The state of Michoacán is an uncommon place. From the sugar cane fields of Los Reyes, the avocados, coffee, and macadamia nuts of Uruapan, the melon fields of Apatzingán, the rice fields of Lombardia and Nueva Italia, the pears of Ucareo, the pescado blanco of Patzcuaro, to the ruggedly pristine Pacific coast, the endless pine-crested […]
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Three thousand years ago engineers in Persia devised an ingenious solution to one of mankind’s most serious problems in areas without rivers and lakes: how to get water from point A, where it abounds, to point B, where it is desperately needed. Today their invention is generally referred to by its Arabic names, qanat or foggara, also […]
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If you are coming from Patzcuaro, a city of about 40,000, when you arrive in Uruapan you will find that this city of over 200,000 is pretty much like a circus. If you come from stately and subdued Morelia, you will find it vibrant and much more active. It is the hub of the agricultural dynamo of […]
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When the honorable and distinguished city leaders of Cocula, Jalisco select me as communications consultant for their mariachi museum, I shall recommend minor enhancements. The host who greets visitors and discreetly flips a switch to light up exhibits would also turn on background music, mariachis of course. If cost is a concern in a snug […]
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Guadalajara, Mexico’s second-largest city happens to be situated right next to a beautiful pine and oak forest covering more than 36,000 hectares (139 square miles). For as long as anyone can remember, el Bosque de la Primavera has been referred to as “Guadalajara’s lungs” and in 1980, when big-time development plans threatened the woods, the […]
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On Wednesday, March 6, 2013, the first book ever on the geology of the Primavera Forest was launched at ITESO University in Guadalajara. La Apasionante Geología del Área de Protección de Flora y Fauna La Primavera was written by U.S. Peace Corps Volunteer and geologist Barbara Dye during her two years of service at the woodland sanctuary. Although written […]
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Beautiful beaches abound all along Mexico’s Nayarit Riviera. Here are two more gorgeous hidden gems and a historic beach town. Playa Los Tortugas is an exquisite five-mile stretch of beach on the coast of Nayarit in the still unspoiled area of Boca de Chila. This portion of the coast is often referred to as Costa […]
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The masses of beautiful violet and yellow flowers of the water hyacinth ( Eichhornia crassipes) add an attractive splash of colour in the Lake Chapala landscape during the rainy season but the lirio as the locals call it, is a serious problem for many of their economic activities. The hyacinth was first described in 1824, in Brazil. In […]
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Inside Mexico On February 20th, 1943, after a couple of weeks of ominous earth tremors and strange underground sounds, the Paricutín volcano in Michoacán, erupted among prayers and rogations, fire displays and intense noise. The church bells of San Juan Parangaricutiro, five kilometers down the narrow valley, rang by themselves, dancing with the moving ground. […]
Continue Readingoriginally – galleries/247 – with no article Paricutin is a famous volcano that popped up in a farmer’s field in 1943 and continued to grow until 1952 to form a large cinder cone. Collateral flowing lava covered the valley and inundated adjacent villages of San Salvador and San Juan. The flow was slow enough so no […]
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