Taxco y Tepotzlan
Hola mis amigos,
Woo, this past weekend was incredible! The exchange program organized a two day trip to las Grutas de Cacajuamilpa, Taxco and Tepotzlan for the exchange students. We started in las Grutas (huge caves) about 4 hours south of Mexico city. The whole tour took about an hour and a half because its over 2 km of caves, but it was super interesting. We then got back on the bus to go to Taxco, a half hour away.
Taxco is the coolest little town known for silver…so I kinda, maybe bought some jewelery 🙂 Mexico has over 40 ‘pueblos magicos’ (Magic Towns), Taxco being one of them. These towns have rules that keep them very traditional and many of them have cobbled streets or the houses and shops all have to be a certain color (in Taxco, all building have to be white). I’ve been to other pueblos magicos before from my trip in high school, and they are just gorgeous. Living in the city and then visiting these towns gives you a totally different perspective on Mexico. Anyways, we toured the city, ended up in the centro and watched folkloric dancers, went in the cathedral, bought some (or a lot) of silver and then had dinner/drinks later. I’m pretty sure I’m going to retire here…
The next day we were up early to go to Tepotzlan, about a 2.5 hour trip back towards DF. Tepotzlan is another pueblo magico and is also known for this huge mountain that you can climb with a pyramid on top. Naturally, I chose to climb it, not knowing how tough it was going to be until we were a third of the way up and I was about to die. We toughed it out, got to the top, got attacked by these raccoon/possum things that found cheetos in my friend’s bag, and then were able to breathe and soak in the beautiful view. It was honestly one of the best moments of the trip. Then it started to rain so we booked it down the mountain to find food 🙂
FUTURE STUDY ABROAD STUDENTS: Take advantage of these trips. La Ibero is pretty good about organizing trips like this and they’re very economical for students (it was a little over $100 for the entire weekend, lodging and food included). Being able to travel to these small towns and see what they have to offer gives you an entirely new view on what Mexico is like. Yeah, DF is awesome, but that’s the city. Mexico is such a beautiful country, but you need to see what else is out there besides the city and La Ibero. I have such a huge Mexico bucket list from everyone telling me “you need to go here!” that I probably won’t have time to finish it.
Ok ok more posts to come muy prontos. Cuidense y nos vemos!
Liz