As I’ve mentioned, it’s been a warm, very dry winter for our part of Mexico, and the landscape shows it. I have, therefore, been craving snow and cold. When I arrived in Uganda one January forty years ago as a Peace Corps Volunteer, I had the same complaint: the perfect (for resorts) weather, temperatures in the low eighties, low humidity and clear skies drove me bonkers. I wrote to my mother to tell her so, and she stuck her head out into the dirty slush of a NYC winter to mail a letter begging me never to complain of such weather again. But here I am doing it. (Part of the concern, of course, is that drought isn’t so good for crops and water supplies, but that is for another post.) So Jim and I designated a day last week as our Snow Day for a trip to the base camp hut on the north side of Pico de Orizaba with the hopes that in spite of the warmth, we would at least get a glimpse of white and have to rub our hands together and jump up and down a bit to keep warm.
Jim plotted a back route for us that took us through Teocelo, towards Ixhuacán de los Reyes,then left to Patlanalan at a little lake (blog post) and then up onto the dry altoplano The other side of the mountains from where we live is desert and near-desert by nature, and at this time of year sand and dust is everywhere. I think I have mentioned that Antonio López de San Antonio (of Alamo fame for USAers, and of fame and infamy for much more in Mexico) drew up the state border between the states of Puebla and Veracruz which he was from, and did it so that the most beautiful and fertile lands were on the Veracruz side. It is almost as if he designed the landscape as well, so stark is the difference between much of Puebla and Veracruz. As we drove higher and crossed over, we came upon people plowing fields with cattle-drawn plows like this one below.
All in all, given the slopes and the dryness, it seems a much more practical approach than some giant Caterpillar tractor.
Puebla, by the way, has much better roads on the whole than we have found in Veracruz, though they are improving there, too. It’s always a bit of a shock to realize that even on smaller roads we aren’t skirting potholes and fissures and that there are lines on the road and so forth. There were, however, significant exceptions when we got to the mountain itself.
We pulled off the route to climb up into a town called Quimixtlan which dripped down the steep hills. We were at about 5000 feet. This is sheep-raising territory, and hunks of fresh borrego meat hung from hooks at outdoor butcher stands. I am shy, as you know, about taking pictures of people I don’t know when they know I’m doing it, so a butcher rack picture will have to wait. Jim always stops at churches to take his GPS readings and a photo. So our first stop was the church, which was substantial.
The front of the church
The turrets didn’t make it into the above picture, but are noteworthy: an Arab influence is evident.
The stained-glass windows lining the nave were stark.
On the entrance doors, the stained-glass images of Jesus and La Virgén de Guadalupe were apparently made by artists from Pueblo.
Next to the church was a very pretty town park.
And a chicken in the park.
Below are some signs and notices from around town.
Notice of the annual pilgrimage to Mexico City to the Shrine of the Virgin of Guadalupe. Signs for this are up in every town we passed through.
The sign in the town park.
Jesus decal in a pickup truck window.
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Office of legal proceedings for indigenous people
Anti-drug abuse campaign poster
Finally, a shot of a small section of the wall along the road out of town.