Mexico Day 3

We are gradually overcoming the jet-lag/lack of sleep and managed to enjoy the fantastic archeological museum in Mexico City, the 7th largest museum in the world. The architect was Brazilian and the museum was opened in the 1960s. It’s wonderful that so much has been excavated and has remained in Mexico. The artefacts were well-displayed but the captions were in Spanish only. They didn’t have audio-guides unfortunately, so we relied on guide Francisco who preferred to tell stories rather than facts.

We had a sandwich there before getting the minibus for the 3 hour drive over the mountains to Puebla, where we spend one night on our way south and east. The drive was dramatic once we finally cleared pollution and busy traffic of the city. We climbed to 3000metres then stopped at the other side of the mountains to view 2 volcanos, the highest of which is 5400m and about 20 km from our vantage point. While we started taking pictures a dirty brown grey plume started blowing from the further volcano. It was erupting as we took photos but was not as spectacular as those we saw in Equador.

We reached the city of Puebla de Los Angeles. At first we were wondering why on earth we were staying in such a huge industrial sprawl, but it soon became clear. It is a UNESCO world heritage site for its colonial architecture in the old centre. We walked through pretty colourful streets till we reached a courtyard guarded by police. It was Patio de los Azulejos, a courtyard of blocks of private flats, the walls of which provided classic examples of how ‘talavera’ tiles were incorporated into buildings, inside and out. My blip. Apparently early settlers who came from Talavera de la Reine in Spain introduced these tiles and associated ceramics. We saw some beautiful examples of this glazed pottery which is now become synonymous with Puebla.

On our way back to the hotel, which is really pretty in the old Spanish style, we called at the cathedral, the exterior of which was plain grey limestone, but inside had beautiful wood carvings with the ubiquitous gold paint. The alter mural was unusual as one of the angels beside the madonna was in red and carried a sun. The ceiling comprised many domes decorated with beautiful tiles, quite plain and possible influenced by Moorish Islamic style.