Artist James Vitale, owner and operator of El Encanto, a boutique eco-hotel or maybe a healing place or perhaps a vibrant retreat for creativity and education, came onto his verandah to say “Good morning, Mexico.” Living in peace and tranquility in the pueblo of Santa Cruz de Miramar, between San Blas and Tepic in the […]
Continue ReadingIn my younger days, when I was relatively fearless or disturbingly dumb, I occasionally operated a motor vehicle on the mean streets of New York City, in broad daylight and at night, and once the wrong way on a one-way. Without hesitation, I ventured onto Los Angeles freeways at rush hour, through interstate construction zones […]
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After many downhill twists and turns, at the very end of a road built for Nayarit royalty, is a little lake that could have spilled from a book of fairy tales. La laguna Santa Maria del Oro, in the crater of a long-ago volcano, is near enough to perfect to forever please Christopher French. He’s been […]
Continue ReadingThis is the story of Mexico City College and the hidden black trick. Some of you may have missed Morris (Moe) Williams, even though he was out and about for more than four decades. Beginning in the fall of 1947, he was an Azteca, a player on the American-style football team at Mexico City College. […]
Continue ReadingLet the word go out across all the land, “The Baptists are coming, the Baptists are coming” — to Mexico. Do what? You say they’ve been here for a hundred years? On my, cancel the cry. I don’t know but I’ve been told that representatives of Protestant religions have been trying to save Catholic Mexico […]
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Southbound gringos of retirement age have the uncanny ability to immediately identify changes that should be made in Mexican lifestyle. Maybe you’ve heard the laundry list. “Punctuality is in desperate need of instant adjustment. Mexicans simply can’t tell time.” “There would be no language barrier if Mexicans would just speak English.” “These people are devoid […]
Continue ReadingHenry Wadsworth Longfellow waxed poetic about the bronze bells of San Blas without seeing or hearing them. These less eloquent westwords are about the bugs of San Blas, a very up-close and much too-personal accounting with scars as proof of participation. From a distance, San Blas is just another beach town, in the state of Nayarit, on […]
Continue ReadingThe backroads of Mexico often offer adventure, perhaps a bit of excitement, sometimes a touch of the dramatic and, occasionally, a hint of danger. We thought we’d found all four on a deteriorating 10-kilometer connector between Highway 200 and the Pacific beaches, to and from the almost dead community of El Tecuan, an hour north […]
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A genuine Mexico love story lives in a big, beautiful home behind a high wall in Tzurumutaro, a not-much-to-it community adjoining Patzcuaro in the remarkable state of Michoacan. Back at the turn of the century, Marta Palomares, daughter of a doctor, was a dedicated career woman, a civil engineer employed by the federal government, a […]
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Editor’s note: After a brief battle with cancer, Jenny McGill passed away peacefully in the early hours of December 31, 2009. I first heard of her when I was editor in chief of About Magazines and she was named U.S. Consular Agent in Puerto Vallarta, where we published a monthly edition. She was, I heard, a tough, […]
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