Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico » Mazamitla

Mazamitla Street Scenes

Rosana — Wed, 27 May 2009 15:52:42 +0000

Oct. 23, 2006 –

Here is a selection of photos from that day trip we took to Mazamitla a while back. It really is a nice place!

Mazamitla Street Scenes is a post from: Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico

Recycling Containers

Rosana — Tue, 26 May 2009 16:29:03 +0000

Sept. 27, 2006 — These are some of the nicest recycling containers I’ve seen in Mexico. They were in a nice neighborhood in Mazamitla and did not seem to be filled with garbage, which I have seen elsewhere… and not just in Mexico!

Recycling Containers is a post from: Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico

Mazamitla Shopping

Rosana — Tue, 26 May 2009 15:31:40 +0000

September 18, 2006 — Mazamitla had quite a few souvenir-type stores. You had to look at a lot of cutesy stuff to find good things, but they were there. If I often served salad to a dozen people, I would have bought a beautiful wooden turned bowl, but I passed on that. My best find was a 35-peso foot massager. After I paid for it, the woman who ran the shop let me take her picture:

Once home, I laid out my purchases on our indoor dining table: a huge bottle of homemade pickles, the foot massager, and a couple of wooden spoons. The table, by the way, is made of pieces of marble. My mother probably turned over in her grave when I bought the pickles, as who knows just how they were preserved!

Mazamitla Shopping is a post from: Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico

Inside a Mexican Church

Rosana — Tue, 26 May 2009 15:29:20 +0000

Sept 3, 2006 – Here are some pictures from the church on the plaza of Mazamitla, Jalisco, a town we visited. There was a little alcove devoted to Mary, just to to the right of the front door:

Here’s a closeup of Mary:
The window of the alcove continues the same theme:
Just outside the door to the alcove were these two. The first was labeled the Virgen of Zapopan, and the other was completely unlabeled. Each was in a locked glass case.

Across the aisle,on the other side of the church was this vividly done Christ:

Comment from the old blog:

Anonymous said…

The one that is unlabled is called the Santo Nino de Atocha

Inside a Mexican Church is a post from: Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico

The Elusive Mazamitla Waterfall

Rosana — Tue, 26 May 2009 15:25:59 +0000

Sept. 20, 2006 — Our trusty guidebook Moon Guadalajara: Including Lake Chapala had a few pages on Mazamitla in which a walk to a waterfall was mentioned. It sounded like a few blocks but ended up more like a couple of miles, up and down hilly cobblestone or dirt streets. The waterfall was in a quiet development of what seemed to be mostly second homes for Guadalajarans, like this:

Eventually we reached a sign that said it was still another kilometer to the waterfall, so we rested a while and I got a photo of Kelly. Then he and I went back to get the car while our friends hiked on a bit further.
I had chatted a little on the way down towards the waterfall with a couple of Mexican women coming back from it. When they passed us in their car as we hiked up and up a street near where we had turned around, they stopped a minute and asked if we had gone as far as the falls. We said no, that since our car was parked up by the church, we had been getting a little tired. In a flash, we were ensconced in the back seat of their car, and as we rode in style my feet were so grateful!

Our conversation was in a combination of Spanish and English. One of the women didn’t seem to be comfortable in English, but the other one had often visited her father outside of San Francisco and her two brothers in Sacramento. I’m so often reminded of how closely intertwined our two countries are!

3 Comments from the old blog:

pedro said…

i’ve been following this blog fer a while.
great stiff.
just so ya know we were interested in that casa ya bought but ya beat us to it by gettin’ down here before us.
pedro
Anonymous said…

We started out on the walk to the waterfall, we were told it was a ten minute walk. We walked an hour in then gave up and never reached it. A friend later told me that she did walk all the way, and it was about two and a half hours each way. Very steep road then path.
I said…

Two and a half hours each way…hmm, glad we didn’t keep trying! And Pedro, glad we beat you to our house! Some friends here were thinking of buying it too.

Rosana

The Elusive Mazamitla Waterfall is a post from: Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico

Mazamitla, Jalisco: a Charming Mountain Town

Rosana — Tue, 12 May 2009 17:51:14 +0000

It’s a short day trip from the Lake Chapala area, where we live, to the delightful mountain town of Mazamitla. It took us under 2 hours each way. Many well-to-do and middle class Guadalajarans have second homes in Mazamitla, or they spend weekends and holidays in some of the rustic knotty-pine cabins that seem to be everywhere, in the town and surrounding it.

Mazamitla has a population of something above 15,000 people, and with an elevation of about 7200 feet is located some 2200 feet higher than Lake Chapala. It’s cooler. I asked a local resident if it ever snowed there, and she said it didn’t but that winter nights could be very cold.

The central plaza has an elaborate church built in the 1940s, a kiosk, and plenty of pigeons for tourists to throw bread crumbs to.

What is there to do in Mazamitla? Eating, for starters. We had a delicious lunch in an open-air patio at the Posada Alpina, right across the plaza from the church. We didn’t happen to sample any of the regional specialties, though there are many. Another restaurant which is said to have the best food in town is La Troje, at Galeana 53, several blocks north of the plaza.

Shopping includes a number of small shops selling trinkets, mostly made of wood. There is lots of hiking in the area, or just walking around the town gives you plenty of exercise! ATVs are popular… for all ages. This father was amused that I was photographing his son driving; the boy looked to be about 7.

We were there from late morning till late afternoon one busy Saturday, and in all that time I saw one foreign couple, heard one foreign man buying something in a shop with a strong American accent, and saw a car drive by that seemed to have a couple of foreigners in it. Mazamitla is a town based on tourism, much like Bernal, Queretaro, where we lived last year; and like Bernal, the tourists are predominantly Mexican.

When it was time to go home, we could have happily stayed the night, and there are many accommodations for doing so. Reservations may be needed for popular times. The Cabañas Monteverde looked very nice when we walked past it, but there are plenty more. Mazamitla is a very pleasant getaway!

Mazamitla, Jalisco: a Charming Mountain Town is a post from: Mexico with Heart - Living, Traveling, and Retiring in Mexico