A Trip for María Luisa

On Friday evening Alejandro surprised me when out of the blue he suggested that we take a weekend trip to a resort hotel located on the grounds of a colonial hacienda near San Juan del Río.  I said "sure", and he called immediately for a reservation.  Fortunately, since it was not a holiday weekend, a room was available. 

He later explained to me that more than two years ago he had bought a package of points to be used at Fiesta Americana hotels.  He had thought that it would be nice to take his mom on some weekend getaways.  In particular he was thinking about the Fiesta Americana Hacienda Galindo, a place which he had heard was very nice.  Sadly Alejandro never got to use those points with his mom.  Shortly after buying the package, María Luisa became ill and passed away.  However, those hotel points need to be used before they expired, and that was the reason why he had suggested a weekend trip.  It turned out to be a lovely getaway, and I like to think that María Luisa was with us in spirit on that trip.

Saturday morning we set out in Alejandro's car.  Fortunately, the traffic heading out of Mexico City, which is usually horrendous, was relatively light.  In about two hours we were in the countryside of the Mexican state of Querétaro.

We arrived at the Fiesta American Hotel built on the former property of the Hacienda Galindo..

We checked in and were taken to our very nice room.

After getting settled, we went out to explore the hotel and its grounds.  We spent a couple of hours wandering around and taking pictures.  As I said the hotel is built on the site of an hacienda which dates back to the 1500s.  It's difficult to tell which parts of the hotel were part of the original hacienda house, and which are modern additions.  Everything, however, is beautiful.

The hacienda chapel is undoubtedly from the colonial era.

There is a very nice pool area.  Although Alejandro and I both brought our swimsuits, we never made it into the water.

Behind the hotel there is a "granja", a farm, with a variety of farm animals for the children to see.

There are horses which can be hired for riding.

This burro was not very sociable...

...but this baby burro loved having its ears scratched.

Alejandro and I both wished that we could have spent more than one night at this delightful hotel.  And we are sure that María Luisa would have loved it.