There are as many ways to travel as there are travelers I suppose, but my favorite style of traveling is for extended periods of time and with few predetermined agendas.
I just feel like everyone tries to do something different, but you always wind up doing the same damn thing. --Richard played by Leonardo Dicaprio in The Beach credit
At the very minimum two weeks allows me to sync with the rhythm of my environment without feeling rushed to soak it all in. Just enough time to meet and discover some secret gems only locals know about but not enough time to wear out my welcome or sink into familiarity.
Blazing A Trail Across Mexico
1998 had been a very good season and I was fortunate enough to travel for up to a year, a luxury that if you ever get a chance to indulge in I highly recommend. Any longer than two weeks in one place and it is best to move on to someplace new.
My year long vacation was in Mexico. It was initially planned as a three-month long vacation to really explore the country at a leisurely pace, and as the adventure unfolded we realized we were just getting started. This was in 1998 before I moved to Mexico permanently.
The trip started in Cancun, though we spent zero time there, and ended in Mexico city. This map shows the route we took from start to finish. This post is not about the whole trip, that would take too long, but it is about some places that most tourists don't travel to.
The decision to extend the trip came one night during a full moon while Visiting Indigenous Tribes Of The Lacandon Deep In The Jungles Of Chiapas Mexico. This adventure was life changing and there was no real good reason why we needed to go back to civilization just yet.
We continued on to San Cristobal De Las Casas agreeing to extend the trip for a couple more months and when those two months had passed we extended it further and before you knew it a year had passed.
Soon we established a pace. One to two weeks camping in a tent in the great outdoors by the side of a huge waterfall followed by one to two weeks pampering ourselves in the nicest hotel in the next city or town along the way. Making camp along the shores of a mountainside lake, then checking into a fine hotel in Guadalajara and soaking in the tub for days before going out to dinner. It was tough but with determination, we got through it somehow.
The only downer is, everyone's got the same idea. We all travel thousands of miles just to watch TV and check in to somewhere with all the comforts of home, and you gotta ask yourself, what is the point of that? --Richard played by Leonardo Dicaprio in The Beach credit
We visited most of the popular beach destinations like Mazatlan, Puerto Vallarta, Acapulco, Barra De Navidad, Puerto Escondido, Zihuatanejo, Vera Cruz, Cancun, and Tulum, and found our way deep into the interior of Mexico in Puebla, Oaxaca, Chiapas, Michoacan, Jalisco, and Palenque. It's in the middle of the country that one truly discovers Mexican culture.
Flavors Of Mexico
Mexican food is full of variety depending on which part of the country you're in and has no resemblance to what passes as Mexican food in the U.S. Some of the best restaurants in the world from La Salles in Beverly Hills to Jean-Georges at the Trump Towers in New York, from Le Cinq in Paris, France, Wolfgang Puck in Las Vegas, Nevada, or Acquerello in San Francisco, peek in the back of the kitchen on any given night and I wouldn't be surprised to find a chef from Puebla, Mexico working alongside the name chef of that particular restaurant.
Puebla, a city founded in 1531, is home to Instituto Culinario de Mexico (Culinary Institute of Mexico} where many of the best chefs study cooking every kind of cuisine you could imagine and many graduates end up working in renowned restaurants worldwide.
In Puebla, I had the best mole I have ever tasted hands down. Puebla, Oaxaca, and Tlaxcala all lay claim to being the city from where mole originates and the stories behind its genesis is a story unto itself.
Moles come in various flavors and ingredients, with chili peppers as the common factor. However, the classic mole version is the variety called mole poblano, which is a dark red or brown sauce served over meat. The dish has become a culinary symbol of Mexico’s mestizaje, or mixed indigenous and European heritage, both for the types of ingredients it contains, as well as the legends surrounding its origin credit
Each region in Mexico has added different spices, chilies, and ingredients to their local mole sauce making it unique to the region. One of my favorite contains chili peppers, cumin, garlic, and chocolate. Chocolate and chilies are indigenous to Mexico. I know it sounds like a strange combination but it is delicious beyond belief.
Mexican Snow Bunnies
Most people do not realize there are many places to ski in Mexico and Puebla is one of them. The second tallest mountain in Mexico, Popocatépetl has an elevation of 17,802 feet (5,426 meters) and offers some great skiing. The tallest mountain in Mexico is Pico de Orizaba at 18,491 feet (5636 meters).
Floating Gardens of Xochimilco
Another off the beaten track destination to check out near Mexico city is Xochimilco (pronunced sotjiˈmilko), known as the Venice of Mexico.
Xochimilco is a network of canals running along flower nurseries in a growing region of Mexico. You can rent a gondola and travel to a floating flower market on the weekends. Sunday is the best day to go.
The water is dirty so you wouldn't want to swim in it, but the colorful boats, delicious food, and the live Mariachi musicians create a festive mood that's intoxicating.
And me, I still believe in paradise. But now at least I know it's not some place you can look for, 'cause it's not where you go. It's how you feel for a moment in your life when you're a part of something, and if you find that moment... it lasts forever... --Richard played by Leonardo Dicaprio in The Beach credit
Dog And Butterfly
When I was a kid I once found some Monarch butterfly eggs on some milkweed in a nearby field. I collected the branch it was on and carefully placed it in a mason jar and four weeks later was transfixed as I witnessed it undergo complete metamorphosis as it turned into a butterfly.
Years later I learned of the epic migration they make to Michoacan, Mexico and promised myself I would see it with my own eyes.
The annual Monarch butterfly migration is one of nature’s greatest spectacles and a top attraction for visitors to Mexico’s central highlands. Each year, as many as 60 million to one billion Monarch butterflies make the journey from eastern Canada to the forests of western central Mexico, a journey that spans more than 2,500 miles. The Monarch butterflies spend their winter hibernation clustered in small areas of the Reserva de la Biosfera Mariposa Monarca (Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve), a national protected area and nature preserve that covers more than 200-square-miles.
The Monarch butterflies arrive in Mexico each year in late-October and make their winter homes in the tops of the trees high in the mountains of the reserve. Their arrival coincides with Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead); one of Mexico’s most important holidays. credit
We took a train to get there. Traveling through the mountains of Michoacan by train in a sleeper car was so much fun and dining and drinking at the bar was a story deserving its own post. The scenery along the railroad tracks are epic and sipping on some rum while taking it in made me feel like I was back in time in an old western movie.
I had seen pictures and Discovery documentaries about the Monarch migration but nothing prepares you for the sight of so many butterflies gathered in one place. It's as if there is a butterfly Mecca and their savior has arrived. They gather upon every available space until everything is covered in a kaleidoscope of butterfly wings.
Killer Queen
Palenque was a Maya city state in southern Mexico that flourished in the 7th century. The Palenque ruins date from ca. 226 BC to ca. AD 799 and is located near the town of Palenque and near the Usumacinta River in the Mexican state of Chiapas.
At one point in its history its ruler passed his legacy to his surviving daughter and from that point on was ruled by women and each generation nobility passed from the queen to a princess.
We spent a day exploring the ruins and then camped at the Misol Ha waterfalls for a week where we caught fresh fish for dinner and hiked all around the surrounding area. We moved camp to Agua Azuland stayed there for a week and met many of the locals.
The Restless Natives
We had to keep our stuff very secure around the camp, not because of people taking things but the monkeys and even some birds would come take things. Keeping it all in the tent worked just fine.
The interesting thing about spending a week or two camping is that the locals notice you after a while and wonder why you're still here. You see, most travelers spend 1-3 days in camp sites like this and then leave so when someone stays longer the locals notice and come around to your camp to get to know you.
Once they realize that I'm in no hurry and have no real agenda they start inviting you to see and do things that most tourists never experience.
I've been invited to eat meals with countless families, gone to all-night rave parties, floated down rivers rafting through paradise, pigged out at Mexican pig roasts, got drunk in pulqueria joints and arm wrestled macho men with Groucho Marx mustaches with our elbows pressed into plies of rock salt until our elbows were bleeding. Nothing a good shot of Tequila can't cure. Viva Mexico!
Trust me, it's paradise. This is where the hungry come to feed. For mine is a generation that circles the globe and searches for something we haven't tried before. So never refuse an invitation, never resist the unfamiliar, never fail to be polite and never outstay the welcome. Just keep your mind open and suck in the experience. And if it hurts, you know what? It's probably worth it. --Richard played by Leonardo Dicaprio in The Beach credit
Conclusions
Traveling means many things to many people. Some travel to visit family, some go back to the same place each year, some go to shop and some just want to change the backdrop and wrap their senses in a place that looks like the screen saver on their computer and have a moment to just live.
I have traveled for all the same reasons but getting to know locals has always led to the best experiences and it's easy to do because you become a novelty to locals. Being from out of town affords you certain abilities that can lead to fun times.
Do you know the definition of the word exotic?
exotic [ig-zot-ik]
adjective
- originating in or characteristic of a distant foreign country.
You see, when you travel to a distant or foreign land or culture, by definition, you are exotic and that attracts some interesting locals that will want to get to know you which is perfect because the feeling is mutual.
Being exotic by just being yourself makes you more interesting to the locals, more than you would normally be to people from where you are from and that makes for some interesting conversations and experiences. Getting out of your comfort zone is a good thing and lets you experience life more.
Traveling to me is living and settling down is the genesis of turning to dust. I guess that's why I'll never stop.
“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.”
-- Mark Twain, The Innocents Abroad/Roughing It credit
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