From the outside, this bullring resembles nothing so much as a red erector-set construction but inside, it is a concrete-stepped cone funneling down to the sand, on which are painted two white rings, one inside the other. Entering the arena, your bags are searched to make sure there are no bottles to throw at the picadores, or […]
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Cogan’s Reviews This one is a little different from your usual travel adventure in that the people involved set out with the definite intention of “roughing it.” And they seem such an unlikely pair. They are Michael Humfreville and his newly-wed wife, Mary Ann. The two were married in California in 1973. Both were employees […]
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Sometimes in the evenings, after the sun has set behind the monolith that towers over the small village of San Sebastián Bernal, ánimas, or restless souls who sleep in the small graveyard near the old chapel, rise up and move silently through the quiet streets. The ánimas mean no harm. They are just continuing their daily round – what […]
Continue ReadingYou can stop looking for paradise. It’s only 5 hours south of the Texas/Mexico border at McAllen or Brownsville. Most guidebooks dismiss the Gulf Coast uninteresting. They couldn’t be more wrong. El Paraiso Resort at Barra del Tordo, Tamaulipas is an ecological cornucopia. To get there, drive down Hwy 97 or 101 to Hwy 180 […]
Continue ReadingCogan’s Reviews Where the Sky is Born: Living in the Land of the Maya by Jeanine Lee Kitchel Enchanted Island Press, Hawaii, 2004 Paperback, 217 pages Available from Amazon Books: Paperback And also on Kindle from Amazon.com at $9.99 Here’s another of those ‘coming to Mexico to live’ books – but with a difference. It’s not concerned with […]
Continue ReadingI am nearly 55 years old. In the culture of the United States, where the desired ones, the members of the “In” crowd are YOUNG, I am not sure I would have just blurted out that information. If I had been seriously trying or needing to hide my age, I might have missed a wonderful […]
Continue ReadingOften, after visitors have been here a short time, I hear them comment on how kind and accepting the Mexicans in the villages along the shores of Lake Chapala are to of the foreigners who have invaded their villages and neighborhoods. For years, I have accepted this is just the way it is in this […]
Continue ReadingBy mid-October, everything was done, I was packed and ready to leave. I placed the cat carrier on the front seat, hugged my friends as they warned me again that I would surely be raped and pillaged, climbed behind the wheel and began my trek to my new life in Mexico. This trip had actually […]
Continue ReadingMexico is a noisy place. Unless your cave is very high up the mountain, far beyond human habitation, noise is an integral part of your life. Certain kinds of noises are universal, occurring with equal frequency and comparable decibel levels in both urban and rural locations. The chief among them is church bells, which ring […]
Continue ReadingSpring fever got to Jerezano in early May of 2001. In that weakened condition the new car bug stung and stung hard. Jerezano mused to himself, “It’s time I got a new car.” Zang went the stinger: “My old one is being beaten to death on these Mexican roads, the shocks are gone, the electrical […]
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