And now... the adventure...
First thing yesterday morning, I was coming back from the bathroom and our host Jamie was outside already so we said hello. I was looking at the sun beginning to shine on the mountains surrounding us and commented how pretty it was. He started to tell me about a place up in the mountains that has geography that is one of a kind in the world.
He said we could take Igor up there and he would go with us and be our guide. But I know how these mountain roads are, and they are not suitable for Igor! (We still haven't figured out how we're getting Igor out of town to begin with!)
Plus, I'm doing all of this in Spanish, and I wasn't sure I was properly understanding him. He said his daughter speaks English and we could talk to her.
Well it turns out that the daughter Marianna (34) drove all the way up here from Pachuca because Jaime had told her we wanted to go up into the mountains. And yes, Marianna spoke English very well. Anyhow, we decided to take them up on their offer using Marianna's car, and Jamie would be our guide.
This all happened while I was writing yesterday's blog... we took off right away, so never got it finished until later in the day.
We drove about 11 kms (7 miles) to a place called El Contadero. And as I expected, the roads were not suitable for RVs!
Our guide Jamie.
He was right, there are some incredible rock formations!
You end up climbing through these narrow crevices like a slot canyon.
Following our guide Jamie.
Cool rocks!
Through daughter Marianna, Jamie told us that millions of years ago there were two volcanic eruptions, and the lava from one solidified rocks that already existed from the first one. Or something like that!
Sometimes there are trees trying to grow in between the huge rocks.
It takes up quite a large area. It would be easy to get lost!
In some areas there are steps and ladders built.
Squeeze through!
Definitely not made for fat people!
Almost there.
Me coming through afterwards.
Marianna coming down one of the ladders.
Kevin, Ruth, and Marianna.
What an adventure!
Eventually, you climb out to the top for some beautiful views.
There is a small chapel at the top.
It is really well maintained.
View from the top.
We took a circular route back to town. Once again on some pretty sketchy roads that Igor wouldn't have been able to do. None of us had lunch, so we went into the center of Mineral del Chico for the first time. Jamie bumped into some local friends and went for a beer, but we offered to take Marianna for lunch with us.
Our host Jamie is an artist and he painted this door to the doctor's office.
The central plaza and the 16th century church.
The menu.
I had the barbacoa en salsa verde.
Goat in green salsa with potatoes.
Ruth had the puerco con verdolagas.
Pork with purslane.
Marianna had the tortilla soup. The bill for all three of us with a non alcoholic drink each was 510 pesos ($39 CAD, $28 USD).
What a great day we ended up having!
We hadn't talked about money with Jamie or Marianne, but they ended up charging us 500 pesos for the tour which was very fair considering they used their car and gas. We think they enjoyed spending time with us as well.
We've decided we're going to stay here through to at least Monday. The parking price is cheap, and there is a collectivo going into the city of Pachuca, which doesn't have suitable RV parking. We'll go into Pachuca either tomorrow or Saturday and stay overnight in a hotel before retuning the next day.
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Black Friday is officially here!
And in Canada...
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