Ruta de Independencia

Take two. As I was writing this blog about an hour ago, I had just finished it and was about to post it when everything got deleted. So here I go again, God help me if it even sounds half as good as it just did.

Before I begin to explain how fantistic this trip was, I would like to thank my parents for giving me this opportunity. I didn't know I was even going until a week prior. So thank you Mapa, muchas gracias Mapa, dankeschoen Mapa!! As a side note, there are some pictures of the trip on the right!


For those of you who have no idea what the Ruta de Independencia is, it is a trip that was organized by my Rotary District. My district is having two big trips, the Ruta de Independencia (which we just had) and the Ruta de Maya which is coming up at the end of May and I cannot wait for it after how this trip turned out.


Morelia 16.2
We left at 6 from the mall in Puebla and made our way towards Morelia. Before we got there though, we made a quick pitstop at a Monarc butterfly santuary. We got off the bus and it was a little chilly. Noone knew we would have to climb mountains to get to these damned butterflies. It was an adventure and really nice to get out of the big city. We practically craweled up these mountain hills and had to walk up and down this long trails only to have to manuver our way down a vegitaded slope to get to these butterflies but it was worth it. I'm not sure if I was extremely grossed out by seeing the sky and trees overflowing with orange and black fluttering wings or amazed. It truely was beautiful but a little scary once I realized I was covered in butterflies and had one staring at my face every few seconds. Once we all had our fullfillment of butterflies we set off for Morelia. We arrived pretty late and just in time for our trolly ride. Personly I did not enjoy Morelia that much as it is similar to Puebla but there is less to do.
The following day we visited a church and a library that had an interesting mural painted inside. It was very large but I'm not sure if it was the history of Morelia or of Mexico; I didn't quite understand. We then took a boat over to the Island of Janitzio. This is an adorable island. There is one main street leading up to the statue of the island, and this street is filled with little stores where you can buy so much schnick schnack (I'm not sure if this is a phrase, but I use it to describe little unimportant but necesary things). My friend Anna and I were so caught up in these little stores that we didn't even make it up to the statue. After the Island we ate at a typical Mexican restaurant with good food and then visited the little town of Tzin Zun Tzan. This is a town full of leather stores and I did not enjoy it very much. I would have much rather stayed on the little island longer. After the leather town we went back to the hotel and straight to bed because we had a long day ahead of us.


Guadalajara 18.2
We left very early and made another pitstop in a small artists city called Tlaquepaque about 20 min from Guadalajara, and it was truely beautiful. It had georgeous beaded jewelery, stitched table blankets and little birds that told your fortune. It was really cute and I had a great time; especially drinking my sugar cane juice (although I prefer eating the sugar cane, sucking out the juice and spiting out the remainds) and eating my liter of raspberries. Again we were in this little town way to short for my liking, and were soon off to the city of Guadalajara. We first stopped by the hotel to drop off our luggage and to everyones delight it was a major upgrade compared to the hotel in Morelia. Squishy beds, carpeted floors, nice large bathrooms...we quickly changed to match the heat in this city and were all bedazzeled by the beautiful architecture of the city in the downtown area. It really was beautiful, and it was cool to see the entire city later on in a carriage ride. I felt bad for the horses, as I always do with animals put to work, but then again I felt special being pulled along in a carriage in a mondern city. The trip took us past a bunch adorable little bars, cafés and restaurants, old houses and mansions, and a lot of bridal shops. You would have to spend weeks here if you wanted to see all the bars and cafés. Once we finished the carriage ride it was already dark so we headed off to our compfy beds and slept so we would be prepared for the Tequilla Express in the morning.
The following day we had to be ready at 730 and not to anyones surprise my room was late. Lara and I had to shower and she sprang out of bed so fast and into the shower all I could do is jump up myself and get my clothes ready. I then hoped in the shower and I swear only 3 minutes had passed once I started pulling my clothes on. We all rushed downstairs and even had time to spare waiting for the bus. The Tequilla Express was pretty cool. A train ride took us the the plantation where we were then guided through the process of how our beloved tequilla is made. It was very interesting and informative and was followed by a lunch and dance contest. Natan, a brazilian and Raita, a finnisch girl won. While I was watching it on a slight buzz (don't worry, we were allowed to drink some tequilla haha) I could have sworn it was a clip from dirty dancing. But they did deserve it. After the train ride back and a trip to the mall, we were all pretty exhausted and crept once again into those heavenly comforters.


Guanajuato 20.2
We left Guadalajara with our destination being Guanajuato. Once again we made another pitstop to the small leather city of Leon, which did not tickle my fancey one bit. It is not a pretty city, nor is it filled with good leather stores. They said that all the leather found in this city was real, but if you can't smell the leather on the product and it looks like plastic, I am going to have to trust my instincts. Finally we arrived at Guanajuato. We made our way to the hotel to drop off our stuff and were then off to visit the mummy museum. It was pretty gross yet fascinating seeing the corpses of these dead people and reading the history behind them. After leaving the museum we climbed the streets and we greeted by a fabulous few. The city is very cluttered-looking, since the houses are so close together and some are stacked on each other but it was a sight to see; all the pretty colors and the collage of houses. The rest of the night and the following day kind of blurred together. We roamed the city a lot, went to see the university, danced around the city with a bunch of young men playing instruments and singing songs until we reached the 'Calle del Beso' which apparently, if you kiss someone on will bring you good luck. We went to a museum of Don Quiote, saw a beautiful theater with the 9 muse's on, and visited a statue overlooking the city. We returned both nights to our cute hotel with rock hard beds.


San Miguel de Allende/Queretaro 22.2
San Miguel de Allende. I cannot even begin to describe how I feel about this city. I felt like God had another child and named it San Miguel de Allende. It was so beautiful and adorable. The shades of orange and yellow and red covering the city was a sight for the eyes. The church was beautiful as well. I usually don't like the churches here because they are so overwhelming to look at. Most of the churches here are Catholic, so they are filled with wonderful structures of gold and angels and beautiful arcitecture and murals, but my eyes just can't handle them. This church was different. Unlike being greeted with a fabulous ceiling college I was greeted by bricks. This was the first church I had seen without having its' ceiling painted and I was in awe. I really enjoyed its simplicity. The restaurant that we ate in was so warm and beautiful as well. It had plants and trees and sun umbrellas and good food. The soup...ahh. After having indulged in this lovely little city that's only downfall were all the tourists, we made our way to Queretaro. Once we got to our hotel we had to hurry to catch our final trolly ride. It was fun seeing all the little areas of Queretaro but at this point we were all pretty exhausted and just wanted to sleep. Once we got back into our rooms, I was very happy. This was the second best hotel room we had had, being a mix of the hotel in Guadalajara and Austria. We enjoyed it very much.


La peña de Bernal/Teotihuacan 23.2
After a long and uneventful bus ride we reached the rock we came to visit. That's right, a rock. I know what you guys are thinking, you guys went to visit a rock? How lame..but no not just any rock! The third biggest rock in the world. 'Ooohhh Ahhhh...' Yea. My thoughts exactly. To me it just looked like a mountain with lots of rocks on it but who knows. The city was little and cute and we didn't stay there too long so it was okay. We then made our way to Teotihuacan to visit the pyramids. It was really cool to see all the old rocks and architecture and most of all to climb the Sun pyramid. I thought I would be cool and have a friend video tape me while I blew everyone away and ran up it but to my disappointment I was doing great until the second part where I died, and had to almost crawl up the third part to reach the top. I'm sure it gave everyone a good laugh though. We didn't have time to climb the Luna pyramid but that was okay because we were all exhausted anyways. On our way to the exit we were swamped by natives trying to sell their necklaces, blankets, rocks, and trinkets. Me, being intruiged by all these things would always stop and admire their work before explaining that I had no money thus, couldn't purchase their items. One women in particular, who was selling necklaces, asked me to buy something. I once again told her I had no money but that didn't stop her. No, she took one look at my running watch and said 'It's okay, give me your Rolex and you can pick something out.' To my utter shock I had trouble hiding my smile as I explained to her very politly that I needed this watch to run, and then muttered under my breath how with this watch I could buy her entire collection of necklaces. I ended up just walking away, not knowing how to continue that conversation. Once everyone had been collected, we were off to Puebla.


Rimex was going on when we got back home, which is a weekend full of Rotary activities. That night I ended up going to a concert consisting of young children playing in an orchestra, exhausted as I was. The following day in the morning we had a meeting with a bunch of important Rotarians and the furute Rotary presidant (he's from Thailand) followed by a Gala Saturday night. Sunday I was a little sick from the lack of sleep and now I have school again this week.


Once again I would like to thank my parents, and cannot wait for the next trip! I am really glad I was able to broaden my areas of Mexico I have visited and am excited to see more.