La ruta del sabor!!!

Samples of our eating in México. From tacos al Pastor, arracheras, bife de chorizo, quesos, dobladas, carne asada, helados y nieves.

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Beautiful Xalapa.

Still in route, Xalapa is the Capital City of Veracruz state, it has hilly streets, beautiful green views everywhere, and nice weather.


The Anthropology museum, has many pieces from the Olmec Civilization (Olmeca), the one preceding to the Aztecs.


Ice cream, "helado o nieve" from different tropical flavors, my favorite is mamey.


Breakfast with extended family. Mmmmmm! Ricas dobladas de chicharrón, hongos, queso....

Un dia en Veracruz.

El puerto de Veracruz, historic, romantic, musical place in Mexico, where El Conquistador Hernán Cortez put foot in Mexican land, decided to take it for Spain, (But that is another story). We visited along with the Martínez, included my own little Martínez.


First, The fort of San Juan de Ulua, defense against pirates, then jail for political prisoners, in Revolution times a refugee for the President.
That day was specially HOT, ¡mucho calor!


So, we went to cool down. Of course the eating in Mocambo, leading us after all, to more eating (the real thing now). We stopped in "La Parroquia"a typical place in Veracruz.


They sell the famous "Lechero", coffee syrup with hot and foamy milk.


To feel the soul of Veracruz, we sat in the "plaza" under the shade of palms and trees, watching how the local people start gathering and wait for the freshness of the evening and the music to dance.
Fotos, cortesía de todos los fotógrafos del día.

Aire de montaña

Up north of Mexico City, there is a beautiful little State called Querétaro, over there, Elliott and Isa (pepe's mom) have a nice house in the country. We stayed with them for five days. Pepe had to leave early, so he missed our little trip to San Juan del Rio, (the closest city to them) and the nice trip down to the stream. Since it rained almost every day, we could hear the sound of the water, so one day we decided to go down and investigate, and we found almost a river with falls and every thing.
Every morning the girls were always willing to take the dogs (Minka and Sherman) to walk and spend time playing with them, plus exploring all the little places in the property.

Hiking Tepic's sorroundings.

The girls and I embarked in a hiking excursion around my hometown's ecological park called "Cerro de San Juan" or the San Juan hills... We took the tour-trolley in the main plaza and it put us right in the spot "kilometer X". For 50 cents each, it is not bad...

It was fun, just being a tourist in my city. Its been years... almost 20 that I wasn't in those hills, actually is an extint volcano.
We climbed up with a bunch of kids from a summer camp, and the guides explained us about the different vegetation and resources of the area, from the tropical down layer to the pines up at the hill.
Of course after the walking, Bidane decided to take a rest in the palapa they have for visitors, since then, she insists in having an "hamaca" at home.

De costa a costa.

Summer vacations are almost over, our trip to Mexico ended one week ago and we are happy to be back in San Diego.
But as always, when one have a long trip, there are many things to do at home, after days of absence and so many memories to put in order, I just couldn't blog about it.

I decided then, to talk about our trip in sections, as it was. First.. our route.

We landed in the heart of the country, the capital city, Mexico, D.F, as you know our friends Caroline, Isabel and Benjamin had the courage to embarque in that adventure.





After we said good by to our guests, we headed east with all the Martinez gang, Veracruz state was our target (located in the Gulf of Mexico). We visited the famous port of Veracruz and Xalapa, the capital state, where the family has its roots.









Than, again to the central part of the country, now Querétaro, where Pepe's mom has a country house in the mountains, very relaxing...







Some days of mountain air, rain and thunder (I love it), my girls and I traveled west to the Pacific, to my home-town Tepic.

Pulgas en mi petate? Maldita sea!

Desgraciadaaaaaaaaaaas, malditas, infames....FOR YOU ALL, I just wrote a bunch of insults.
Aitana, Bidane and I, got home after our summer vacation in Mexico and found fleas all over the place. Since pepe is not home, at least somebody hugged me when I opened the door. They climbed on my pants and shoes, literally hugging me, !Welcome home, you..!
See why I didn't want a cat?... And talking about the cat, he freaked out so much, he run away, luckily he came back. We gave him a bath, of course he didn't like it, but it was necessary.
Anyways, I'm glad we are home, "hogar, dulce, hogar". See you around, I'll post about our trip in a better time.

GRACIAS A TODOS USTEDES QUE NOS RECIBIERON, FAMILIA, GRACIAS, AND FOR ALL OF YOU THAT CONCERNED ABOUT OUR CAT, THANK YOU TOO.

Casi listos!

Ya estamos preparandonos para nuestra visita a México. La panorámica de la ciudad siempre me trae recuerdos de cuando yo vivía en el D.F y trabajaba en el INE.

Mexico City. Yes is huge, yes is crazy, yes... is a beautiful land, and in summer time, is Grey and blue, green and red. I was remembering today, once many years ago, when this sight of the city was a constant in my way back to home, I spotted the "Plaza de Toros". It was sunday or an special event, because it was packed, and I could see from right above in the center of "el ruedo, al torero".

Is always exciting to visit family, to catch up with life over there and this time, to have a theme, a special porpoise of our visit and having guests (you know!!).

The Fighting for the TOP

Have you heard about the voting process for the "New Wonders of the World"?
Well, I find it an absurd and suspicious. To ask people to "vote", over what they think is the most fantastic thing made by mankind, and include the most popular among a Top 7.
Why the Christ of Rio de Janeiro, would be a better Christ that this you find along the way from Tijuana to Ensenada?
This silly example, applies for the this voting thing. "Wonders" that are not included in the list, like Palenque or Teotihuacan, deserved as much respect and AWE, that the ones that would be in the top 7. Just because those in the list, probably have big corporations and Governments support, (including Chichen Itza in Mexico) that doesn't mean they don't represent a big effort of people and expression of their culture, engineering and architecture.

Yoga works!

Some of you know about Bidane's back condition. We went to the Orthopedics today, to follow up and x-rays. We are so happy, because he said, Bidane's spine is better, in fact the degree of deviation she has is less now than nine moths ago!!!!!!!!!!!! So, the doctor took away the "scoliosis" term to let it just in spine deviation. I thank God (yes I do!) for this and to Bidane for her hard work with yoga.
She needs to be monitored though, until her teenage years, but Doctor said it is unlikely we face a backwards, See you Doc in ONE and 1/2 years!!!!. -Namaste-