Exploring San Miguel

Friday we slept late and then got a tour of the heart of San Miguel from Barry and Melissa.  San Miguel was founded right after the Spanish conquest of Mexico.  It is in an are of cities that are known as the silver cities because they were founded based on silver mining.  San Miguel was a wealthy place during the colonial days.  It is also called El Corazon de Mexico, The Heart of Mexico, because it was here where the Mexican Revolution from Spain was initiated by Ignacio Allende, a military officer.  Hence after he was martyred and independence won, they renamed the town "de Allende" in his honor.

The independence years were not kind to San Miguel and it fell into economic malaise.  After WWII, an art school opened, the Instituto Allende and became a place where GIs using the GI bill came for education.  This led to the town becoming a center of arts and crafts and an important expat community all of which of led to the town's return to prosperity.  It also has retained much of its original colonial street and architecture design and has now become a UNESCO heritage city.

Barry and Melissa live right in the heart of the city and one can be in the center plazas in only 10 or 15 minutes.  Our first visit on Friday, we were just getting the lay of the land.  Then on Saturday, Wife and I got up early and were out to take pictures in the favorable (for picture taking) early light.  San Miguel is a late rising town.  Nothing much is open between 7 and 8 in the morning when we were roaming.  The streets were pretty much empty, in total contrast to what is was like at midday.  By 9 AM it totally changed with the world back in action. 

We had breakfast at one of the places that Barry had showed us.  They have an unusual dish that is scrambled eggs in a spicy broth - really good.  Also they serve hand made corn tortillas.  This is of course the national food here.  If tortillas were as good as this back home, I would eat them all the time.  Even Wife, who does not like corn tortillas, was raving about them.  We also had another of those 'tourist food moments'.  Wife suggested that we just share the egg dish and we would by some kind of pastry for her so we didn't end up with too much food.  So we ordered Chocolate Pastel thinking it was some kind of chocolate croissant.  But not no, it was a piece of chocolate cake!  Only after we got it did I remember that the Spanish word for cake is pastel.  We never dreamed cake would be on a breakfast menu.  It was very good however and the sweetness was a nice counterpoint to the spicy chile of the egg dish.

Then it was back to the house to shower and change because we had lunch planned with some Mexican friends of theirs.  But before we left Melissa says to me "Michael come!"  And soon we are walking out the door, down the hill to where there is a Chiccheronaria.  This is a place where they do nothing but make chiccheron - fried pork fat - think cracklings/pork rinds etc.  So she buys a big bag which she, Barry, and I start nibbling on.

It was probably a bit too much for me given how much we'd been eating and drinking.  My system started giving me issues.  We went to lunch and I limited myself to a half of a salad.  The vegetable matter was very welcome.  As I was still having issues, Barry and I went back to the house after lunch.  He gave me a bunch of probiotics which along with time did the trick and I was much better by evening.

We went to dinner with another friend of Barry and Melissa to an Italian place but it had an off day and we were very disappointed in the meal.  We all decided to abstain from any serious drinking and went to bed early.

Mexico - Very First Impressions

It is so strange that with all the travel I've done over the years, that I've never gone to Mexico.  Flying here takes no more time than it does to get to Chicago.  But for some reason, I've always felt a bit intimidated.  Partially it is the inability to speak Spanish.  And there is always for me a little bit of intimidation factor when going to some place I've never been.  There are always stories.  I've heard people tell stories about places I go to frequently where I wonder where they come up with them and how can they be believed.  But nonetheless the irrational, emotional mind is a powerful thing.  So I had some mild anxieties.

We arrived into the Leon/Guanajuato airport from Houston yesterday.  It is a small airport but they have recently done a complete remodeling of it so it is exceedingly clean and modern.  It was a small plane coming in from Houston and the only one landing so there were no crowds.  The immigration and customs people were very efficient and pleasant.  Finding our shuttle that would take us to San Miguel was a breeze.  It was almost a bit shocking to have certain expectations shattered. 

It takes about an hour and twenty minutes to get from the airport.  We went through a number of towns/cities on the way.  The geography and climate here are not that different from New Mexico thought they get around 20 inches of rain compared to our 10 so it is not so dry.  San Miguel is at 6500 feet.  In February, there weather is like what ours will be in April.  So the days are warm but it is still pretty chilly at night.

It was dark by the time we arrived.  Our friends Barry and Melissa live off an alleyway and I was concerned about finding it in this strange, very different looking cityscape in the dark.  However, the shuttle service Barry employs is extremely efficient.  Our driver after we got off brought us right up to the door and even found the doorbell (not easy to see in the dark) and made sure we were in the house.  I made sure to give him a good tip.

Barry and Melissa are serious home remodel addicts.  I use to tease him all the time about the amount of work they were doing to their house in Albuquerque since it seemed the projects never stopped.  I think Wife and I probably caught the disease from them.  We had heard all kinds of stories over the years of there dealing with the Mexican construction culture and Barry forcing his Anglo will to make things happen.  So it was wonderful to see the beautiful results.  Unfortunately Melissa is having some breathing issues and the altitude is not the best for her plus they do a lot of travel so actually owning a place here doesn't seem to fit their plans.  As a result they have really cool video that you can look for marketing it that will give you a good picture of it.

Dinner was French picnic with tequila samples.  Barry had four different versions so by 11 PM we were really ready for bed. 

Off to Mexico

Wife and I are in the Albuquerque International Sunport waiting to take some flights that will eventually get us to San Miguel de Allende, a noted historic city with a long arts and expatriate reputation about 200 miles north of Mexico City in the mountains.

Friends of ours have owned a house there for years, spend about half their time there and have been after us to come visit them for ages.  So we're taking a long weekend to check it.  Unfortunately I've forgotten to pack my cord so I can download pictures from my cell phone.  So I'm afraid my usual timely photo journalism will be delayed until I get back.

Why The Deer

I was with a client who hikes a lot today and told him my rampaging deer story.  He said, "they were probably flushed out by a mountain lion."  He told me he had seen it happen a couple of times in his years of hiking. 

Hmmmmm.  So for all I know there was a mountain lion I did not see that was probably not all that far from where I was.  That gives one pause for thought.

Grandpa Was Run Over By a Reindeer

My kids will remember that as one of our favorite later day Christmas songs.   However, in this case it wasn't a reindeer but a mule deer.  And it wasn't one but two.  And they didn't run me over, they just almost ran me over.

I was up in the Sandias as usual on Saturday morning.  I was doing my 'go to' trail, the South Crest.  It's the one I fall back on when I'm by myself and I just want a quick hike with solitude and beauty.  Even during the summer, it is not frequented as much as other trail. But during the winter, if you go in the early morning when it is cold, you won't meet anyone until you're three quarters of the way back.

I was doing the six mile hike that is my kind of "I'm just getting a workout in" hike.  When its been snowing as it was this week, very rarely do people go beyond the 2 mile mark.  While there wasn't much snow, there weren't any human foot prints after that point.  But there were animal prints.  I thought they might be coyote prints.

The first couple of miles is pretty good climbing.  Then it sort of levels out and scallops along a series of valleys for another mile until you get to the next climb.  I was at the point of the first of these valleys when it happened.

Scene of the Incident

I heard this thumping and crashing sound.  I looked straight ahead to the point just left of that bush with the gold leaves.  Two buck mule deer with full sets of antlers were tearing down the valley and heading right for me on the trail where I was standing (where this picture was taken from.  There is a drop off to my left and a hillside to the right.

I lifted on of my hiking poles like a spear and gave a loud deep voiced shout...something like Haaa.  (Why I did this I have no idea).  One of the deer bolted to my left down the trail.

The other just avoided me by going over the slope to my right

The whole incident took 5, maybe 7 seconds.  I stood there for a while and reflected that one of those bucks hitting me with their antlers was probably not going to have been good for my health.  Too bad Dad is gone, he would have gotten a kick out of the story.

On The Road In Northwest New Mexico

New Mexico is one of the largest states in the Union in terms of physical size (5th roughly the size of Poland) and one of the smaller states (36th) in terms of population.  Like almost all the western states, one or two cities dominate the population density (Albuquerque and Santa Fe here).  But some of the smaller cities in the southeast and northwest are very prosperous because they have oil and gas. 

I had a prospect in the northwestern city of Farmington.   It's about 180 miles from my place to Farmington, around 3 hours driving.  My appointment was for 10:30 in the morning.  I got going around 6:30 and stopped halfway there for breakfast.

Although that's a lot of driving, there is a benefit because New Mexico is a beautiful place.  We had snow yesterday and it had a wonderful effect on the mountains.

Approaching the Jemez Mountains going southeast from Farmington to Cuba

Approaching Sandia Peak from the same direction going from Cuba to Bernalillo

Musing on Mortality

The event of watching my Father's death process has led to quite a bit of introspection and discussion on the part of Wife and I. 

First, there is this visceral understanding that you are watching your own future.  We are in our middle sixties so our ultimate end is far closer than anything else in our lives.  That leads to all kinds of thoughts about what we really want to be doing, what is really important to us, how do we make the best use of the time that is left to us, and how do we not take what we have for granted.

Then there are the ruminations about how we are going to meet the end when it happens.  We both would like to think that we would not just drag it out and hang on and on.  My Dad said he wanted to go but evidently whether by constitution or mental make up couldn't let go.  This was in stark contrast to my Grandfather who at around the same age as my Father, just went to his room in my parents house, sat in his chair, dosed off, and never woke up.

You'd like to think that you know yourself but how will you really react when you get there?