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Dec 13
A hotel room that is two story, bedroom upstairs, seating room below. Sounds cool, right? Yeah, so did we. Welcome to Morelia, where if you need to go to the restroom in the middle of the night be prepared for alot of groping. What they got wrong was the placement of the TV and the bathroom. From the sitting room you can watch the bathroom and visa versa.
This is the capitol of Michoacán, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Beautiful cathedrals and cobblestone streets. Once we settled the bathroom/TV paradox we walked down the street to their aqueduct and “The Steet for Lovers”. That’s a narrow walking alley with no supervision. Add a movie and you’ve got a drive-in theater. No one watches the movie.
Dec 14
Sharon had heard of the latest Morelia craze; Gazpacho. No, it is not cold soup. It’s finely diced fruit heaped high in a cup that you add chamoy, cheese, orange juice, salty lucas, and lord knows what else. We opted for just some lime juice. That said it was a great way to start the morning. Gazpacho in hand we walked towards the Morelia Candy Market. Stall after stall of diabetes just waiting to introduce itself. Still, we bought a fair amount for an upcoming new years eve party in Acapulco. And for some odd reason we stumbled across a bike parts store with great prices on bike seats. So we bought a couple of those too! Candy and bike seats. Yep. If you’re gonna eat Mexican candies you better get your butt on that bike and work it off.
Dec 15
It was another gazpacho morning. We gazpacho’d towards the Morelia Zoo. After a number of blocks we opted to catch a collectivo (bus) to whatever location in the city. When it comes to collectivos you need to look at their windshield as it approaches. If you don’t see a location near where you want to go, you wait for the next one. For us it’s a great way to rub elbows with the locals. Literally, elbows and other body parts weather you want to or not. One guy got to know me a little too well but Sharon seemed to be really enjoying the ride.
Riding a not-so-crowded “collectivo”.
We stayed on the bus quite a while and ended up at Morelia’s ritzy mall atop a steep hill overlooking the city. We’re not mall people. However, we got to look at lots of stuff we had no intention of spending pesos on. We did get some nice refreshing cocktails at one of the mall’s restaurants. It was new, quite posh and best of all served 3oz shots along with fancy purple chicharon with guacamole and blue chips.
We taxied back to centro. Earlier we purchased tickets to what looked like a fancy shmancy show. This was a first for us. It was a fusion of traditional Mexican Christmas songs with stunning live music and Cirque de Soleil type acrobatics. !Fabuloso! Simply flawless singing and performing.
Dec 16
Gazpacho breakfast day three. Let’s be as lazy as our breakfast selections. Walk around a bit and watch the protest of the day. Today it was teachers.
Dec 17
We got up SUPER early, like 5:30am, to find morning coffee. Why? It’s another first for us. We actually booked a private tour to see the sanctuary of the monarch butterflies. Our guide Rodrigo picked us up at 6:30 for the 3 hour drive to far east Michoacán. After the drive it was a good hour hike into the mountains. Along the trail there was a fair amount of ice from the previous night’s sleet storm. Rodrigo was an awesome guide and plenty chatty. He knew plenty of history and had knowledge of flora and fauna. Have a question? He had an answer.
At one point we had to stop. You can only get so close to the massive clusters of butterflies. Then you look down at the trail. It’s littered with thousands of butterflies that didn’t make it to the butterfly herd before they got too cold and wet. Rodrigo, Sharon and I turned our hike into a rescue mission, one by one placing the butterflies on nearby branches. We felt like our hike made everything sustainable. But the hike back? That sucked. 90% uphill.
Back in town, Sharon and I had a delightful dinner on the square at a place called Lu that Rodrigo suggested. We later went back to the two-story hotel room but returned to the streets around 10pm. It was a great little walk as we witnessed the city winding down.
Dec 18
We exited Morelia early and made our way to Puebla. The drive was a highlight of traffic jams and crashed 18 wheelers. We’ve seen a number of ghastly big rig crash sites on this journey. Once we settled in Puebla we taxied to centro and mingled with the locals.
Dec 19
After breakfast we drove back into centro. This city’s central downtown is a frantic buzz of activity. The markets spill into the streets for many blocks. Thankfully we parked well away from the district. Most of this day we walked the markets of meat, fish and veggies. I’ll make a separate posting of photos from that later. It won’t be for the faint of heart.
needed this. brings a smile while on break from work. pics says it all. thanks merry christmas mi amigos & a great whoop whoop new year. take a couple of shots of tasty great tequila for me.
Currently in Oaxaca… so it’s Mezcal.
Entertaining as always. Looks like you got up close and personal with what you eat in your tamales. The blue chips and walk a moly looks good. Too lazy to go back and change that. All right guys, be safe and merry Christmas.
I really enjoyed to be part of your journey through Michoacan, specially at the Monarch Butterfly Reserve. I hope we can meet again in the future so you, Sharon and Me can live many more interesting adventures. It was a pleasure to meet you both!