{"id":153,"date":"2013-08-03T17:55:29","date_gmt":"2013-08-03T17:55:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/donniemeals.net\/?p=153"},"modified":"2018-12-12T17:55:57","modified_gmt":"2018-12-12T17:55:57","slug":"above-the-clouds-and-magic-mushrooms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/donniemeals.net\/index.php\/2013\/08\/03\/above-the-clouds-and-magic-mushrooms\/","title":{"rendered":"Above The Clouds and Magic Mushrooms."},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n \t<\/i> Read Time:<\/span>6 Minute, 15 Second <\/div>\n\n <\/div>\n

27\/7 \u2013 Cecillio spent the night last night and the three of us solved all the pertinent problems of the world and detected an error in theMayan calendar. Yes, the tequila was flowing. We were none the worse this morning as we closed up the house and headed for points south. I drove for a bit with Cecillio in charge of navigation and Sharon in the back on ice chest duty. We had a slight delay near Playa Adventuras, near Akumal. Cecillio really wanted to see a buddy of his who owned El Arbolito, a roadside taco stand on the highway access. This guy likes to eat at every opportunity. We met the owner and his extended family and were then treated to\u2026 tacos. 2 hours later, we\u2019re back on the road and don\u2019t stop till we\u2019re in Chetumal. This is on the border with Belize. I was told there was an inspiring museum there that I had to visit. Though I thought the air conditioning was outstanding, we still left within a half an hour, ate on the street then headed for the nearest available hotel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

28\/7 \u2013 The trip across the base of the Yucatan peninsula is straight, flat and makes a day at the kiddy park seem spine tingling. Sharon drove most of it while I languished in the back, enjoying the a.c. with our new friend Oscar. The military guys at the last check point asked us if we would drop him off in Escarega . It was on our way and\u2026 heck, if the Mexican military asks, we comply. Under Cecillio\u2019s directions, we dropped Oscar off and then made it as far as Coatzacolcos. Somewhere along this post-Oscar path I managed to short-out our newly working a.c..<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lovely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We checked out a couple of \u201cNo-tells\u201d then grabbed dinner in the \u201cTaco District\u201d near the bus station. Once to the \u201cNo-Tell\u201d I checked for a blown a.c. fuse. As of this writing, it has proven elusive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

29\/7 \u2013 No a.c.? No problem.  Yeah, right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today we head into the mountains and search for the micro-city of Huautla.\u00a0 Huautla is a mere 50 miles away that took a full four hours to get to. If it wasn\u2019t for the speed bumps, chug-holes and random livestock, it was the 45 degree up hill climb that made for a long but beautiful white-knuckle ride. No matter how far the steep fall off the edge of the road might be, that doesn\u2019t mean there needs to be some puny guard rail between you and your fate.\u00a0 Chacha did not dig the constant uphill and decided to not go above 25 mph for the bulk of the journey. That being said, \u201cWow\u201d! What a spectacular view from up here in the nose bleed section.. Huautla is old, crooked and dirty, carved out of the side of a mountain side, near the top. Once we parked I didn\u2019t dare drive anymore. We checked into a dingy hotel right where we parked, took a quick nap, then walked \/ climbed the streets. We happened to catch a couple of entertaining basketball games in the town square. It was some sort of tournament so it was evidently \u201cthe place to be\u201d. As darkness crept over us we sauntered up to the \u201cmain\u201d street, had some tacos al pastor and were further entertained by watching a tropical storm engulf the town. One crack of lightening in particular made our little group move away from any nearby metal objects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

30\/7 \u2013 So, why Huautla? Huautla was the hometown of Maria\nSabina. She was a world famous shaman. What makes her so different from all the\nother shamans, brujos and curanderos I\u2019ve been researching? Marina Sabina used\nthe power of her so-called \u201clittle angels\u201d, and her little angels came in the\nform of psychedelic mushrooms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stop. I know what you\u2019re thinking and no, I didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Maria Sabina<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

We grabbed an early taxi to take us even further up the guardrail-less mountain to the shrine of Maria Sabina. I got a couple of great interviews and live shots of some soon-to-be hallucinating followers. After a few hours in the magic kingdom we roller-coastered back down to town and ate lunch. We loaded into Chacha, released the emergency brake and never touched the accelerator till we were two hours and several thousand feet lower in altitude. We found a bar at the bottom of the mountain so I could let Chacha get the feeling back in her brakes. Sharon took over driving and got us to the outskirts of Puebla. We happened to pass the ADO, (Mexican Greyhound Bus).\u00a0 Cecillio asked if we would stop by it . He emerged with a one-way ticket toAcapulco in hand for a bus that left in two hours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Well, this was a surprise. He basically explained that business called and that he needed to part company so he could handle blah, blah, blah, etc. We found our hotel, invited him up so he could freshen up before his long bus ride. After the obligatory tequila toast to a journey well traveled, he quickly disappeared in a Puebla taxi. Sharon and I had a quick bite at the hotel restaurant and soon after we snored in perfect two-part harmony.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

31\/7 \u2013 I don\u2019t know about y\u2019all but we felt pretty tired from all the previously mentioned driving so we slept in till practically noon. I shuffled out to the lobby, booked another night and went back to bed. We\u2019ve been to Puebla before and didn\u2019t feel the need to re-explore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

1\/8 -After 20+ hours of rest, we got up and out pretty early. I made the Puebla rush hour my play toy and we quickly found our way intoTlaxcala, yet another gorgeous colonial town. We checked out a couple of historic cathedrals, had a cappuccino on the square then headed north. The scenery north of here is outstanding and we are still at a pretty high altitude. After this we somehow found our way back to Tampico, caught a few street tacos and off to slumber land.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2\/8 \u2013 We bounced out of bed fairly early and decided to get on the road\u2026 and, well, that was about it. We thought we knew exactly how to leaveTampico. Unfortunately we didn\u2019t let each other in on our individual plans.\u00a0 After a number of turns and miscalculations, we ended up on the road toVictoria, Mx. That was not in our plans but, what the heck. We scooted past on the outskirts of Victoria and found ourselves in 5 o\u2019clock rush hour in Monterrey.\u00a0 Not fun. We knew there were hotels on the way to the Monterrey airport, so\u2026 seemed like a simple plan to seek them out. Except for the driving part.\u00a0 Before anyone suspected, we were \u00bc of the way to Nuevo Laredo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

3\/8 \u2013 We got to Nuevo Laredo right at sundown, headed for a nice restaurant we were familiar with, slammed a couple of Cuba Libres and\u2026 the rest is a blur. Not from the rum but from the looooong day of driving. However, today? Piece-o-cake. Got our \u201cTurista\u201d sticker removed, hustled out of town to the Colombia bridge and \u201cTa-da\u201d we\u2019re back safe, somewhat sound and in search of Whataburger, no beans.<\/p>\n

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27\/7 \u2013 Cecillio spent the night last night and the three of us solved all the pertinent problems of the world and detected an error in theMayan calendar. Yes, the tequila was flowing. We were none the worse this morning as we closed up the house and headed for points Continue Reading<\/i><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/donniemeals.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/donniemeals.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/donniemeals.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/donniemeals.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/donniemeals.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=153"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/donniemeals.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":155,"href":"https:\/\/donniemeals.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153\/revisions\/155"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/donniemeals.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/donniemeals.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/donniemeals.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}