Freakish Weather

North of the border it seems that every day there is news of more tornados leaving a path of death and destruction in the central portion of the U.S.  Here in Mexico, much of the country continues to be in the grip of a heat wave.  In the tropical forests of the state of Tabasco howler monkeys are dropping dead from the trees.

It does seem that the rainy season has finally begun and will hopefully relieve the drought here.  On Wednesday evening, in the neighborhood of my apartment, there was a nice, steady rain which lasted for at least two hours.  In some parts of the metropolitan area, however, the rain was accompanied with hail and high winds which downed trees.  On Friday there was no rain at the apartment, but Alejandro's family's neighborhood had rain.  Then early yesterday evening, while Alejandro and I were in a restaurant having supper, there was a downpour.  It conveniently eased to a light sprinkle when we were ready to return to the apartment.  As I expected, when I took a look at the webcam photos this morning, the precipitation had left the volcano "Popo" covered in a mantle of snow.

Last Friday the city of Puebla, just two hours away on the other side of the volcanoes, was hit with a freak hailstorm.  Some parts of the city were covered by as much as a couple feet of hail.  There were downed trees, vehicles buried in ice, and flooding when the hail melted.  These pictures that I found on the internet look more like winter scenes from the north than of a country in the midst of a heatwave.

"Popo" Is Restless

The volcano Popocatépetl (known as "Popo" for short) has erupted numerous times over the centuries that records have been kept.  There was a major eruption in 1947, but after that the volcano was mostly quiet for nearly a half century.  Then in 1994 it came back to life spewing gas and ash and prompting the evacuation of nearby villages and the beginning of scientific monitoring of the peak.  Over the past three decades Popo has been fuming and occasionally erupting.  In 2000 there was another major eruption, and tens of thousands of people living close to the mountain were evacuated. 

In the past few days, the volcano has once again become very active.  There are some photos from the Mexican webcam site that I often look at.  This webcam is situated at Tlamacas, the site of a mountain-climbers' lodge which was shut down after the peak was closed to climbing due to increased volcanic activity.

11:00 P.M., Friday, May 19th

1:00 A.M. Saturday, May 20th

Mainly quiet at 8:00 A.M. Saturday, May 20th

Spewing ash again at 3:00 P.M Saturday, May 20th

6:00 P.M. Saturday May 20th

8:36 A.M. Sunday, May 21st

Most of today, the mountain was obscured by clouds, but just a couple hours ago, the clouds parted enough to reveal that Popo was still spewing ash.

Usually, it is the Valley of Puebla to the east of the volcano (the other side from Mexico City) that is most affected by falling ash.  Schools in several towns were closed on Friday, and yesterday Puebla Airport was closed.  This morning the citizens of the city of Puebla woke to skies gray with ash. However, this time Mexico City is getting some of the volcanic ash.  Mexico City Airport was closed for six hours yesterday and, according to Alejandro, a few hours this morning.  His sister has been sweeping a fine layer of ash from the terrace.

One of Alejandro's mountain-climbing friends ascended the mountain Iztaccíhuatl this weekend, and he took this spectacular video looking toward Popo.

You may be asking, "Why are you moving to this land of erupting volcanoes?"  I really don't think that I am going to have a role in the remake of "The Last Days of Pompeii".  Mexico City is more than forty miles from Popo... Pompeii was only ten miles from Vesuvius.  I certainly wouldn't want to live in one of the villages on the flanks of the mountain, but I think it would take a cataclysmic eruption to effect Mexico City.  (Fingers crossed.)

On Safari

Alejandro's nephew Ezra graduated from elementary school this summer.  Unfortunately, this summer he only had a few days of vacation because this week he started orientation for "secundaria"... junior high school.

Last weekend, during his mini vacation, his mom took him on an excursion to Puebla, a couple hours to the east of Mexico City.  They stayed at a hotel located near the "Estrella de Puebla" (Star of Puebla), a 260-foot-high Ferris wheel.

(Photos taken by Alejandro's sister Sandra)

On Saturday they went to a safari park located outside of Puebla called "Africam Safari".  

The zoo was established in 1972 by a Mexican businessman as a place where animals could live and reproduce in an area resembling their habitats in the wild.  Visitors can ride through the park in their own vehicles or in park buses.  The zoo features animals not only from Africa but also from Asia and Latin America.  

Ezra enjoyed his visit to the park, and I am happy to report, he is very excited about his new school.  It is hard to believe that he is now in junior high school.  I hope that he continues to be the excellent student that he was in elementary school. 

A Taco a Day

While in the car with Alejandro, driving through Puebla, I snapped this photo of a hole-in-the-wall taco joint.

The sign on the awning says, "A taco a day... is the key to happiness!"

Colonial Puebla

Puebla is Mexico's fourth largest city with a population of over three million people.  It is a modern metropolis and a major industrial center. (One of the largest Volkswagen plants in the world is located here.)  Nevertheless, its historic center is a UNESCO World Heritage site with over 5000 buildings of historic significance.  There is an abundance of Baroque architecture from the the 17th and 18th century.

Alejandro and I have made several weekend trips to Puebla, and I have written about the city in a number of entries on this blog.  You can check them out by clicking on "Puebla" under the list of labels on the right.

After we hit the candy shops, we strolled around the colonial center for a bit before returning to Mexico City.  Here are a few photos of Puebla's beautiful architecture...

 

I am sure we will make more trips to this city in the future, because there are still museums and historic sites that we have yet to visit.

On Candy Street

On Sunday, after we checked out of our hotel, we drove to the historic center of Puebla.  Alejandro's sister had asked him to buy some of the traditional candies for which Puebla is famous.  So we parked the car at a parking lot near the city center and walked to a pedestrian street which is commonly referred to as "Calle de Dulces" (Candy Street).  The street is lined with candy shops.

The stores are filled with an enormous variety of candies and cookies.  Many of the recipes originated in the convents which abounded in Puebla in the colonial era...  most notably the Convent of Santa Clara.

Alejandro bought several kinds of goodies, however he did not buy any of Puebla's most famous candy... "camotes", a confection made from sweet potatoes.  Neither he nor I are big fans of "camotes".

Most of the candy shops also sell typical handicrafts of Puebla, especially the Talavera pottery for which the city is also famous.  I saw something that I did not expect to see this time of year, a clay figurine of the type used in Nativity scenes.  This old shepherd in a wide brimmed hat is seated on a tree trunk (a real piece of wood) and is holding a lamb.  A flock of five sheep is included.  I bought it, and it will be another addition to my traditional Mexican Nativity scene next Christmas.

The View from the Seventh Floor

After spending most of Saturday afternoon at the ex-hacienda of Chautla, we drove on to the city of Puebla where we had a hotel room reserved for the night.  The hotel was nothing spectacular nor picturesque... bland, modern accommodations on the outskirts of the city catering more to people visiting Puebla on business rather than tourists.  However it was a part of the chain with which Alejandro has hotel points.  

Our room was on the seventh floor, and from our room and from the windows in the hallway, we had views in three directions.

I knew Puebla very well because on my first trip to Mexico, nearly fifty years ago, I studied at the University of the Americas located in the nearby town of Cholula.  My, how Puebla has changed in those intervening years!  Cholula used to be a rural town, but now it has been absorbed by metropolitan Puebla. 

From a hallway window facing the southeast, we could look toward the center of the city.

None of the skyscrapers on the horizon existed back when I was a student.

The only thing that I would have recognized was the church dome on the hill in the La Paz neighborhood of Puebla.  As a student I could stand on the edge of the campus, look out across the fields and see that dome in the distance.

From a hallway window facing the northeast there was a hazy view of La Malinche, the sixth highest mountain in Mexico.  It too was clearly visible from campus... although back then I didn't even know the name of that peak.

From our room there view was a view of the volcanoes to the southwest... a very, very hazy view of the volcanoes.  It wasn't until later, as the sun dipped behind Popocatépetl that the mountain was seen clearly in silhouette.

 

Even the next morning, the view of the volcanoes was hazy.  It is a sad commentary on our increasingly polluted planet.  I remember the crystal clear views of the mountains every single day when I was a student here.  

An English Castle in Puebla

The main sightseeing destination on our weekend excursion in the state of Puebla was the former hacienda of Chautla.  The estate was granted to the Marquis of Selva Negra in the 1700s.  The property was expropriated following the Mexican Revolution of 1910 and divided among local peasants.  The manor house fell into ruin, but was restored and turned into a resort hotel.  We didn't stay there, but we toured the beautiful grounds.

The gate to the manor house

The hacienda chapel

From the terrace of the house there is a view of the garden.

In the 1820s, Soledad Gutiérrez, the widow of the fourth Marquis of Selva Negra, remarried to an Englishman by the name of Thomas Gillow.  Gillow was a jeweler who had moved to Mexico City and established himself with the local high society.  After marrying the "marquesa" he gave up his jewelry business and devoted himself to the running of the hacienda. He made numerous farming innovations such as the importation of the first metal plough to Mexico.  

When his wife died intestate, Gillow found himself at risk of losing everything, so, in order to maintain ownership of the hacienda, he married his stepdaughter (one of the Soledad's children from her first marriage).  That marriage produced a son, Eulogio Gillow, who inherited the estate upon his father's death in 1877.  

Eulogio was a priest and rose in rank to become the Archbishop of Oaxaca.  However he also followed in his father's footsteps and continued to run the hacienda and to introduce modern agricultural technology.  He built a dam on the property and constructed Latin America's first hydroelectric plant.  He planned to establish an agricultural college, and he built a house in the style of an English castle to serve as a residence for the teachers.  The "castle" is one of the most picturesque, albeit incongruous, sights in the state of Puebla.  It is a popular tourist destination, and has served as a setting for several Mexican soap operas.

 The view from the roof of the "castle"

Eulogio Gillow's plans for an agricultural college never came to pass. With the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution Gillow went into exile in California, and did not return to Mexico until shortly before his death in 1922.

The "castle" and the property around the lake do not belong to the adjacent hotel, but are operated as a cultural and recreational park by the state of Puebla.