Heading Home

the Palenque ruins

Okay, Okay, so not everyone travels for months.  The funny thing is, no matter how long you are traveling, you start to feel like you are at the end if the time left is less than the time that has come before.  I need to get back to the states for teacher training in a week.  I know that most people take a week as their vacation but this trip has been so awesome, it is hard to see it end.

Heading North

We started heading north a few days ago.  We left from Villahermosa, which is on the coast, to Puebla, in the central mountains just south of Mexico City, on Friday. We had been in the jungle tropics for the whole trip so driving into the mountains was a trip.  I am sure that you will feel no sympathy but it was gosh-darned cold up there, well it was below 80. The mountain region is so different and so beautiful.

On the road to Puebla

Food On the Road

Some of you know about my obsession with food.  I love how you travel through Mexico, you see what is grown and what is popular in each region literally on the side of the road.  On the trip from the coast to the mountains we bought Habanero peppers in onions and vinegar, coffee beans, fried plantains with chile, fresh pineapple juice, and jicama with chile.  When I say side of the road, I mean the people just walk up to the side of your vehicle and you slow down enough to pass money out the window and get the goods.  Love it!

road side habanero

Chalula

How can you not want to go to a town called Chalula?  There is a church built on top of an Aztec pyramid and a great market.  Oh, and of course a wonderful hole-in-the-wall place to eat.  Again, my food obsession.  So this woman is cooking tortillas on the top of a 50 gallon oil drum right on the street outside her place.  She is making the tortillas a mano and putting beans and epazote inside.  We sat down and I kept asking questions and taking pictures.  Crazy gringa that I am.  I think they were happy that I was interested in the food, or they were just humoring me.  I will be making lots of home made tortillas and all kinds of different sauces.  Each area in Mexico has a different way to prepare tortillas as well as different salsas.  My favorites so far are the green sauce from Bacalar made with avocado, green tomatoes, and Habanero, the salsa roja from Chalula made with tomatoes, olive oil and chipotles, and the mole that Chef Enrique taught me from Maya Tulum.

tortillas on a oil drum

San Miguel de Allende

We got to San Miguel last night and found that the pool was filled by a hot spring.  Right on.  It is chilly here in the mountains so swimming in really warm water was welcome.  This place is very cool.  We are staying at a hotel/RV Park that is also a farm.  They fill the pool in the morning with water from the hot spring.  It then cools down during the day and then it runs into the irrigation system for the farm.  They grow Nopal cactus here which many eat all over Mexico.  They also grow agave which is used to make one of my favorite things on earth, tequila.  Thank god it is vegan.  We explored the town today and then came back for another swim.  Finished the evening by going and feeding some of the cows bananas.  They go, well bananas over them.  We also visited the new lambs who are just 3 days old and bouncing all over the place.  The sheep really do go Bahhhh and so like people making sheep noises.  Crazy.

What Dylan will do for Money

Dylan eats chapulines on a bet

Chapulines are fried grasshoppers.  My son Dylan loves a challenge and tried them on a bet from his dad.  This guy was a sweetheart.  I bought some chile covered garbanzos from him.  There is chili on everything, even candy, even…… the grasshoppers.

We have a week to go and there will be lots more stories to tell.  For now, stay warm and eat lots of stuff with chile peppers.  Un abrazo, Mimi

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