Mexico - Winter 23/24

Trip List Calendar

2024-01-01 : San Miguel de Allende
This morning we stopped in, again, at Bici Burro to see if they were open and if they have a tour we can hop onto for tomorrow. Not open. Understandable. We’ll try again tomorrow but it’s really short notice so it’s unlikely we’ll get on a bike tour tomorrow. Plan B is to go for a visit to Sanctuary of Jesús Nazareno de Atotonilco.

After Bici Burro we went for a scenic neighborhood walk. We climbed up to the Mirador viewpoint but the view wasn’t very good because of a smoky haze. We assume it was from last night’s fireworks. We then walked to the El Chorro park which we visited with Elissa in 2017. Then, we walked randomly through neighborhoods El Chorro (including Parque Juárez), and Guadiana, and then popped back into neighborhood San Antonio on our return.

I was getting a little noshy so we looked for a place for a light lunch. We looked at a few places, but decided to go back to El Correo, where we had breakfast on our first day.
Tonight we discovered a restaurant that does…… only shrimp cocktail. We saw the camaroncito menu from outside, and recognized it was something to do with shrimp (camaron), but… expected more of a menu once we got inside…? Nope. You can have shrimp cocktail… large, medium, small, or on crackers. We both ordered small but holy shrimp cocktail there were a lot of shrimps in the smalls. We couldn’t even finish them.


2024-01-02 : Sanctuary of Jesús Nazareno de Atotonilco
Our good bus karma continues. We were told that the bus leaves for Atotonilco every hour on the hour, but assuming we may have been given erroneous information, we wandered up to the bus stop about 30 minutes early, and asked about the bus. It was already sitting there - on the opposite side of the street from where we were told. We hopped right on and away we went. For our return, we sat and waited only about five minutes for the bus.

There’s not much to Atotonilco. The town is teeny and the UNESCO cathedral is small but very impressive. We had a good look at it then walked down the road and found the non-UNESCO cathedral in town, San Miguelito.
In reviewing various blogs about what to do in SMA, one thing that was mentioned was the Biblioteca de San Miguel (public library). We had a look at that this afternoon - it’s a great library with countless rooms and levels and some great art in the meeting room and gift shop.


2024-01-03 : Travel San Miguel de Allende to Querétaro
A few days ago Brent noticed a bakery not far from our AirBnB. Like, a proper bakery, not a coffee shop bakery.

Yesterday we went there for the first time and were surprised and delighted to discover it’s a self-serve bakery where you take a tray and then go behind the counter and pick your own items to buy.

I was so intrigued that I forgot to take photos yesterday. Today it was our last stop on our way out of SMA and I did not forget this time.
Today we walked to the bus depot in SMA, took the bus to Querétaro, and then took a taxi to our AirBnB. We’re staying at the same place, in the same room (canary room) as last time. I am so happy to see that Querétaro and our AirBnB are pretty much exactly the way I remember them!!
I wasn’t feeling super ambitious this evening but we still wanted to get out for a walk. Brent suggested doing a spin around our very interesting block, so we did that and then had a beer on ‘our’ roof.

Very happy to see some familiar sights: Los Arcos, Templo La Cruz, Taco Tucson, the food trucks down the road, and El Tanque all decorated up for the season.


2024-01-04 : Errand Day in Querétaro
We have some stuff to do to get our feet under us before we can get down to some serious touristing.

We walked down to Plaza de Las Americas to hit the Soriana (for some Griego yogurt). Since we were on Avenida Constituenties anyway we headed west so Brent could hit a bank machine and then kept going to visit the Transportation Department to get some QROBus Tarjetas (rechargeable bus passes).

There were a few transit stops along the way so we tried the QROBus vending machines at each but none of them would dispense the Tarjetas, only recharge ones you already have.

When we got to the Transportation Department they said to try the transit stop across the road. Before we got to the transit stop, there was a Super Q store that is supposed to sell them. We stopped in there and they directed us back to the Transportation Department. We decided to head back there and use the machine that Brent used in 2022 and not ask a person for help. We went to the machine at the Transportation Department and its vending machines also were refusing to dispense Tarjetas. Hmmmm.

We started talking with another couple who were there trying. They said that the city seems to be completely out of Tarjetas - they tried all day yesterday and were told to try again today… but… still no Tarjetas. After talking some more with the woman (the man went off to inquire at the desk) we discovered that they’re from Vancouver… and they’re staying at La Encantada. Crazy. The first other English-speakers we meet here and they’re staying at the same place as us!! We’re going to meet them on the roof for bird-o-clock.

We then returned home via the Mercado for lunch and siesta.


2024-01-05 : Errand Day #2 and church tour #1
Today is going to be another errand day, but to start things off we walked down the street to the bakery. The one we planned on was not baking… all they had was day-old stuff so we walked to a different bakery. We took a chance on their croissants and they’re actually great! Real croissants (not just the crescent-shaped bread we get almost everywhere out of Europe). The weather was nice enough for us to eat on the roof, and the neighbor’s peacocks came up on their roof to look around while we ate. All around a fantastic morning.
We had a great errand morning today, including getting our bus passes (Tarjetas). There is an enormous Mercado near us that we somehow missed when we were here before. We had a good long look at that. Walking home, we stopped for an impromptu look at Templo de Teresitas, then bought some groceries and Brent made salsa for lunch.
This evening we went for a walk around the centro historico. I plotted us a route that took us past several of the local churches.

We first went east and saw our nearby cathedral that we see all the time, Templo La Cruz, and its companion, Capilla del Calvarito. Continuing east, we saw the modern and unusual Templo Expiatorio del Sagrado Corazón de Jesús de la Misericordia. We then saw the much more traditional San Isidro.

We then headed west and saw Templo de la Merced, Templo de la Congregacion de Guadalupe, Parroquia de Santiago, Templo de San Antonio, San Francisco cathedral, and Teresitas.

We also had a nice walk through a number of parks and shopping corridors, and, in a most delightfully random way, made a new friend. We wandered through Plaza del Corregidora, which is a small park lined with restaurants that we visited a number of times in 2022 (including the infamous cricket incident). While we were walking through we were approached by one of the restaurant hostesses (because they all try to call you in). We brushed her off and then she asked Brent if he speaks German. Well isn’t that unusual. So I started talking with her in German. She lived in Germany for three years and has a son there in Köln. We exchanged phone numbers and are going to meet for a German conversation on Sunday morning.


2024-01-06 : Circus recon and Church Tour #2
We’ve decided to go to the circus on Friday evening. Since we haven’t got a car, I wanted to make sure we had an effective and affordable method of getting to and from the circus grounds before we bought tickets. So, this morning we rode the 134 bus (using our spanky new QROBus Tarjetas) up to the grounds, which are behind a huge shopping mall. We had a look at the big top which is up but empty at this time.

We then took the 134 back again but got off early to get a bit of a walk in. We had a look at Templo de Santo Domingo from the street and went to the Mercado that we frequented in 2022 (Mercado La Cruz) and had lunch at a little stand there called Doña Beni.
Tonight we decided to finish our church tour and then go to Jardín Zenea, which is the bustling park with nightly dancing. Things didn’t go quite as we planned.

We saw most of the churches on the east side of centro last night, so tonight was for the western churches. We saw Templo de la Congregacion de Guadalupe and Templo de San Antonio (among others).

While we were at Catedral de Querétaro, we were approached by a random guy (Robert, an American who has been living in Querétaro for about two years), who asked if we were interested in looking at churches. When I answered in the affirmative, he just started on about the best ones to see, and then he took us on an impromptu tour to show us some stuff.

There is an arts center beside Santa Rosa de Viterbo that Brent and I ignored today that actually houses a small archaeological site where the city’s aqueduct actually ends. Robert wanted to show us one of his other favorite churches, so off we trotted and he took us to Templo de San Antonio, which he knows by a different name. I told him we’d already seen it that night and it was my favorite so far! I can’t wait for Santa Rosa de Viterbo to be open on Tuesday so Brent and I can go back there and see it, plus the arts center. I also hope it works out for us to get together sometime soon with Robert and his wife.


2024-01-07 : Easy day in Querétaro
I’ve been having some trouble with heel cracks for a few days - something that happens if I don’t stay on top of my heavy callouses. Anyway, we are going to Michoacán tomorrow to see the monarch butterflies again and I want to be in good shape for walking so I have to give my heels a chance to heal a bit. We met Lorena for coffee and Deutsch sprechen, then walked home via Panico (our favorite panaderia).


2024-01-08 : Michoacán Monarch Butterflies
When we were in Querétaro a couple years ago we did some tours with Bike Tour Querétaro (which does more than just bike tours). It is a company run by a young couple, Uriel and Ana.

Their tour company is still going strong so we asked them if they could (1) take us back to Michoacán to see the monarch butterflies, and (2) drive us up to Jalpan on the 23rd when we move up there.

Today was butterfly day! Yay! Because the weather was cooler we opted to hike the whole way instead of taking the horses part way. Unfortunately, because it was quite cold, the butterflies were all sleeping quite soundly in the trees the whole time and we didn’t get to see much at all. We saw a few butterflies on the ground - almost too cold to move. Apparently February is the best time to go, which is when we were there last time. Anyway… we had a good hike up and back and sort of saw some butterflies.

We did have a couple of great meals. Uriel and Ana took us first for breakfast at Antojeria Juarez in Querétaro. The proprietor is from Amealco and brings blue corn flour from there to make her own tortillas. Then, for lunch after the hike we returned to Cocina Economica Doña Osve, which is where we tried huitlacoche last time. We had to have it again this time. It was good but I think I liked my potato taco better this time.


2024-01-09 : Viterbo and Acequia Madre
Today we followed a couple of recommendations from our acquaintance, Robert.

We started the day with breakfast at Küni, which was muy rico.

Then we headed down to Santa Rosa de Viterbo (which is decorated with an over-the-top amount of… not gold), and the cultural center next to it. Robert had told us that the archaeological bits in the cultural center were the original end of the aqueduct, but while we were there, we learned that’s not correct. It’s actually a water system that was fed from the rio PRIOR to the construction of the aqueduct. It is called Acequia Madre and it’s really cool (even if it’s not what we thought it was).
Tonight we took it easy and walked over to Plaza de Los Fundadores (near our AirBnB). We had a little bit of sushi and watched the people go by. Then we walked back with a quick stop to see the interior of Templo La Cruz for the very first time even though we’ve seen it from the outside zillions of times. It’s kind of ordinary for a Catholic Church but it has a souvenir store in it and a lovely courtyard. Unfortunately by the time we were done looking at the courtyard the souvenir store was closed. Oops.


2024-01-10 : Los Arcos and Hercules
This morning we walked up to the start of Los Arcos and then discovered that we were right beside the Hercules neighborhood, which is up for consideration as. Barrio Magico. So we took a wander through Hercules as well. When we got there the sole came off of one of my Keens. We bought some crazy glue (Kola Loca) at the nearest OXXO, and after a quick repair, off we went again. At the end of our walk we had gorditas from the food truck down the road.
There are two neighborhoods in Querétaro that are up for consideration as Barrios Mágicos - El Tepe and Hercules. It is my intention to visit both of them while we’re here. I didn’t realize that the entry to the Hercules neighborhood was essentially right at the start of Los Arcos. We discovered that when we got there and decided to extend our walk into Hercules. It is REALLY interesting. I think we’ll go back to see more of it before we leave. There was too much to see everything this morning. We also dipped briefly across the railroad tracks into a little neighborhood called La Estación (I guess because it is above the Hercules train station). Really cute little neighborhood but probably also really noisy from the trains.


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