Puerto Morelos Culture

This weekend we had a presentation of local talent, actually it was the closing ceremony for a weeklong theatre presentation from various artists. Here in the park gazebo beginning at sundown is a local band Gnomos. Following was the flamenco dance class that did an amazing performance!! We were all so proud of Dinah!! I was taking lessons but due to too many absences and pure fear of this performance I did not continue. I will take credit for making 2 of the skirts though! Maite, the dance teacher, wowed everyone with her solo performance!

Merida for passport

Faced with an expiring passport and not wanting to give up my current one while applying for a new one, I had to travel to Merida to the U.S. Consulate. I have to say I was very impressed with their service. There must have been 150 Mexicans standing in line trying to get visas and I was ushered to an area with no line!! Unbelievable...so easy! Merida is a really nice colonial city about 4 hours west of here. I stayed with friends Ralf and Yvonne, who have remodeled a downtown house hacienda style...and then we went to hang out at their beachhouse near Progresso for a couple days lounging by the pool with a view of the Gulf of Mexico.....poor me!

Unimog

Our expedition team will have this Unimog for traveling! They are amazing 4 wheel drive vehicles with high ground clearance and capacity to carry lots of equipment. The box on the back is completely sound proof and we can edit in comfort as we go down the road! It is at the Mercedes-Benz place right now waiting on brake parts mainly. What an adventure this will be!!

Crystal Caves of Naica

These giant crystals found deep (1000 feet) inside an old siver,zinc and lead mine below Naica Mountain in the Chihuahuan Desert of Mexico were discovered by 2 miners in the year 2000. We were supposed to go, but there was a mixup with our permit and the Italian scientists were having their time, so we will go back in September and I hope this will be ME in the photo!! These gypsum crystals were formed submerged in mineral rich water. The temperature down there is around 136 degrees Fahrenheit (58 degrees Celsius), so one cannot stay long. Imagine the energy!!!

Mole Sauce

What is mole and where does it come from? There are so many ingredients in mole that it is truly a labor of love to make it. For that reason a lot of people buy it already made and then enhance it with their personal touch, but there is such a thing as a place that will make it to your family specifications! It is called a Molino.The smell inside that place is incredibly delicious! Mole is prepared with dried chile peppers (commonly ancho, pasilla, mulato and chipotle), ground nuts and/or seeds (almonds, indigenous peanuts, and/or sesame seeds), spices, Mexican chocolate (cacao ground with sugar and cinnamon and occasionally nuts), salt, and a variety of other ingredients including charred avocado leaves, onions, garlic. We even took some on our camping trip and had fireside enchiladas with mole...WoW!

Valle de Bravo

This village is about 2 hours southwest of Mexico City tucked away in the mountains nestled along Lake Avándaro. It is a natural area with tall pine trees, flowers everywhere and known for a popular paragliding destination because of the thermal winds and the topography. It was the end of Semana Santa so there were lots of activities and good food! The indigenous Temascaltepec Indian women in the square.

Art Exhibits

I saw 2 incredible art exhibits while here....one was outdoors along Avenida Reforma, one of the main streets downtown....it was a lovely Sunday afternoon and hardly any people which was amazing to me. They change the exhibit every month...this one was of paintings and sculptures by Leonora Carrington, who is 91 years old now. The significance of that is that most of the LARGE bronze sculpures were done last year!! As you can see she is a surrealist artist,
but I think she has definently been to another world!

Ashes and Snow

I had seen the video in Cancun, but being inside this "nomadic" museum was really moving !!The exhibit includes 200 sepia-toned photographs and a film by Canadian-born artist Gregory Colbert, housed in a soaring, temple-like structure built of shipping containers and bamboo that now occupies the Zocolo in Mexico City. It's a striking, stripped-down setting that, with its dramatic lighting and piped-in, meditative music, is an appropriate setting for Colbert's images of elephants, lemurs and dolphins and the beautiful models he has posing with them. I think my favorite was his swimming with the whales.

Mexico City

Wow! I never thought I would love a big city. And especially not the biggest one in the world or close to it...at 25 million + people! I think its the cultural preservation I am in love with. AND I was fortunate to have great personal tour guides who were born and raised here, friends and family of my friends! What a great taste I got of this city...Ana drove us around pointing out this red building she just sold for $52 million dollars (US). First realtor I have known who specializes in selling skyscrapers! This other one is the tallest skyscraper in all of Latin America at 55 floors...Torre Mayor...remember that Mexico City is built on a lake bed and these buildings have to be earthquake resistant, unlike the buildings in New York City that are built on rock. I even rode the metro (subway)...and I can tell you that I was the only white person there...I saw some strange things, but felt very safe with my friend. Had dinner at a landmark restaurant...Cafe de Tacuba..founded 1912. I will most likely be back to this city to do some editing for the documentary and I look forward to it!

Dunas de Yeso (Gypsum Dunes)

A surreal landscape, made of 99% pure white gypsum sand, these dunes are located in the same valley as the fresh water pools of Cuatro Ciénegas. The dunes are formed by sand collecting around some vegetation and then they grow. Some of them are huge! I accidentally left my sandals there, but luckily we went back the next day to do some more filming and Voila! they were there right where I left them. There was a hellashish sandstorm that started as soon as we arrived, getting sand in every conceivable place...not too good for camera equipment you can imagine. We decided to stay after dark and celebrate a good days work! And to look for nocturnal animal life amoung the vegetation....we found spiders....good for our arachnid scientist. Jerónimo being creative with our lights and his time exposure photography!

Cuatro Ciénegas (4 Marshes)

Cuatro Ciénegas is in the midst of the arid Chihuahuan desert, between the 2 biggest mountain ranges of Mexico, to the east the Sierra Madre Oriental and to the west the Sierra Madre Occidental...the humidity that comes from the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific are blocked by both ranges which caused the creation of this desert...you would never know these clear water pools were tucked away in the tall grasses.... that contain endemic species (found nowhere else on earth)of fishes, reptiles, amphibians and plants. Most importantly they contain fresh water STROMATOLITES (ancient cyanobacteria that invented photosynthesis), allowing life as we know it on this planet. I have seen prehistoric life with my own eyes. Another scientific treasure of Mexico! Flor de Maria and Jerónimo doing some underwater photography.

Nice Accommodations

We didn´t rough it the whole time....in fact we stayed in some pretty nice places. I would recommend the Hotel Misión Marielena in Cuatro Ciénegas. Nice, quiet, great view, quaint courtyards...as is typical in Mexico...you can never tell from the outside what is inside those walls! A look down the street from the hotel. All 12 of us....whew what a feat it is to get all of us in one place at the same time!!

Logistics

Sometimes the interviews were calculated and the setting was ideal, other times it was very spontaneous. And then there were just plain old laid back discussions and pondering of the evidence. Because of where we were, it was necessary to take along lots of water and extra fuel.

Canteras

We traveled to this location (marked in red) in northern Mexico (only a few miles southeast of Big Bend), as it is an important site for finding fossils because it's on the edge of an ancient sea. In other words, it was the coastline 90 million years ago. Most of the sites we visited were quarries (canteras) where they were already opening up the earth so it made it easy to find things. Now I know where those beautiful rocks I have on my patio floor come from!
Looking closely or turning over a rock can yield an amazing find.Filming the explanation of a find in process. All the Germans spoke Spanish as this documentary will be for Mexico!