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 Vallarta Living | February 2006 
Viviendo en México - A Visit to Mazamitla
 Korah Winn - PVNN
This past weekend I was offered the chance to go to Mazamitla, Jalisco with two women from my school. Kathy is an adventurous person who lives in Tacoma, WA. She has been traveling in Mexico on and off for several years with her husband.
She read about Mazamitla in a little guidebook and decided going there would be a nice respite from the hustle and pollution in Guadalajara. She invited Nancy to come and then Nancy invited me.
Nancy is a sweet, retired teacher who is from just outside of Minneapolis, MN. Her northern accent is just precious when she says no or know. So with backpacks stuffed, we headed to la central camionera (the central bus depot) after school on Friday.
The trip was going to take about three hours on a second-class bus. We bought one-way tickets there for just about seven bucks apiece. I was feeling a bit tired, so I did my best to sleep on the way there but only succeeded in drifting in and out of consciousness in between bumps.
At one point, I woke up and noticed people standing in the aisle. My immediate thought was that they must be getting ready to get off at one of the little towns along the way.
After I was awake a little longer, I realized that the bus was completely full and they were standing there because there was no other place to sit. I realized this is just another way my naivety about how things work in Mexico was showing itself.
When we arrived to Mazamitla it was at the perfect time. We were in the mountains and the air was fresher and the topography had changed. We checked into our hostel, El Ciervo Rojo (The Red Deer,) and set out to go explore around the small town.
It was a short walk down to the town plaza. There was a Christian group playing music, so we stood for a little while and listened to them and watched people walking around the plaza.
The plaza itself was very cute and well planned. There was a kiosko (gazebo) in the middle of it and tall pine trees were planted in various areas. All my life I have seen deciduous trees in town squares so it was a novelty to notice the difference.
 From there, we walked over to a busy taco stand and tried tacos de la cabeza (tacos of the head.) The way it was explained to us was that it is meat from the cachete (cheek) of a cow. When we finished, we grabbed some delicious ice cream from a little place called "La Michoacana."
After a good night's rest, we woke up in the morning and split up. Kathy went for a hike in the mountains and Nancy and I went in search of horses. After asking numerous townspeople which way to go, we finally just started following the trail that horses leave and found the horses themselves within fifteen minutes.
A guy came up to us and asked if we wanted to go horseback riding, and just like that, we got on the horses and began riding to the cascades without having to sign our lives away on paper forms. The ride was gorgeous. We saw beautiful vacation homes along the way. We rode for a half an hour until we had to dismount and walk down to get to the cascades.
We decided to stay one more night. We left for Guadalajara the next morning. It was definitely a great weekend trip that almost anyone can enjoy. |
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