¿Te gustan los toros?” asked eleven-year-old Maggie. Her eyes scanned my face looking for a yes. Did I like the bulls? A bullfight? I flinched at the thought. Earlier during the week, I’d jumped at my young friend’s invitations to enjoy all events at La Fiesta de Virgen de Guadalupe. But now, visions of bloody bulls […]
Continue Reading
As the evening mass ended, the huge colonial doors of Santa Maria Magdalena swung open. People swarmed down the church stairs into the plaza. I moved along with the crowd to a wrought iron bench. The small town plaza was alive with color and movement. Shadows flickered across the white curlicues on the kiosko or bandstand. Lights […]
Continue Reading
Gold-colored walls line the main street through Santa María del Oro, Nayarit. Bumping along the cobblestones in our camper-van, we are following in the footsteps of the Spanish conquistadors. In 1504, the nephew of Hernán Cortés, Franciso Cortés de San Buenaventura came here, in search of gold. In 1530, the renegade conquistador, Nuño Beltrán de […]
Continue Reading
Ahhhh. Oohhh. Awww. Mmmmmm.” These are the sounds most often heard as bathers first step into a warm mineral pool. More and more North Americans are discovering the pleasures and benefits of soaking in mineral baths, as they seek cures for rheumatism, arthritis, and a multitude of other ailments. But the Mexicans have known the […]
Continue Reading
Moctezuma ordered his special chair. Pedro Páramo, in Juan Rulfo’s award winning novel sat upon one. Both men enjoyed equipales, the rustic leather furniture found everywhere in Mexico. Equipales are still hand-manufactured in many parts of the country. However in Zacoalco de Torres, a small town south of Guadalajara, the tradition dates back to Pre-Hispanic times. By the […]
Continue Reading
Chapala, el mayor lago natural de México está muriendo. En este tiempo el lago juega un papel vital en un gigantesco ecosistema, la cuenca hidrológica del río Lerma – lago Chapala, que incluye a más de 8 millones de personas, 3,500 de industrias diversas, 750,000 hectáreas de tierras de riego y 14 ciudades con poblaciones […]
Continue Reading(Este artículo apareció por primera vez en Ron Mader’s Eco Travels (www.planeta.com) Un desierto cuya inmensidad bordea montañas con aspecto de cráteres, donde abundan aereolitos esparcidos en sus alrededores, asi como el recuerdo de un cohete espacial que cayó en su árido territorio, hacen de la misteriosa Zona del Silencio, en el norte del país […]
Continue Reading
Orquídea. La sola palabra conjura todo aquello que es bello, exótico, raro. Un aura de fascinación ha rodeado siempre a esta extraordinaria familia de plantas. Su cultivo se considera algo esotérico y difícil. Nada más alejado de la verdad. En un clima como el que disfrutamos en Guadalajara y sus alrededores, mantener una sana y […]
Continue ReadingIt’s just a short run to the Third World. Twenty five miles in fact. That’s how far it is from Deming, New Mexico to Palomas, Mexico. Deming sits quietly along Interstate 10, fifty miles from Las Cruces and about a hundred miles south of Tucson, Arizona. In fact Deming’s claim to fame is that it […]
Continue Reading
The biggest attraction on my most recent Baja to-do list was a visit to Mission San Francisco Javier De Vigge-Biundo, or simply, San Javier. Located via a 2.5 hr drive from Loreto, BCS, this mission is well worth the trip. Founded in 1699, this mission is the best-preserved in Baja. I was surprised to find […]
Continue Reading