to go to a restaurant and have a decent breakfast. Our original goal was to head across the Gulf and stay the night in Acayucan before dropping down to Oaxaca.

The car all loaded and everybody in their place, off we went. The road was very familiar to me by this time. This was the fifth time I had driven this particular stretch of MX 180 along the Gulf. I knew what was to come for the most part, no surprises. Not even the giant bridge at Frontera held any fear for me this time. Frontera is where we cross from Campeche state into Tabasco state. My biggest concern was getting through Villahermosa.

If you will recall, Villahermos is where we got lost on our first driving trip, mostly because B decided to be a sight-seer instead of a navigator. We got hopelessly lost that time and I ended up putting a pretty good dent in our brand new car. That was also the scene of our biggest fight on the road. So, I was dreading going through that town again. And sure enough, we did have a very small problem.

Signage in Mexico, if it exists, is very poor, to say the least. Signs will lead you along and then just vanish, never to be seen again. Sort of like “Oh, it’s in this general direction, just drive along here for awhile” kind of thing. If you really want to find out about Mexican signage, go here.

We needed to look for signs directing us to the city of Heroica Cardenas, the next big town on our way to Acayucan where we planned to spend our second night on the road. I had a vague memory of an overpass and that we should turn at that. I saw the overpass as we entered town and instructed B and L to watch for signs to Heroica Cardenas or MX 180. Or maybe Minatitlan or even Acayucan or Veracruz. Any of those would take us in the right direction. We sailed under the overpass with no sign in sight. After going about four blocks, L decided that the better course here was to pull over and he would jump out and ask a taxi driver for directions. We did not want to get too deep into the city before doing this. L if very fluent in Spanish and handy to have along! Sure enough, the taxi driver told us to turn around and just after we went under the overpass to turn left. That would put us back on MX 180 in the right direction. So turn around I did and made the left turn. As I turned the corner, there in front of us, about mid-block was the sign we had been looking for. Is it just me, or would it have been better to put it at the intersection to inform drivers which way to turn?

We were making excellent time and approached Acayucan hours before we thought we would. We consulted the map and decided that we still had enough time to change our plans and keep driving. We never drive after dark if we can help it, sometimes stopping hours before hand if we don’t think we can make it to a city with hotels before dark. We decided to exit onto MX 175, which leads directly into Oaxaca. We figured we had enough daylight left to make it as far as Tuxtepec. So with no more discussion about it, we exited the freeway system and entered onto our first secondary road of the trip.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 2

2008-04-10T07:39:00.000-07:00

Our first night on the road was a pleasant one. Despite there being not much to do in Ciudad del Carmen, I like the city. It is located right on the Gulf and exists mostly due to the oil drilling offshore. To get there, one has to cross a low, two mile long bridge. Likewise when leaving. Ciudad del Carmen is actually an island separating the Gulf of Mexico from the many bays formed behind the island. The downtown area is located on a bay that comes in from the Gulf and is quite calm. But dirty. I would not even stick a toe into that water!

one of the two dreaded bridges leading to and from Ciudad del Carmen

Ciudad del Carmen has a very nice town square. One of the nicest I have ever seen. It is the typical bandstand with tree lined spokes that is so prevalent in Mexico. Lots of trees also. One side is bordered by a church and one by restaurants and shops. Scattered along the other two sides are various vendors in funny little wagon shops that they close up at night and pull away. I assume that there is some sort of warehouse where they lock them all up. An interesting fact about the downtown area, and one to keep in mind, is that they do not sell or allow the consumption of alcohol. Including beer. This is the only town I have ever encountered this in in Mexico. There is also a huge statue of a shrimp as you enter town. I should have gotten a picture of it, but, since I was driving, that was a bit difficult to do.

large statue on the edge of town, just before getting onto the dreaded bridge

Having been in Ciudad del Carmen many times before, we already knew what hotel we were going to stay in. The Parque (17)* just off the town square. It’s a pleasant, slightly modern building and all rooms are air conditioned. We got a room with two double beds for $480** pesos. There is no off-street parking but there are allocated spaces just across from the entrance for your car. They have a night watchman who watches your car. Supposedly for free but he hit me up for $10 pesos “for a Coke to stay awake”. Small price to pay for a guard for the car.

After lugging all of our stuff to the room, we freshened up and headed out for dinner. The hotel clerk had recommended several places we should try along the water front. We knew from past experience that the few restaurants around the square were a waste of time and space. We negotiated our way along the sidewalk across from the malecon. I wish I had taken my camera to dinner. The holes in this sidewalk were incredible. Some of the best I have seen! Plus here and there it was heaved up by tree roots, just waiting to put you flat on your face if you didn’t watch out. We finally found our destination, a place called La Fuente. We overloaded with typical Mexican fare for the area: suaves, tostados and tamales.

Ciudad del Carmen has one of the nicest, largest gas stations I have seen in Mexico

Feeling very full and a bit tired from our first long day, we shuffled our way back to the hotel and turned in for the night.

Total distance traveled: 711 kms/444 miles
Costs: gas, ferry, bridge and road tolls, hotel: $1188 pesos

* We devised a simple rating system for every hotel we stayed in. We each gave it a value rating from 1 to 10. Ten being the highest. So out of a possible 30 points, this hotel only scored 17. You will see this figure in ( ) throughout the rest of the story.

** All prices in this story will be stated in Mexican pesos. To figure out how much it is in US dollars, divide by ten and you’ll be very close.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 1

2008-04-08T08:15:00.000-07:00

Friday, May 11, found three excited guys jumping out of bed when the alarm went off at 4 AM. We needed time to finish last minute house details, have a cup of coffee or two and get to the ferry in time for the 6:30 AM departure to Cancun. Dawn was still a sleepy yawn on the eastern horizon as we backed out of the driveway and headed out for the great adventure.

The ride, the seemingly endless forty-five minute ride, on the car ferry to Punta Sam on the mainland was without incident. Except that we were late leaving. I hoped this was not to be a sign of things to come! We docked safely and made our way through the morning rush of Cancun traffic, heading out of town to grab the toll road to Merida. By this time it was a little after 8:00 AM and we were hungry. One of the last pieces of civilization one encounters before getting on the endless toll road is a McDonald’s. I obediently pulled in and we had a quick breakfast of McMuffins before truly heading out.

The road that slices through the jungle from Cancun to Merida is one of the most boring stretches of highway I have ever traveled. And I really feel qualified to say that now! There are maybe three slight curves in the whole thing, no change of elevation and nothing to see. The scrub jungle comes right up to the road and it is just a solid wall of green or brown, depending upon the time of year. At the 62 mile mark is the border crossing and we passed from Quintana Roo into Yucatan. This is also the first opportunity one has for using a bathroom. Rest areas are non-existent in Mexico. Border crossings and gas stations are about the only chance one gets to use a real bathroom. I could do a whole blog on the condition of these bathrooms, but I will spare you. Suffice it to say that I would rather pee on the side of the road (and have!) than enter most of them.

A little further along and one comes to the turn off for Chichen-Itza and Valledolid. There is also a rest station here with various restaurants and a PeMex gas station. There are no other opportunities for gas or to stop until one reaches Merida, about another 2.5 hours down that tunnel of highway.

A quick potty break, a light snack and some fresh water purchases and we were back on the road. Nothing to see, nothing to do but try to stay awake as the endless gray miles of ribbon unfurled in front of me. The two sleeping passengers in the car with me did little to help alleviate the boredom. At times I was slapping my own face and pulling my moustache hairs to keep myself from falling victim to highway hypnosis. "Wake up one of the passengers to help keep me awake", you say? Not on your life! If I did that, how could I complain about it later?! Finally we reached the outskirts of Merida and things started to get a little more interesting. None of this was new territory yet though. That would come tomorrow. For now, we were just retracing miles that we have traveled many times before.

At the traffic circle where one can choose to go to downtown Merida or angle south to Campeche, we chose the southern route. We still had another rough five hours before our first night on the road - Ciudad del Carmen.

As we traveled south, the jungle gave way to slightly rolling hills and a change in the vegetation. We were now starting to see some fields and rock outcroppings. But still plenty of scrub brush. It always amazes me how the terrain suddenly changes, like dropping a curtain and then raising it again to see a totally different landscape. This time when the curtain rose, I was looking at the shoreline of the Gulf of Mexico. Only a few more hours and this first, boring but necessary, stretch of the trip would be over.

Summer 2007 Car Trip - Introduction

2008-04-07T08:03:00.000-07:00

Having done a driving tour of Mexico a few years back, we decided we wanted to do it again. We had formerly visited the Gulf Coast region and parts of east central Mexico. We knew there was much more to see and explore in the vast beautiful country. And we intended to do it!
With the months of detailed planning and research that went into this trip, you’d think for sure that we are all anal retentive. But I assure you, that is not the case.

I can’t begin to count the hours that the three of us spent each night on the internet. Researching hotels, cross referencing them to hotels listed in our guidebooks; researching cities and beaches and even travel routes and distances. This was to be, after all, a long, great adventure. Little did we know that by the end of it we would have put 9178 Km, or 5736 miles on our little VW Pointer.

We had no set time frame but were estimating that we would be gone for at least six weeks. Our planned itinerary would be taking us from Cancun, along the Gulf of Mexico, across the mountains to central Mexico, then north and eventually ending up in Los Mochis where we would take the ferry across the Sea of Cortez to Baja. Back on the mainland, we planned on following the Pacific coastline, stopping at any little village or beach that caught our attention along the way. Of course, we would be hitting the major cities also. What we finally settled on for as a proposed route was this:

to follow the route: start at the upper right, follow the top orange line to where it becomes a single line. Next we go up to Chihuahua, back across the Sea of Cortez and then follow the bottom line along the Pacific Coast. (I had to merge both horizontally and vertically to get this map. Sorry some edges are missing.)

Travel the Gulf Coast and then drop down to Oaxaca, then up through central Mexico to Los Mochis, take the train to Creel in the Copper Canyon, catch the ferry over to Baja California Sur and then back to the mainland, travel the Pacific Coast highway back and then cut up to San Cristobal de las Casas and then home.

Since we had friends staying in the cabana in early May and L’s contract with the company he works for out of London was up then also, we set our departure date as May 11. Prior to the actual leaving we hired a property manager to come by every day and check on the house. Plus we hired our housecleaning lady to come over every other day to water plants and to feed the cat that was being left behind. This was also a way to continue to pay her while we were gone so she 1) wouldn’t suffer a financial hardship because of our vacation and 2) would not go looking for another job! I also dropped my house cat, Simon, off with a friend who would be watching him while we were gone. So, with the house boarded up, windows all secured from the inside and extra padlocks put on the inside of doors, we were ready to go!

New Series Starting Soon!

2008-04-02T14:25:00.000-07:00

I will start posting the next adventure on Monday, April 7. This is the adventure of our seven week car trip throughout Mexico last summer. All new, never before published work with a ton of pictures and movies! So c'mon back next Monday and let's get started!

Watch This Space

2008-03-24T07:22:00.000-07:00

Well, folks, I have nothing more to post about my travels at the moment. However, I am working on getting the tale of my adventure last summer up and posted.

I drove my car for seven weeks through central Mexico, Baja California and the entire Pacific Coast of Mexico. Lots of pictures and videos along the way. I would estimate about two more weeks before I start posting. Keep checking here, or visit my other blog where I post Monday to Friday. I will announce on there when I will start posting to this blog again.

So stay tuned and don't give up on me!

Costa Rica 43 - The End

2008-03-21T08:15:00.000-07:00

CONCLUSIONS AND THOUGHTS

The big question I always ask myself when we return from a trip is this: Would I ever visit there again? The answer in this case is a resounding yes, but with a different agenda.

Of all the places we visited, the one I would probably return to is the one that I thought I would not. Puerto Viejo de Talamanca. This is the tiny Caribbean town where all the reggae music was being played. Take the music out of the equation and it was a great town. I really liked the beaches, especially Punta Uva and would like to return there.

I would like to visit the Guanacaste region in the north and then see the Pacific side. We didn’t get to either one of these places and there are some great sounding things to do and see there. Of course, it is not rain forest and that is what our primary objective was on this trip. Guanacaste is described as the “wild west” of Costa Rica with lots of cowboys and cattle ranches. Which also means horses and I still want to ride!

Here are just some of my observations:

Green. I marveled over and over at how green everything was. And all different shades. As far as the eye could see. Which was not very far at times! The vegetation was lush and covered everything. Plants we normally think of as potted house plants grow wild here and reach dimensions we never even consider. The bamboo was everywhere and just simply incredible.

Vegetation. I suppose this could be listed under Green. But it truly does seem like a category unto itself. Especially in the rain and cloud forests. Plants are king in Costa Rica. Remember the leaf I jokingly (?) described as a fig leaf? It’s unofficial official name is “Poor Man’s Umbrella” because people do use it as a makeshift umbrella. It’s that big. The amazing diversity of plant life alone is a good reason to visit.

Bugs. I thought we would encounter a lot more than we did. Of course, there were mosquitoes. But where isn’t there? We truly had to keep our eyes open and really look to see most of the bugs we did see. They are extremely well adapted and camouflaged for their environment. I was a bit apprehensive going into this. I thought we would plagued by bugs everywhere. Creepy, crawly stuff. Not the case at all.

SNAKES! What a disappointment they turned out to be. With over 220 species of reptiles, half of which are snakes, in Costa Rica, I thought we would see a lot more. We saw exactly one in the wild. That harmless pink bellied thing the guide caught to show us. Good thing we visited that snake place in Monteverde or I probably never would have seen a fer-de-lance. I wonder though…how many snakes saw me??

People. I thought Mexicans were friendly! They don’t hold a light to the people of Costa Rica. I never once encountered anything or anybody even coming close to being rude. No line jumping, no shoving to get on or off a bus and smiles from everybody. The national motto of Costa Rica is “Pura Vida”, meaning pure life. They take it a step further and it takes on a meaning of live and let live. Politeness seems to be a national pastime.

San Jose. That city made me very nervous and uncomfortable. Big cities don’t usually bother me at all. There was just an underlying current of danger there. I noticed that everybody who had something to carry, a purse, a bag, a camera, had it around their necks and had a very good grasp on the strap. Just in case somebody gave it a jerk. It is a necessary evil. The starting and stopping point for most adventures, due to the airport being there. It is not a city I want to spend any more time in than I have to. The only down side of Costa Rica I found.

I enjoyed this trip. I think you can tell. It took me 42 chapters to tell the story! Not only because of where we went, but also of how we traveled. I really enjoyed being a backpacker. I enjoyed sitting by the side of the road waiting for a bus. I enjoyed lugging that thing around, everything I owned carried with me. I enjoyed the luxury of not having to drive or find my own way around. I would like to do it again sometime, but not on our next big trip.

We are planning a minimum six week adventure starting in June. We will be taking the car. We are going to drop over to the Pacific Coast and follow it more or less northward to Mazatlan. Then a 19 hour ferry to the Baja Peninsula. Around there a bit and then back to the mainland and on to the Copper Canyon. Lots of cities, waterfalls, canyons, ruins, mines and who knows what else await us. Stay tuned for that!

I am always curious. Did reading of my adventure make any of you want to go to Costa Rica? Or just the reverse? What part of the trip story did you enjoy the most? The least? I am interested in hearing feedback. I enjoy writing about our adventures but am not always too sure people enjoy hearing about them! Any feedback would be welcome! Thank you to all of you.

Costa Rica 42

2008-03-19T09:01:00.000-07:00

We grabbed a taxi from in front of our hotel and had him take us downtown to the pedestrian shopping zone. This is a stretch of about nine blocks, blocked to traffic and full of shops. Some upscale, some not so upscale.

I was looking for a cheap, small day bag. I had purchased more things than I could comfortably fit in my bags and needed an extra. I finally found one. I thought it was ok but while waiting in the Panama City airport, the zipper broke on it! Nothing to do but carefully carry it on home. We did try to take out what we could and rearrange the other three bags we were carrying though.
Mostly we just ambled in and out of bookstores and clothing stores. A few T-shirts were bought but not much else.

We took a break for lunch and one of the many street side cafes on the zone. We had a direct view to a guy who had imitation PUMA sweatshirts for sale. They were all spread out on a tarp and people were buying them like crazy. Of course, there were many other vendors displaying their wares up and down the length of this street. Nothing tempted us.

At one point, while L was looking at some new trainers (sneakers), B and I waited outside to have a smoke. While waiting, this long haired American dude approached us. He said he was looking for some hospital or other and did we know where it was? He explained that none of the streets have signs. We politely told him that we did not know and kept backing away from him, all the time scanning the people all around us. We were not going to be played for suckers and get pick pocketed while being distracted by this dude. He kept following us, chattering away, trying to keep our attention on him. I finally very rudely told him to take a hike or I would call a cop to give him directions!

Totally exhausted from this last afternoon of power shopping, we made our way back to the hotel and had a nice siesta before having to clean up and head out for our last dinner in Costa Rica.

We once again took a vote and decided we wanted to end the trip where we started. At the nice little soda down the street where the waitress had mopped my feet a few short weeks ago. She, of course, remembered us. It was a nice farewell meal.

Next morning found us fully packed and up by 4am. We had to take a taxi to the airport to catch our 4:45 AM flight to Panama City. A two hour layover there, where we enjoyed one of our favorite travel meals…..roller dogs! Then a two hour flight to Cancun, a bus downtown, taxi to the port, ferry to the island, and finally, a taxi home!

Our adventure over, it was just plain old good to be home!

Costa Rica 41

2008-03-17T08:03:00.000-07:00

Early the next morning we were in downtown Monteverde at the bus station. By early, I mean early! Like 5:30 IN THE MORNING! Our bus for San Jose was to leave at 6:30 and we wanted to try to get coffee and some kind of breakfast before that. Also, we had to purchase tickets. It is a first come, first serve for seats and we did not want to miss this bus!

The only place open was the bakery that is kitty-korner from the bus station. We satisfied ourselves with big cups of coffee and some “sweet” roll concoctions. L went over and purchased our tickets and then returned to the curb where B and I were sitting…sipping our coffee and inhaling as many cigarettes as we could before the long bus ride. Long by Costa Rican standards. It was only supposed to be 3 hours.

As is usually the case in Central America, the bus pulled out of the station promptly at 6:30 AM. The lesson is to be there or get left behind! We wound our way out of town and immediately started to ascend into the tall hills surrounding us. Cement buildings began to become scarce and we started to encounter the wooden houses I like to call shacks. Then they stopped and we only occasionally saw a homestead for quite awhile. But the scenery, like on every other bus trip so far, was stupendous.

We were climbing very high. Not sure what the altitude was, but it was a long way down! Again, sometimes great panoramas of rolling green hills and other times the hills only stopped because a road had been cut through them. Sometimes I could look out my window and see no road at all, it was just pure straight down! We were traveling all this time on a gravel road. With hairpin turns just big enough for the bus. And steep embankments with no shoulder on most of them. A lot of my joy at the watching the countryside on this trip was taken away from me by the uncouth bus driver.

He had another driver hitching a ride with him and he was sitting on the console next to the driver. They spent the entire time chit chatting away. Of course, this meant that our driver had to keep looking at his guest and using his hands a lot to drive home some point he was trying to make. I felt he should have had his eyes glued to that treacherous road! I swear, we would approach some of the most dangerous curves and at the last minute the driver would grab a hold of the wheel and give it a mighty twist, sending us pall mall around the curve and narrowly avoiding plunging off the side to our deaths below. Such a pity. It was beautiful country but I was so overwrought by this dangerous way of driving, I could not concentrate on it. I was sure we were going to die here. Sounds dramatic and it was!

We finally descended onto flat land and I was very grateful! It had taken us 1.5 hours of nerve wracking, gut wrenching riding to get to our first stop. We stopped at some roadside restaurant so that the bus driver could get breakfast. Not a word about how long we would be here or anything. He just pulled into the parking lot, opened the door and got out without a look behind.

I find this behavior very rude but all the bus drivers do it. When it’s time to eat, it’s time to eat!
We all grabbed some kind of snack and loitered around outside, not knowing how long it would be. We certainly did not want to get left behind. I did find a special treat here though. LifeSaver Butterscotch Rum candy! I hadn’t had those since I was a kid.

We finally got under way again and just a mile down the road came to an intersection of paved road and the driver turned to the left and San Jose. We had left the hitchhiking driver behind at the restaurant.

The rest of the way into San Jose was pretty uneventful. At some point, we turned into a local bus and would stop to pick up or discharge people. Twice we picked up some interesting ones.

The first was a man with 1.5 legs. He was on crutches. The people in the front seats tried to give up their seats to him but he just kept motioning for them to sit down. We soon found out why. Once the bus was rolling again, he started talking. I didn’t catch a lot of it, but enough. His was a tale of woe, of how he lost his leg, then his family and now could not get a job because nobody wanted to hire somebody on crutches. Could we help out with just a little money for food and stuff? This was actually a 20 minute monologue. None of our group gave him anything. In fact, I was appalled that the driver allowed him to panhandle to a captive audience like that. Call me cold hearted, but I think he had somehow latched onto the moving gravy train and that was his job! After he had made his way to the back of the bus and to the front again, he cheerfully thanked us and the driver pulled over to let him out. Just a few miles down the road, we picked up another strange fellow.

This one had all of his appendages and was rather clean. He also carried a box of something. His story was so sad. (insert tongue in cheek!) He was an ex-druggie, just out of rehab and had found a new beginning. But he didn’t want anything for free, oh no. He had a box of BIC pens and was willing to sell them for 20 cents US each. Guess whether or not I bought one! When he left, he reached into his box and gave the driver two free pens. I guess that was the going rate for being allowed to harass all of us.

This was not the first time that this happened on a bus ride but I really resent it. They really try to play on your sympathies and guilt (of which I have none!) and you can’t just say no and walk away. Different culture and one just has to roll with it.

We finally pulled into the depot at San Jose but not before passing through one of the sleaziest parts of town. I have never seen so many homeless people in my life. The lucky ones had cardboard to sleep on. L warned us that this station was in a bad part of town and that when we got off we should stay together, get our luggage and get away as fast as possible. Because of the high crime and stuff, we had to walk several blocks away from this station before we dared hale a cab. Cabs in that area are not always safe and don’t always take you where you want to go. At least not before lightening your load by taking all your valuables.

We made it safely back to our original hotel, through our stuff on the beds, collected ourselves and then headed out for lunch and afternoon of shopping.

Costa Rica 40

2008-03-14T08:15:00.000-07:00

NOTE: not all of the attached pictures were taken at the butterfly garden.

With full bellies and still thinking of the wonderful chicken we had just eaten, we decided to grab a cab to our next adventure. We weren’t sure how far away it was but we knew it was in the mountains overlooking the town somewhere. We were going to a butterfly garden!

Ok, I admit it. I was about as excited to go look at a bunch of butterflies as I was to poke a sharp stick in my eye. But it was something to do to fill the hours. We could have gone back to the room to take another nap I suppose, but that just didn’t seem like a valid use of our time.

We arrived at the building, which was nestled into the side of a hill, purchased our tickets and waited for the English speaking guide to gather enough people to start the tour. Finally, with the masses amassed, we entered into the first room. It was some kind of educational room with various species of bugs and caterpillars and spiders on display.

By on display, I mean in little glass, open topped aquariums or trays. Our guide was in the center area in a space made by tables all around her. The first thing she did was reach into a tub and pull out this huge tarantula. While she explained what gentle, docile creatures they really are, it was busy running all over her hands, trying to get away. Truthfully, if she had asked if anybody wanted to hold it, my hand would have been one of the first ones to reach out. This fact surprised me to no end. Guess I don’t feel the same way about spiders that I do about SNAKES!.

But she never offered this creature, or any of the others, to the crowd. Except to shove stuff at your face if you got to close to her. Like gross cockroaches, caterpillars and other beetles and bugs that I have long since forgotten the names of.

Tour and initiation into the wonderful world of bugs and crawly things over, we headed out for the butterflies. But first, a stop at a leafcutter ant village. We finally got to ask all the questions that had popped into our minds while watching them cross the jungle path so many days ago in Cahuita.

The butterfly exhibits themselves were nothing short of amazing. They had four different buildings, each one just a little bit higher on the hill than the one before. You had to go through double doors to get in so that none of the inhabitants flew out. You also had to check your clothing and that of the people around you before you left. Just in case there was some stowaway wanting to get out! Each one of the buildings represented a different level of ecosystem and was climatically controlled. They went from sea level to the highest level of the cloud forests.

The whole thing was a fascinating piece of business. I was truly amazed at the diversity and beauty of all these different butterflies. And our guide was truly well versed in each and every one of them. We lingered longer than usual in the fourth and last building. Perhaps reluctant to leave this tiny bit of paradise, populated by so many interesting butterflies.

I went into this little side trip with a definite ho-hum attitude but it turned out to be one of those special little surprises that one doesn’t expect. I would recommend it to anybody.

Costa Rica 39

2008-03-12T08:46:00.000-07:00

We were able to sleep in a little this morning. Our transport was not due until 10:30 AM. We had made our reservations and paid $20 each yesterday to book our cloud forest canopy walk. I was really looking forward to this.

The taxi arrived right on time and drove us over those same rut infested roads to our starting point. Thankfully for my innards, we only had to go 3.5 kilometers (2.1 miles) to our starting point. We were dropped off at a lodge looking place. All pine logs and looking like a resort in the north woods of Minnesota. We were given our wrist bands and a map of the trail showing the location of the eight bridges we would be crossing. So off we went.

In the beginning, it was much like the walk we had taken yesterday at Santa Elena. Cobble stoned pathways and lots of steps and switchbacks that led us ever higher into the hills. Then we came to our first bridge. They all varied in height and length, depending upon the valley we had to cross. The highest one was 215 feet above ground, the lowest was 138 feet. A typical building in the USA has 10’ per story. So these bridges were like being 21 stories to 14 stories above ground, looking straight down!

They are, of course, constructed of metal. The floor being a see through mesh and the sides look like wire fencing with big cables running along the top. They are basically little suspension bridges. They don’t sway from side to side, but they sure do bounce when you walk along them! It was almost impossible to get a picture that would be in focus unless you were the only one on the bridge. Otherwise the constant traffic of people kept the thing in perpetual motion.

Since the pathways between bridges were all enclosed by the vegetation of the forest, it was a welcoming site and feeling to cross the bridges. Panoramas opened up, or at least seemed to. At times we would be looking directly into the highest branches of trees. At other times we were looking down at the tops of trees. Kind of surrealist feeling. There was a small creek that had possibly formed the valleys that we crossed. At least the creek was evident at the bottom of each one as we looked down. Sometimes we could see it clearly. Other times we had to search and search through the dense growth to even catch a glimpse of it. But it was always there. It was a strange but delightful feeling. Being amidst the trees but not really in them. At one point we looked down upon a giant fern. This thing was huge, the biggest one I have ever seen in my life. I took several pictures of it, but like with most pictures, there is no 3D perception and it is hard to see just exactly how immense it truly was.

By about the third bridge, the sun broke through the clouds and the sky actually turned from gray to blue. It turned out to be an incredibly nice day. The thermometer I carry on my backpack zipper said it was 50F but it felt so much warmer there in the jungle. We took our time and looked at every bush, leaf, vine, tree and piece of jungle growth that we could. We knew that this was our last jungle adventure and just did not want it to end. Besides, this was the big reason I had come to Costa Rica and I was determined to experience it as deeply as I could.
Eventually we crossed the eighth and last bridge and found ourselves back at the starting lodge. We caught the shuttle back to town and started looking around for a place to eat. We were famished by this point.

We had spotted a little fried chicken place off and around a corner from main street and headed for that. I have mentioned before how much the Ticos love fried chicken and they do a great job of it. This place was just a single room with a few tables and chairs, nothing fancy. Against the back wall was a small counter and a glass display case. We all three ordered the breast and fries special. We had to wait for him to cook it but it was well worth the wait. I have never tasted better chicken. And the size of those breasts! I think they must have come from a breed known as Dolly Parton, they were so huge!

Chicken all consumed and fingers all licked clean, we headed out for our next adventure. The one we chose to replace the horseback ride we didn’t do.

Costa Rica 38

2008-03-10T06:44:00.000-07:00

We got smart on the way back to town. We decided that we did not need to stop off at the hotel first to drop off ponchos and umbrellas. We just stuffed them into our day backpack and had the driver deliver us all the way down the last hill to town. Our object now was lunch!

The sun had come out while driving back and it was now a hot, steamy afternoon. There are no restaurants in Monteverde with outdoor seating. Probably because the sidewalks are so narrow and about two steps up from the main road. You don’t want to accidentally step off them or you could end up getting hurt. Or run over!

We found a friendly looking little café and settled in at the only table left. It was right in front by the window so we had a good view of passersby. And, of course, the sun was beating in and roasting us. I forget what B and L had but this was the day that I discovered Salchipapa. The name is a combined form of salchicha (hot dog) and papas fritas (French fries). They cut up a hot dog into 2” pieces and slice them almost all the way through in the form of an X. Then they deep fry them. They open up and look just like a hot dog flower! These are then served mixed in with a plate of homemade French fries. Yum! Covered in ketchup and salt and eaten with a toothpick. I was in trailer trash heaven! B and L just rolled their eyes, as usual.

Lunch over, we decided it was time to do some souvenir/gift shopping. Monteverde was our last stop before returning to San Jose and then back to Mexico. Nothing like last ditch shopping! We managed to find a few presents for people and even a few things for ourselves! Nothing too big or grand though. Space in a backpack is at a premium. Plus we knew we wanted to bring home as many bottles of Flor de Cana as possible since it is so much cheaper in Costa Rica. And space for that took priority!

Totally exhausted from our morning adventure and power shopping the three stores in town, we next had to stop at the tour agency and book our last adventure of the trip. The one that I was looking forward to the most and that was on my list of top 10 things to do in life. A cloud forest canopy walk. That done, we trudged back up the hill to our hotel. For some reason, we didn’t take a taxi this time. My legs were burning by the time we got to the top of the hill and I desperately needed the siesta we then took!

Awake, feeling refreshed and freshly showered, we headed down the hill for drinks and dinner. I ended up getting totally drunk on the great Costa Rican beer and had a very enjoyable evening. I don’t know if B and L did since they had to listen to my drunken ramblings and bits of wisdom that come from a bottle. But I think they did and were probably just as tipsy as I was! We were back to the hotel and in bed by 11:30 PM but it sure was a long and eventful day.

Costa Rica 37

2008-03-07T08:30:00.000-08:00

The next day was Friday, August 5. Today was to be our first real adventure walk in a cloud forest, unescorted and unguided.

Cloud forests differ from rain forests in that they are higher, located in the mountains. And they are usually very wet because the clouds are in them all the time. Whether it has been raining or not, the vegetation is usually dripping with moisture from the dew contained in the clouds. Long range visibility is almost non-existent also. Not that you can see very far through the dense undergrowth and giant trees and vines anyway.

The larger, more popular cloud forest here is Reserva Biologica Bosque Nuboso Monteverde. It can get very crowded and hard to really appreciate the true nature of the forest. So we opted to go to the lesser visited, but equally impressive Reserva Santa Elena. Even though it is smaller, it still has 12 km (8 miles) of well marked and easy to negotiate trails. There is also a large viewing platform for viewing the one good area that opens up for a panorama of the area. It was not very well marked, off down its’ own little trail, but we found it nonetheless!

We were standing in front of our hotel at the appointed time that our pre-arranged driver was to pick us up and take us to the forest. He arrived fashionably late, we climbed in and we were off. And what a drive it was!

This being very hilly, almost mountainous terrain, we wound our way up and then down and around vast hills. And no gradual grades either. They seemed to be either straight up or straight down. And in very bad repair. Since they are basically just paths bulldozed out of the hills, they are dirt and rocks. They are full of potholes and deep ruts where the rain water has washed down them. Our cab dodged and swerved the entire way. I was once again left feeling like my insides had broken loose from their moorings. A very unpleasant feeling. Thankfully the ride lasted only about half an hour.

We were dropped off at the entrance, bought our tickets and were on our way. Shortly after entering the first trail, there is a sign directing you to the various routes around the forest. Which one to take? They ranged in length from 4 miles to just over 1 mile. Knowing my stamina point, we opted for the shortest one. As we walked it, I was glad we did. It took three hours to get around it as it was. Lots of steps taking us higher and deeper into the forest. Of course, we stopped a lot to take pictures and just take in the awesomeness of our surroundings.

The vegetation did not differ that much from the rain forests but enough to make it interesting. Except here everything was wet and dripping with moisture. It was difficult to get any good pictures because it was so overcast and almost gloomy. I am tempted to say that if you have seen one rain/cloud forest, you have seen them all. But that would be unfair and not do them justice. Yes, they are all full of trees, vines, ferns and various other plants that foreign to us Northerners, but each one is still unique.

At one point, we actually crossed the Continental Divide. We had done this last year when we did our American Southwest tour but I was surprised to actually come upon it again in the middle of a cloud forest in Costa Rica! Unlike the USA, there were no souvenir shops or gigantic signs to indicate this. Just one little sign, kind of ho-hum about the whole thing.

We eventually made our way around the whole loop and came back to our starting point. Wet from the moisture and constant drizzle, but happy to have done the walk all the same. There was a little souvenir/coffee shop at the end/start of the trail and we relaxed over a welcome cup of hot coffee before having to start back to town. I was not looking forward to this since my insides still kind of hurt!

Costa Rica 36

2008-03-05T05:31:00.000-08:00

Once safely out of that SNAKE infested place, we hunched our shoulders against the wind, drew our hoods tightly around our faces and headed back downtown. Our destination, naturally, was to find a bar. I really needed a drink at this point to calm my shattered nerves and get over the SNAKE overdose that I had just endured.

We had seen what looked like a really interesting bar on Main Street earlier. It was actually built around and into a huge tree. Instead of chopping it down, some enterprising soul turned it into a tree house bar. L had never ventured into its’ limbs on his prior trips so we decided to give it a go. Let me tell you, the idea of this is much nicer than the practicality of it. Each of us bonked his head at one point or the other while trying to climb over and around branches to reach a table.

When I go out, I am usually a beer drinker. No guess work about the strength or quality of booze being used. Plus it is easier to gage my encroaching level of drunkenness that way. I was really upset to learn that a simple bottle of beer in this place cost $2 US, plus they added 13% tax and then another 10% gratuity onto that! That made my one beer cost $2.53 US! I know, it is probably cheap compared to American prices, but for CR, or Latin America in general, it was expensive. We each had one drink and then made our way out. As difficult as it was, I cannot even begin to imagine trying to climb our way out of the place if we had been a bit tipsy!

We made our way down the street to a much more user-friendly bar/restaurant/disco frequented by the locals and the foreign hippie crowd. L ordered some concoction of pork pieces, beans and tomatoes. He swore that it was very tasty but it sure didn’t look it. Having decided that I was eating way too much on this trip, I passed on eating anything for dinner at all. Besides, I wasn’t hungry. But I have mentioned my lack of hunger before. But I was thirsty and had no problem consuming huge quantities of Cuba Libres that night! (Geez, I sound like a real booze hound. But I’m not. Is denial the first sign??)

The evening pretty much over and me drunk enough to have forgotten all the slithery things we had seen earlier, we made our way back out to the main street and hailed a cab to take our weary and slightly tipsy bones back up the hill to bed. We had just made it back to our room when a terrific mountain storm blew up. The wind and pouring rain was incredible, but mesmerizing. Safe and snug in my warm little bed, I fell asleep to the sound of wind racing by and rain pelting our wooden deck just outside my window. Bliss.

Costa Rica 35

2008-03-03T07:27:00.000-08:00

So down the steep hill we trudged. At the bottom we had to take a sharp left and traverse one of the side streets that led to the Serpentarium. It was up on top of another hill, of course. I conjectured that it was located here in case any of the inhabitants got loose. That would give the staff a bird’s eye view to locate them slithering their way down the hill.

We arrived and bought our tickets. We were told that the English language tour had just started. We hurried our butts through the little lobby and joined the tour in progress. They were really still at the beginning. The Costa Rican guide was still at the pretty chart on the wall with pictures of every known SNAKE in CR on it. The only other people on the tour were a very tall gentleman from somewhere in England with his two young boys. The guide was busy explaining how to tell the difference between poisonous and non-poisonous SNAKES at a glance. I suppose “at a glance” because he knows that most of the world’s population doesn’t stick around long enough to take a good look when encountering a SNAKE in the wild. Most people just shriek SNAKE and turn and run. Knocking over anybody in their flight path. Or is that just me?

For the curious among you, poisonous snakes have cat eyes, where the pupil is thin and vertical. Non-poisonous have round pupils, much like ours. As if anybody is going to get down on the ground and look! Also, deadly ones usually have triangular heads. The friendly to mankind ones have more rounded heads. I’ll be sure to bear that in mind next time something slithers across my path.

Ironically, just as he was telling us the oh-so-important way to tell the difference between the deadly as hell Coral snake and the not even deadly other one (notice the stripes: red next to yellow - hurt a fellow; red next to black - friend of Jack. And just who the heck is this Jack guy and why does he want to be a friend of a SNAKE?), somebody shouted to him and he went running into the actual exhibit area. Leaving us to wonder what the heck was going on. Stupidly, we followed him. We never even stopped to consider that one of the deadly monsters may have been loose or something. But it wasn’t that at all.

We found our very upset guide at the first glass enclosed display case as you enter. The one with the Coral in it. We could tell because it had red next to yellow stripes! Except this puppy was huge. But as we looked closer, we saw something strange about it. It had two tails and its’ head was located in the middle of its’ body. No, wait a second. It wasn’t one SNAKE at all. It was the king of the enclosure eating his bunk mate! Evidently there were three of them originally in the enclosure. Coral #1 overpowered and ate #3 last week. This week he had overpowered #2 and was in the process of eating him. Some kind of territorial war I presume.

The guide was very, very upset since Coral SNAKES are hard to come by. I say, Duh! Learn your lesson guys. As soon as the first one had been eaten, I would have separated them. It was at this point that the English gentleman decided that this was too much for his delicate little boys and they gracefully lied about another commitment and left. So it was just the three of us on another private tour.

So, SNAKE snack time over, we moved along to the other exhibits. I was really happy to discover that they actually had several specimens of the one SNAKE I feared most in CR. The fer-de-lance. It was hardly distinguishable from our North American Rattlesnake. The biggest difference in appearance is that it has no rattles. Thus no warning before it reaches out from its’ hiding spot in the jungle and delivers a potent dose of venom to your unsuspecting appendage. Turning your flesh to a black rot before finally reaching your heart and killing you. Plus he is notoriously evil tempered and will lash out at anything that gets too close. Just like me when I don’t get my own way.

We also saw the Green Tree Snake, several Boas, Anaconda and lots more that I can’t even remember. Having successfully erased their visage from my brain. We also saw a bunch of frogs and turtles. At the end of the tour, we were allowed free access to the exhibit and were allowed to take as many photos as we wanted. Except no flash allowed. The glass enclosures were not very well lit and were made to resemble real habitat with logs and stuff. So it was hard to even see the critters in most of the exhibits unless the guide shown his flashlight on them. Not many pictures were taken. Not many pictures would have been taken anyway I am guessing.

At the very end, we found ourselves in this little room with square glass aquariums sitting around the room on tables. They all had screens on the top with rocks on them. For some reason, one of them had a big tree branch coming out the top. B spotted it and said “Look! They have even put some stuffed Boas on that branch to make it look real!” L scurried on over for a closer look, I sort of kept my distance. Even a stuffed SNAKE is a SNAKE. But then one of them moved! Turns out that they had gotten loose from their cage. We called the curator, or maybe he came running in response to my shrieks of horror, I don’t remember which. I decided that this was not a safe place to be at all if they allowed SNAKES to just crawl around unattended. We beat a hasty retreat with me darting glances at every corner, nook and cranny!

Costa Rica 34

2008-02-29T06:43:00.000-08:00

L assured us that it was not going to be an easy walk for us to get to downtown. We were located almost at the top of the hill that descends into town before flattening out a bit to allow for stores, hotels and restaurants. He had stayed at this hotel before and had done the hike up and down this hill many times. It was only three blocks straight down this hill so we thought we could do it just fine. We picked our way down the hill, using the sidewalk whenever we could. It was in such disrepair that at times it was just easier to walk in the street. But a bit more dangerous. It appeared that the major form of transportation there was off-the-road motorcycles, or dirt bikes. Loud and powerful. With big tires. I suppose they had to in order to get around these clay hills, especially after a rain when they would sure to be slippery.

After a pleasant little lunch, we checked in at various tour agencies and booked ourselves for our next adventures. I wanted to go on a guided horseback ride here and, in fact, it was part of our itinerary. I wanted to take the eight hour ride, B and L wanted the three hour ride. Turns out that we did neither. The weather turned really cold and it started to rain while we were arguing/discussing this. Having had more than my fair share of riding in the cold and/or rain when we owned our own horses, I quickly decided we could do without this adventure….this time! So we booked our jungle walk and our jungle sky walk and returned to the hotel.

Let me tell you, going up that hill was a lot worse than coming down! If I had had a sharp knife, or probably even a dull one, I would have cut my legs off and carried them! That was to be the first and last time we attempted to climb back to the hotel. After that, it was always a taxi. I know, only three blocks. But three very steep ones. The taxi never even got out of second gear!

We had ourselves a little siesta, getting up in time to dress in warm clothes and head out for our 5 PM appointment. We were (God only knows why!) going to take the English language guided tour of the Serpentarium. Or as I affectionately call it…..SNAKES ALIVE! If you can’t wait for my account, you cn visit them here: www.snaketour.com

Costa Rica 33

2008-02-27T06:11:00.005-08:00

Here it is Friday, August 4 already! Today we were to leave La Fortuna and the incredible Volcano Arenal behind and head across the mountainous hills for Monteverde. Leaving the rain forests behind and climbing into an altitude where it changes to cloud forests.

We were to again leave early in the morning and take the much touted Jeep/Boat/Jeep transport to get there. I was looking forward to riding in a Jeep again. I sold mine over a year ago and miss it immensely. Of course, thanks to L once again, we had the needed reservations to ensure a place on this trip. Space was evidently limited. We were downstairs at the appointed hour, waiting for our ride to Lake Arenal where we would board the boat for the journey across. On the other side would be the final “Jeep” to take us on in to Monteverde.

Imagine my surprise when L informed us that it really wasn’t a Jeep that would be picking us up at all. (He has traveled this route many times before) In actuality, it was just another run of the mill mini-van. “What about on the other side?”, I asked, hope dripping from my voice. “Nope, another minivan” came the reply. I was greatly disappointed. I thought it would have been great fun to ride in a Jeep again, especially over the great hills I figured we would be going through. Evidently they used Jeeps years ago and have just never changed the brochure.

Our van pulled up to the hotel, actually a few minutes early. There were already people aboard so we waited as they loaded our luggage on top and then squeezed in. Around town we drove, from one hotel to the other, picking up more people that had booked this particular form of transportation. It was at one such stop, when nobody appeared, that the driver decided to check his manifesto. Sure enough, we were on the wrong minivan! I have no idea how that happened, but it did. So our first twenty minutes of the trip that day was just a wasted tour of the other hotels in the area. They drove us back to our hotel and off loaded our backpacks and told us to wait for the next minivan. I have no idea where the people on the minivan we were thrown out of ended up. We never saw them again.

A few minutes later another van pulled up. L insisted on seeing the manifesto to be sure that we were listed on this one before we got on. This time we were the last ones to board and there was hardly any space. We all crawled in and over the present occupants and were on our way. Thankfully, it was only about a 20 minute ride to the Lake, which is on the other side of the volcano from town.

Once our luggage was collected, we were directed to walk down a long cement causeway, much like a boat ramp, and get on the boat down there. Except there were about 15 boats moored down there. B and I just kind of looked at each other, then at L. He said not to worry, just walk down there and they would tell us what boat to get on. Sure enough, that is exactly what happened.

It was a nice boat. I had been worrying a little bit about this part of the trip. I was afraid they would try to cram us into some small fisherman type boat, which would of course tip over in the middle of the lake, sending us and all of our possessions into the water. I was overjoyed to see it was quite large and had ample room for everybody. You could even get up and walk around if you wanted to. I can’t imagine leaving the safety of your seat, but you could have. I took a “window” seat and B joined me in the “aisle” one. L sat across from us. I made careful note of where the life jackets were stored, since none were passed out!

Lake Arenal, named after the famous volcano that looms over it, is formed by the huge dam at the other end. So far away that we could not even see it. This lake provides a major percentage of electrical power for Costa Rica. Suffice it to say that it is huge. We were only crossing one small bay area of it in order to get to the mountainous, non-paved road that leads to Monteverde. The crossing was almost relaxing and certainly beautiful. The water was a nice shade of seafoam green and was surrounded by the verdant hills that ran right down to the shore of the lake. The crossing took 35 minutes.

We reached the safety of the dock and off loaded to stand around in the hot sun and wait for our van. Several vans came and went and they called out your name from a big list they had. Finally our names were called and we ran like a couple of dorks track and field stars to get a place on the small mini-van.

Except that the van was hot and crowded, it was an enjoyable ride. It was almost like being on a slow motion roller coaster. The gravel and stone road at times led us gently up the slopes and other times we seemed to be at 180 degree angle going up. Same with coming down, but with more speed! The hills here are gentle rolling things that all meet up at crazy angles to form beautiful, fertile valleys. This is the land the Quakers found in 1951 and purchased much of it for dairy farming and cheese production. Thus while traveling through this lush land, it is possible to see little villages that look like they have stopped the hand of time from touching them. And let’s not forget the cows. They are everywhere, both behind fences and grazing along the road.

We carried on like this for quite some time, stopping only long enough for the driver to have his lunch. After lunch, the road climbed noticeably higher and got worse. The dusty gravel road was behind us and we were now traveling on mostly clay, rock strewn roads. If not dodging the rocks, we were dodging the numerous potholes and wash outs. By the time we got to our hotel, 3.5 hours later, I felt like most of my internal organs had come loose from their moorings! My rib cage was sore the whole next day. I did read that there are no plans to improve this road from La Fortuna to Monteverde in the near future. The road is purposely kept in bad repair to try to cut down on the number of tourists flocking to the area. They don’t want to loose their eco-system to a bunch of inconsiderate tourists. They will, however, gladly take your dollars!

Our van pulled right up to our hotel door. We unloaded our stuff and checked into our rooms. We had a very nice room, a cabin actually, set into the side of a hill so that our private terrace was actually two floors above ground. The view was spectacular. We could see all the way across the valley below us to the Pacific Ocean! And that was quite some distance. Finally situated, we decided to walk downtown and take a look around.

Costa Rica 32

2008-02-25T13:04:00.000-08:00

Our adventures as Tarzan and Cheetah over, we made our way back to town. I remember the going was tough. It was a long way to walk anyway and I was exhausted. But a good kind of tired. It had really been a lot of fun and I could go back there everyday. I wish there was someplace like that here on the island.

After grabbing a quick lunch, we headed back to the comfort and security of our room. B and L decided to take a swim in the luxury pool included in our digs. I just couldn’t see getting all wet again. Besides, I had enough of water games for one day! Wouldn’t you know it. Just as they were about to step off the safety of the porch and head down the stairs to the pool, the heavens opened up with a typical monsoon type rain. We had not had to endure any rain the past three days and had been more than elated about that. No matter. They decided one could swim in the rain just as well. I have a great picture of them running towards the pool in the rain, all hunched over from the cold pelting them, but I am not allowed to post it! They have no sense of humor when it comes to making fun of them!

I sat on the porch, catching up on my journal and notes for this (I hope not!) long, boring ass story. They eventually tired of being wet or just plain busy and returned to the porch. We were all exhausted and decided a nice siesta was in order. I think we snoozed the snooze of the dead because when we woke up it was time for dinner!

On our way home for the hot springs last night, we passed by what looked like a really good pizzeria. A quick look in the guidebook also recommended it, so pizza it was. We walked to the main plaza, just a few blocks from the hotel, and caught a cab. Not just any cab though. I think we upset the apple cart because I would not get into the first taxi in line. I insisted on the third one. It had nothing to do with the driver being cute, but rather the car itself. I don’t remember the name of it, but it is local only to Costa Rica. A medium size boxy sort of thing. I had seen similar looking cars while in the USA last May and wanted to ride in it, just for fun. I oohed and aahed about the car all the way to the pizzeria, much to the delight of the owner/driver. Alas, he would not pull over and let me drive it though. Even though I begged liked a little boy.

We were practically the only ones in the pizza place. A really nice, big place with a huge brick oven for baking. It took awhile to get through the eight pages of gourmet pizzas before we could decide on two. Whatever happened to just plain pepperoni and cheese? It was great pizza and just what the doctor ordered.

Since the pizza place was a bit out of town, we had to have the restaurant call for a cab and had a bit of a wait. Just as we were thinking maybe we should walk back to town, a taxi pulled up. Turns out it was not the one that had been called for us, but we got in anyway, grateful for the ride!

Back at the hotel we broke out the ice, Coke and Flor de Cana and the deck of cards. We sat as long as we could on the porch, sipping Cuba Libres and playing cards. Finally the bugs chased us indoors. I was more than ready to call it a night. However, while surfing the cable TV in the room, L came across Pirates of the Caribbean. B and I had already seen it but he had not. Of course, it is such a good movie, we were drawn into it and it was another two hours before we finally turned out the lights and settled down to sleep.

All in all, a very enjoyable day off from traveling and being on a tight schedule.

Costa Rica 31

2008-02-23T05:36:00.000-08:00

A day off! No scheduled tours, no buses to catch. Free to do whatever we want. Ok, then, how do you fill the day? L told us about this amazing place just outside of town that he had discovered on one of his earlier visits. A swimming hole used mostly only by local kids. What the heck, it sounded like fun so off we went.

L had promised that it was just a “short walk” out of town. I guess he uses a different dictionary than I do. Some quick calculations later told me that the entire walk, one way, was 1.2 kilometers, or ¾ of a mile. Except that we had to walk along the side of hot tarmac road. The sun beat down unmercifully upon us as we trudged our way along. We could clearly see Volcano Arenal off to our right as we walked along. It was such a beautiful clear day that the clouds kept sweeping away from the top, exposing the peak in all of its’ glory. Except that by the time I pulled my camera from my bulky cargo shorts pocket, got it turned on and then focused, the stupid clouds would reappear and cover the peak. It was very frustrating. I finally just gave up and concentrated on the chore at hand….putting one foot in front of the other. I didn’t think we would ever get there and we were sweating like pigs by the time we got to the path that led to the pool.

And it was well worth the work. This surprising little gem is known only to the locals and a few lucky tourists. A clean, clear, fast running river cuts through the rocks and boulders before ending in a ten foot drop into a beautiful plunge pool of water. From there it meanders its’ way on into the forest over more rocks and smaller boulders before disappearing out of sight around a bend. The pool itself is about twelve foot deep. I know this from personal experience, having hit the bottom!

Off to the side, high above on the rocks, somebody has attached a very thick rope to a very thick tree. From this it is possible to swing out and drop into the pool. I quickly named this place the Tarzan Swing Pool. Many years of use by eager feet have trodden steps into the hard clay so it is possible to swing out from varying heights. The higher you go, the faster the swing out and further the drop into the water. One just had to choose their personal preferred comfort zone height, hang on tight and drop into the delightful blue pool of water. Hours of free fun. Easy, right?

I watched several local kids (ranging in age from about 6 to 15) grab onto the rope and swing out, defying gravity and death. It looked like so much fun. I even saw a guy, an American I found out later, older than myself, do it. And of course, L took several turns at it, blithely swinging out from the highest step and dropping gracefully into the water. I could see the huge grin on his face as he fell into the water. It looked like so much fun. “Mmmmm”, I thought. “I can do this!”

Up to the top step I went. Somebody had to grab the rope as it swung back from the previous swinger and hand it up to me. I grabbed on and froze. I looked out over the cliff at the water and thought, “This is way too high!” So I retreated down one step. Then another. Then the last two and ended up on the first step above the cliff edge. Ok, not too bad. I had no fear of landing in the water, I am a good swimmer and knew that I would have no problem once landed and resurfaced. Unfortunately, I took a few too many deep breaths and a few false starts, which gave absolutely everybody there a chance to stop what they were doing to watch the old guy take a swing. With everybody watching, there was no way I could chicken out, nor did I really want to. So here goes!

I definitely remember pushing off. I remember the great feeling of sailing off into space. I remember seeing the trees on the other side of the pool coming at me. I remember hanging on for too long and starting to feel myself go backwards towards the hard cliff. I let go.

I remember sensing something was wrong. I remember seeing the whole pool coming up at me…fast. Shouldn’t I just be seeing my feet heading for the water? I was maybe about ten feet away from landing when my fuzzy brain got the message that I was headed for a belly flop like no other. I remember hitting the water full force with all of my body and then going under. I don’t remember coming to the surface. I remember telling myself not to panic, even though all the wind had been knocked out of me. Somehow I was on the surface and doing a weak dog paddle for the downstream, shallow side where Bob and L had been sitting to watch my premier Tarzan Swing performance. Only they weren’t sitting anymore. They were both standing and L was swimming furiously towards me. He yelled if I was ok. I gasped that I was, even though I could hardly breathe and felt like a train had just attacked me. No way did I want my humiliation to be completed by an in pool rescue! I dragged myself up on a rock and slowly caught my breath, trying to act nonchalant for the many, many spectators watching me. Soon, however, they realized that I wasn’t dead and returned to their normal programming.

I was mortified beyond belief. The entire time we were there, I was the only one to do a belly flop. I decided that once I caught my breath, I was going to get right back on that swing and try it again! B and L thought that that was maybe not a good idea. I told them to mind their own business. Kind of rude of me after causing them so much concern. All I could think about was what a fool I must have looked.

Back up onto the cliffs I went. By this time, there was a line of people waiting for the swing. I had a chance to just watch style and techniques. And I had a chance to rethink my decision. I decided best to leave well enough alone. And it looked so damn scary now too! I decided that I would go around to where the river fell into the pool and dive off the boulders. I knew it was fairly safe because people had been doing it all day. And heck, what was a ten foot dive into unknown waters anyway!

I made my way down and around to the boulders. B and L were still sitting where I left them. As I walked out to the edge of the boulder, placing my feet just right for the push off, I looked over and saw L frantically waving and shaking his head no at me. I couldn’t figure out why he did not want me to dive from there but I trusted that he knew something that I did not. So I moved over a couple of rocks to my right, put out my arms and did my best impersonation of an Acapulco cliff diver ever. My body sliced into the water and I am sure not a splash was made, so perfect was my entry. Redeemed at last!

Except that for the time I was underwater, it was really scary. I hadn’t thought about how the water at the base of a waterfall churns and just throws you around. I did have a moment of panic down there because I could feel the tremendous force of the water wanting to just agitate me like a load of laundry and really had to fight against it to make it to the surface. Once on top, all was fine and I nonchalantly swam across the pool to where B and L were waiting, feeling quite proud of myself. I wasn’t feeling quite so smug as I received a severe tongue lashing about the dangers of diving into the base of a waterfall. Oh well, my daredevil feats for the day were over anyway.

Luckily, the batteries on my camera went dead just before I did my belly flop so there are no existing photos of it. And L had not brought his camera. I have enclosed pictures of the place, just to show you how magical it was.

More Photos

2008-02-20T06:12:00.000-08:00

The flowers in Costa Rica are so fantastic. Here's another sampling of them. Friday I will return to the story.