Dolores Hidalgo

We keep coming back to Dolores Hidalgo. The town is so tranquil and lovely; I completely disagree with the Lonely Planet Guidebook representation. We had contemplated staying the night in Guanajuato, but after making multiple trips to Dolores, decided we’d spend a hotel night here. We’re currently at the best hotel in town, right on the plaza, have a King, a double and a twin with two balconies for 500 pesos. All rooms face an inner courtyard that has been converted into a restaurant and the third floor is a terrace bar and restaurant. This is the first town we’ve been to that I could definitely consider living in. Very few gringos, a very real town and the few hotels that exist cater to vacationing Mexicans (as this town is something of a pilgrimage site to Mexicans).

It has been so lovely to visit the town; we went to our favorite eating place in the municipal market and had yet another wonderful meal. Ninety five pesos for six quesadillas, five hot shredded pork (and many other ingredients) sandwiches, seven glasses of jamaica. Absolutely the most food we’ve gotten for that amount of money.

The kids made fast friends of a local family (and their kids) and we talked til sunset about families, life in the US and life in Mexico. The kids were so sad to find that their friends didn’t spend the night in the plaza waiting for them to return this morning.

But the best thing about staying in a hotel in town? Jamie is enjoying Tour coverage via one of the ESPN stations. He now realizes that he could have been watching it all along if he’d taken my advice and asked the restaurant next to our camping spot if they carried ESPN International. (they do)
Jesse had an amazing birthday. Pike was absolutely certain that Jesse would get absolutely NO presents and it would be a horrid day. We started the day with a release of the toys (the boys enormous quantities of toys have been in isolation for a couple weeks) and Jesse said that was the best present he could hope to get. He and Pike spent hours playing with their long lost toys and stuffed animals. We then headed to la Bodega (a giant superstore) that he wanted to visit and got a few presents. Much earlier in the day he had asked if Mexico had anything like “The Jungle” (a playarea we used to go to in the Bay Area) and I told him no. Believe it or not, as we left the Bodega store, and I took a different route to avoid some toys that were keeping Ellen captive, we found a “Jungle” like place. Simply amazing. So, I bought socks (just like at the Jungle ) and they played for an hour.

We had dinner at the restaurant and I snuck a cake and candles in earlier, so Jesse was enormously surprised to have a cake brought from the kitchen to finish the meal. Both he and Pike admitted that it we pulled out a wonderful birthday.

Dolores Hidalgo is the birthplace of the Mexican Independence (from Spain) movement and the entire town is steeped in history. It is quite colonial and the town square (and surrounding area) has beautifully painted homes and businesses. The boys and I headed out and explored the area and found a second municipal market and made some purchases. Jesse must have smelled this dulceria. A dulceria is a sweet shop, but on a grand scale. Generally, almost all items for sale are bulk quantities. It is simply a wonderland for the kids. In this last picture, note the flavors of ice cream.

Le Tour frustrations

If you don’t recognize “Le Tour” you might want to skip this one too…

We have been desperately trying to find Le Tour on TV Azteca. According to the official Tour website, Mexico (which for some reason known only to the French resides on the continent of South America) is supposed to carry Le Tour on TV Azteca. We haven’t been able to find it yet, have no Internet access (Velosport provides stage text coverage the last 3 hours of a stage) and are searching for a bar or cantina or restaurant with ESPN International (which is supposed to carry live coverage). Postings on the Velosport forum, emails to TV Azteca, Velosport and OLN and screaming to the winds have produced no results. Looking at the date, I realize that a holiday is in the works. One year ago, people from all over Mexico marched on DF demanding a decrease in kidnappings, violence, murder and violence against politicians. July 2nd was the anniversary of this march and celebrations commerating the decrease in violence were planned. Course, I gathered all this from the news and could be wrong on some points.

Me thinks that there might be another celebration happening north of the border, but why ANYONE would design to leave the comfort of their cable TV while Le Tour is on is beyond me. We watch no TV other than the month of July (Le Tour) and September (Giro de España). When we lived in a stick house (that’s how RV’ers refer to houses that aren’t on wheels; aren’t I so With the LINGO?) I would order cable TV once a year and take advantage of free installation and 3 months 1/2 price and then once the Giro was over the cable was turned off. Ten years of that and the cable company never once refused. They too must have understood the NEED for Tour coverage.

Eleven years ago, I was washing dishes in the teeny tiny kitchen of our first home (rental). The kitchen was so incredibly tiny that only one person could walk into it at a time. Of course, Jamie was watching Le Tour on TV. All of a sudden I felt a gush (you might want to excuse yourself from this one also; I can’t seem to let go of bodily fluids today…) and wondered if I’d just peed on myself. I was 9 months pregnant and due in two weeks. I wandered into the bathroom (well, more like waddled with my legs pressed tightly together; quite a feat when you’re so off balance by the enormous protrusion on your belly, that you are likely to fall over in a light wind) and waited. It didn’t take long to realize that it was not pee but my bag of waters.  While only 15% of pregnant women actually break their water before labor, I managed to achieve that feat in 3 out of 4 pregnancies.

Anyway, this being our first, Jamie bounded out of his chair and began running about the tiny little house in circles (which was much harder than it sounds due to the size of the place) discarding ideas of what to do as soon as they entered his head. I calmly sat and waited for the frenzy to stop. We found paper and pen and waited for the contractions to start so we’d have something to time. Surely we would have SOMETHING to time, no? We called the doctor (our first was born in hospital) and were told to come immediately to hospital. We decided to wait until we could wait no longer. My contractions began every 15 minutes and were, within the hour, at every 2 minutes. This didn’t seem to fit the textbook model and we were certain that delivery was eminent as the books indicated 2 minutes apart was “GO time”. We hastily called off picnic plans and rushed to the hospital, certain that I would likely deliver in the car. The contractions stayed this way the entire labor. Two minutes apart; they were exhausting and terrible.


Some 15 hours later, after declining multiple offers of narcotics and then finally succumbing, I pushed out the tineyest little monster I ever saw. Pictures show me reaching for him immediately after he emerged though I don’t remember. He nursed only a couple minutes at a time every four minutes and I was certain he was underfed. He was a skinny, scrawny little minute. To this day, he eats the least of all of us. Even the 3yo, who subsists mainly on air, eats more than he does. He is maturing into a wonderful boy who has absolutely no problem being constantly taken for a girl here in Mexico. He is very much like me; he constantly questions authority and any decision made. He is very confident and a very healthy self-esteem. Were it possible, he would start each day with a five gallon container of sugar and work on it all day long. He is my first, my guinea pig, my ray of light and my best effort. I could not have hoped for a better child to challenge my assumptions and teach me the ways of the world.

Much more pictures later, but it has taken 17 minutes just to get this one uploaded. Ugh.

house of poop

No, not Pooh, but poop. Might want to skip today’s entry. Seriously. Might want to just pretend it isn’t there and give it the ole drive-by. Can’t say you haven’t been warned. With 4 kids under 11, poop is still very much on the daily radar.

The past two days we’ve been assisting Ellen with her battle against poop. She has a tendency to withold, but her diet is usually full of enough whole grains, raw vegetables and fruit that it isn’t an issue. Lately, her diet has been comprised of pan dulce (lard and white flour and sugar), cow’s milk yogurt (in the states, the kids never drank cow’s milk, but instead rice milk), more pan dulce, cheese, chorizo and a little pan dulce on the side.

So, it had been EIGHT DAYS since movement has occurred. Southerly movement. Her mood has deteriorated with the lack of movement; something we realized only after movement had been achieved. We began with a bottle, and entire bottle of prune juice. She has had prunes almost daily, but apparently not enough. We spend entire days concentrated on the problem of movement and yesterday achieved a measure of success. We resorted to threats (though not empty ones) of needing “medicine” (suppositories) which she then decided she wanted. It took three seperate attempts for her to accept the “medicine”. The first two were accompained with such screaming that I was certain she was allergic to the glygerine. After the first two attempts, some movement was achieved and after the third, she didn’t even realize the medicine had achieved it’s station and was skipping and playing about. The other threat (though not empty) was that of the “doctor”. If we hadn’t been able to achieve success with food, we then planned to resort to the “medicine” and if that either did not work or she refused, we would have been forced to visit a doctor. She’s never been to one in her life so I’m not sure where the terror lies, but she definitely Does Not Want To Go To The Doctor. I tried to re-assure her, but it is fixed pretty well in her mind that the doctor is not a happy place. We’re going to have to work on that in the event that someday she WILL have to go…

So today we’re on day three of the war against her witholdings. Yesterday she ate well for the first time in memory. Broccoli, prunes, brown rice, chorizo and cantelope for lunch; broccoli, brown rice, ham, prunes and cantelope for dinner. She has been a much happier girl but we still have a long road ahead. Breakfast today was oatmeal with sugar, cantelope, prunes and mango. Lots of water in-between. I’ve always tried to honor the kids’ own hunger and thrist, but the last two days I’ve been insisiting on prunes and water. She ate every bite she took for lunch and dinner; the best she’s eaten in over two weeks. Ever since Jamie got over Typhoid, he has been addicted to a type of “noodle soup”, a Ramen type of “soup”. He eats it for lunch and dinner and eats pretty much nothing else. As such, the kids want the same and think this is where the downfall began. She is somewhat prone to constipation and I think the solitary diet of “noodle soup” exceberated the problem. So Jamie is on the wagon. He’s starting to eat real food again too. 

Still in Queretaro

We’ve been talking about the Death Penalty, Texas vs. California legal system, 3-strikes, Mayan curses and kharma for hours. I’ve had a 48 hour fever and Pike had the same but it only lasted 24 hours. No other symptoms other than wicked aches and headache. Pike seems to have recovered well but I’m still wondering. Our appetites haven’t completely recovered and Typhoid is always in the back of our minds. Ever since Jamie got Typhoid he has been terrified any time that someone mentions an upset stomach.

We haven’t done much the past few days; I’ve been in bed for two of them and Pike was in bed all day yesterday. We are really loving this area; there is a small town up the road from us, Santa Rosa J and it has an absolutely gorgeous celeste-colored bell tower on it’s church. I think they are tiles. Against the mountains it is incredible. The town seems to specialize in carnitas; the entire main street is covered with one after another. We found a different type of tortilla there; the tortilla is made (in front of you) with queso in the middle and then fried as you wait. Ellen and Sissy could not eat enough of them. Next time we head into town I’ll have to take some pictures. The town is small enough that it doesn’t count with a supermarket and I didn’t see one abarrote, but did find a wonderful agua purificada store. We took our garrafónes of Electropura and Crystal and had them filled there for less than 1/2 the price of the water at San Miguel’s Gigante.

We found the Costco in Ceyala (or is it Celaya? I ALWAYS get it mixed up) and also found it is appartently the cajeta source for Mexico. Fabrica after fabrica of cajeta, but we’ll remember it for Costco. I ordered my contacts and they’ll be there by the beginning of next week; meanwhile we still have a LOT to occupy us here. Guanajuato, San Miguel (Jamie has changed his mind and LOVES the town), Santa Rosa, lots of balnearios in the immediate area and three in San Juan del Rio (about 60km from here); it is a wonder that we’ll be able to leave, but then again, we’re not thinking about it. The boys are desperate to be with Andrew and Sissy and Ellen miss Sara, Becky and Catie (and Aunty Chris) desperately, but Mom and Dad are in no hurry. The kids are really enjoying the area also. They LOVE Guanajuato and we found a wonderful playground/park in San Miguel that we go to each time we visit. Jamie rides almost every day and we found the station that broadcasts Le Tour (TV Azteca) so we might find it hard to find a reason to leave. Oh, and I got a year’s worth of vehicle insurance, so we’re sitting pretty.

We did, however, receive a solicitation to caretake some property in the Ozarks; a ranch with horses and the girls are drooling at the prospect. Not sure how we’d fit that into visiting Drew et. al., but I’m sure we’d figure something out.


We got electricity today; our nightly bill goes up to 70 pesos/night (from 40) but buying gas for the generator was costing about 27 pesos every two nights and we’ll be able to use electricity any time now. The kids really balk at turning lights off.

I heard something on the news yesterday about a tropical storm Fred hitting Veracruz and another headed towards Guerrero and other Pacific states. There is simply nothing on the TV news about it so we hope to get to an Internet café and see what we can find out. Luckilly we’re very much inland and should not be bothered by any hurricanes or storms, though we did get some much needed rain last night.

It is absolutely luxurious having full hookups; water, sewer and electricity. Amazing to flush the toliet with the toliet instead of a bucket and wash in the sink. The girls are looking forward to a bath tonight and Jamie and I may even SHOWER!!! The shower at the hotel, well, lets just say it leaves a LOT to be desired. There is water and it is hot, but it trickles out miserly making the shower experience somewhat frustrating and lacking.

I’ll have to post some pictures later… Pictures are of Santa Rosa Juagerui (something like that) and our second favorite town in the area.

Guanajuato

Yesterday we drove to Guanajuato. Today I hope to purchase a new vehicle insurance policy because there is absolutely NO WAY we can leave this area. Due to the way that we drove through the mainland, Morelia “feels” so far away but is actually within a short day’s drive from here. It is so hard to believe; we have done so many months of traveling and are almost in the same area we started.

We chose a route that was a “yellow” road - supposed to be secondary to the slow and circuitous “red” libre roads. We found that after Dolores Hidalgo, it was actually a better road than the “red” road. We drove down around a dammed river making Presa Ignacio Allende. Not a pretty looking water, but with the surrounding area and sky it was magnificient. Jamie was driving (for the first time in Mexico) and it was wonderful to take in the scenery and shoot photos. The landscape was incredibly reminiscient of the wine country of California and we felt absolutely at home. It was a good and wide road and we were quickly at the outskirts of Guanajuato.

It was SO nice not to lug the trailer through an unfamiliar town; even more so as this town is notorious for its narrow cobblestone streets. There are even signs for urban buses in town directing them around narrow areas. The town looks to have a sort of medieval wall surrounding parts of it but it could simply be old walls protecting it from the now dry riverbed. There was a horrible flood in 1905 and afterwards the river was diverted.

This town is simply indescribable. While San Miguel de Allende is an absolutely gorgeous town, it feels like a Hollywood representation of Guanajuato. Guanajuato is real. Peeling paint and dirt but homes clinging to hillsides and “streets” almost too narrow to pass through with a large backpack. In the touristy part of town the callones (little streets) are clean and bright. We parked by the railroad station (this is the first town we’ve found with parking lots - and they are necessary as most exploration must be done on foot) and headed to a lovely park we’d seen earlier. There was a festival going on - the fiesta de San Juan and plants, flowers and all things horticultural were for sale. The kids found some swings and I was able to bribe them away with their first snowcones. I had tamarindo flavor and everyone else had fresa (strawberry). Just not adventurous enough for the vanilla or limon. Later, we had aguas frescas (not sure how to translate this, but most are a kind of tea but with fruit sometimes) and everyone had fresa and I had tamarindo. They had alfalfa available, but I wasn’t adventurous enough.

We eventually wound our way around the to municipal market and were rewarded with a wonderful clean mercado. We found the larges guayabas we’ve seen yet in Mexico and of course, had to get some. Strawberries are grown locally and we got some of those too. First time since Baja that they’ve been reasonable enough to purchase. The same fruit stand had lovely nectarines but coming from California, they were 30 pesos/kilo (for California, reasonsable price but for Mexico, HIGH on the chart). I rarely pay more than 20 pesos/kilo for any fruit and most is around 10 pesos/kilo. That way, we are always eating in season. We bought lots of little goodies for the kids, some borrachines (liquor candy and it was STRONG) for Jamie and me and wandered and wandered until it was soon almost 7pm.

We stopped for dinner at a downtown taqueria and paid 101 pesos for 7 glasses of agua fresca, 14 tacos, 1 burrito and 1 quesadilla. Cheapest yet. We’ve decided to stay in the area for another week, I’ll order contacts from Costco in Ceyala, we’ll stay in a downtown hotel in Guanajuato for a couple nights, we’ll explore the area more, I’ll stay FAR AWAY from the fabricas of Talavera pottery (NOT!) and Jamie will ride and ride the beautiful mountains. We’ll then head to San Luis Potosi and spend a few nights there and then to Zacatecas. Not sure how long we’ll be in Zacatecas but it shouldn’t matter as the next vehicle policy we get will be a YEAR long one. Not making a short time mistake again.  It will also cover us when we come back next winter.

Today we were going to visit some local balnearios but the kids have really needed a long morning just playing and not going anywhere, so Jamie is riding and we’ll meet him in San Miguel de Allende. I’m taking the opportunity to copy “A Short History of the World” and “Tom Sawyer” to CD and then to tape for traveling.

Life at a slower pace

You know how some words in another language work so much better than your own? Right now I’m stuck on “intregar”. I don’t know the translation but I know how I use it and I know how it is used. It means something like “give over” or “hand in” or something. We buy our drinking water in garrafones. They are about 5gal (19 litre) water containers. You buy the rafon and then whenever you need more water, return the rafon and simply pay for the liquid. In Baja, you take your rafon to the water purification store and they’ll fill it up or you can go to a super or an abbarote and simply exchange for a full one and pay only the water charge. Here on the mainland you find that different areas have different brands of water. It is almost impossible to find a brand of water that is universal to the country, so you can’t exchange your rafon for the brand the store carries. You have to buy the liquid and then pour from the store’s rafon to yours. Right now we have Crystal and Electropura brand garrafones.

 Yesterday I intreged (Spanglish) my garrafon and got the other groceries and at the checkout said I wanted one rafon of Ciel. That’s all they sell. The clerk told me that I should have received a boleto when I intreged my rafon. So, leaving the groceries with the bagboy, I headed outside, back in and to the paqueteria where I was told that I needed to buy both a garrafon and the water as they don’t sell Electropura. Telling her that I was simply going to pour the liquid from their Ciel containter to my Electropura didn’t help. So back I schlep to the cashier, buy the garrafon and liquid, back outside to the entrance and to the paqueteria to collect the rafon, then back to the cashier where the Ciel is sold, pour the Ciel into my Electropura rafon and back to the paqueteria to collect my 54 peso deposit on the Ciel garrafon. And that was for only 5 gallons.  Sometimes I really miss Baja…

The kids are growing like weeds. Ellen is growing out of her pants that fit her 6 months ago, both Jesse and Pike not only find that their pant waists don’t close but the shoes that fit them 6 months ago are too small. They’ve been in sandals since February and haven’t needed shoes until we hit the cool of the mountains. The mountains are so much cooler than the Yucatan and from what we hear, the Pacific and Gulf coasts. I’d completely forgotten about the humidity until Jamie reminded me the other day - there is simply no humidity here. It is amazing not to be sticky and wet All Day Long.

Sissy’s hair is getting long and curly, Ellen’s stays about the same and Jesse’s is getting nice and long. Pike likes his very short and if I don’t cut it quickly enough, he and his brother LOVE to cut their own bangs. Drives Jamie absolutely insane as the cut is anything but straight, but as far as I’m concerned, it is THEIR hair. Everyone here takes Pike and Jesse for girls; Pike has an earring and Jesse has long hair. Never mind HOW they’re dressed, earring=girl and Jesse’s long blond hair=girl. I am always asked numerous times, as if they think I don’t understand or am making a mistake, if I’m SURE they’re boys. Yup. Changed their diapers for years. Absolutely positive. Course, that’s not what I say.

I’m becoming taken for someone from Spain. I’m thinking it is my Argentine accent because everyone recognizes the kids as gueras (blond/blue eyed) and as such, foreigners, but my Spanish throws them off. I’m called a guera in markets even though my hair is not blond but quite brown. It must be the 3 little true gueras that accompany me. I always point out my morenita, Sissy but her hair is getting very sun-streaked and is almost turning blond on the top. The kids are about as brown as the kids here due to the sun they took in the Yucatan. That’s another giveaway; no true guera would be so brown here.

The girls have been in a huge drawing phase; mostly horses, but some depictions of stuff they’ve seen in museums. Right now, Ellen is drawing bones covered with dirt (which she saw at Teotihuacan). Pike LOVES to draw pyramids and asks us to take specific pictures of specific pyramids so he can make a drawing from it later. Makes all the markers on bodies, walls and cushions worth it. Well, almost.

All the photos are from the drive to Guanajuato and of the town itself. Simply amazing!

Queretaro y San Miguel de Allende

We had a very easy time driving from San Juan Teotihuacan to Querétaro. The road was well signed and we didn’t get lost once. Imagine!! The scenery was simply amazing. Ribbons of green and spring green and brown on the bottom and grey and grey-blue mountains with overcast sky. Yellows and tans filled in the tierra and bright orange, sky blue, magenta and red homes dotted the landscape. We came down a huge amount of altitude from Pachuca and passed a large area of balnearios. These were HUGE water parks with numerous slides and tubes. The kids were dying to stay but the weather was cool and we were pushing for the border. Yeah. Were. Still not sure what we’re going to do, but we simply do not want to rush through this area. On paper it looked good, but we are loving the colonial architechture, the hills and mountains that Jamie can ride and the artesenia.

We are currently camped outside a Pemex station at a motel - no electricity or bathrooms, but for 30 pesos the family can get a key to a room and take showers. A wonderful restaurant is nearby and while some entrees are in the 85-100 peso range, they also have very reasonable 40 peso dishes. The kids have been introduced to enchiladas (nothing like the ones in the states) and absolutely LOVE them.

We took a daytrip into San Miguel de Allende yesterday. Besides being a huge gringo town, it is one of the towns that began the Mexican independence. The rebels were supposed to begin their fight for Spanish independence in Querétaro, but word got to the Spanish so Allende and Hidalgo began with the takeover of Dolores (then not named Dolores Hidalgo) then to San Miguel and then to Querétaro and San Luis Potosí. We visited art galleries and the Center of Bellas Artes (Fine Arts) where we saw sculpters, painters and other artists at their craft. The town of San Miguel de Allende is simply indescribable. It is absolutely The Most Beautiful Town we’ve visited yet.

We stupidly left with a light breakfast and were dying of hunger early on. We found a lovely restaurant but it was quite pricy. It did, however, lead us to a store of local craft that is dedicated to helping rural women earn a living from their craft. In the state of Guanajuato, many of the men leave to find work in the US and the women and children are left at home to suffer and starve. This store is trying to support the crafts of the women by bringing their craft to market and paying them upon deliver of goods (instead of upon sale of their goods). If you would like to support this store and can wait for me to ship stuff once we cross the border, let me know. They have lots of embriodered clothing (but it looks old style for girls) but pillows at 120 pesos, tablecloths and blankets at 800-1200 pesos. Little boxes (which look like they are made by children) at 25-50 pesos and paper mache bright colored fruit at 6 pesos each. Exchange rate is about 10.80 pesos to the US dollar. The prices seem a bit high, but we’re used to municipal market rates and bargaining. Knowing that the money is going direct to the families makes a difference.

Ellen fell asleep on us so we decided to take a trip to Dolores Hidalgo for some Talavera pottery. Lets just say the trip was a success. I could have purchased about 10 times the amount I did without a second thought. We never made it to the town and I really wanted to show the kids where the “grito” was made - the call to independence by Hidalgo. The pottery factory (it is a home and other outbuildings) is also a furniture factory and they had very very many carved horses. Sissy was in heaven.

There is so much more, but Jamie is out on the road and we need to go pick him up. We’re absolutely LOVING this part of the country and are loathe to zip through it. When I get to town (and post this) I’ll be researching vehicle insurance and trying to obtain a month more policy so we can amble through this area. Guanajuato, Querétaro, and Zacatecas are simply NOT areas to burn rubber through. We could spend months in each state.