With a long weekend thanks to Mexican Constitution Day (Feb 5th for everyone that is keeping track of important Mexican holidays.....Benito Juarez´s birthday is next on the 21st of March), I headed up to visit some other volunteers in Ciudad Valles in the state of San Luis PotosÃ, only a short 12 hour overnite bus ride away. Saturday was international wetlands day so I tagged along with the volunteers and their SEMARNAT office to a cienaga (big wetland basically) in the Huasteca region for a trash clean up and small get together with the local community. This area is the heart of sugar cane production in Mexico. There are sugar can fields as far as the eye can see and the road out to the cienaga had tons of trucks laden with cut sugar cane to be processed. It’s definitely a little warmer in this area than Puebla (and much more humid). In the summers, the highest temps in Mexico have been recorded here, over 130°F…..thankfully Puebla maxs out in the 90s in the summer!
Sunday we headed to a town about 2 hours away called Xilitla, although technically we never made it into town, only to Las Pozas. Las Pozas is a hard place to describe because I’ve never quite seen anything like it. It is basically a garden of concrete structures created along a series of waterfalls and pools (poza means pool) and was constructed in the 1940s by a Brit named Edward James. A place like this would never be open to the public in the US as there are narrow staircases without railings 2 stories above the ground and all sorts of other lawsuits just waiting to happen. It’s set in lush tropical vegetation and everywhere you turn there is another strange structure, arch, gate, sculpture, or staircase just waiting to be explored. These pictures do not do it justice at all, but they give you an idea of what it was like.
We got back Sunday night just in time to watch the superbowl with Spanish commentary. The only unfortunate thing was that Mexico does not get the normal superbowl commercials….oh well. Monday I bummed around Ciudad Valles, saw a bull in a pick-up truck, explored the market, made some excellent guacamole, and then started the journey back to Puebla by heading to Tampico. Unfortunately, upon my arrival in Tampico, the bus to Puebla was sold out, no fear though there was another at 9 pm that would get me into Puebla at 6am, in time to shower and go to work, right?...wrong. Got stuck on the high way somewhere in Veracruz for quite a while so I didn’t actually get back to the bus station in Puebla until 7:30. With the gynormous line at the taxi stand, I opted for the city bus at the height of morning rush hour and arrived at my house at 8:20, to find my host mom in the shower. 5 min later and I was out the door, unshowered, but ready for a great day at the office. All well worth it for the weekend.
Many of you have asked about my apartment status. I think I now have a place and hopefully should be moving in at the end of the week, more to come on that as I get some more details.
