1950

Early Sunday morning we left Oaxaca for the Tehuantepec Peninsula in the company of an excellent guide whom we shared with three young women who rode with him. His mother had been English, and after his father's death while Jose was still quite young she had taken him to Milwaukee to be near her sister. So he spoke English which we could understand. He also knew what to show American tourists. We stayed at the Tehuantepec Hotel, which looked like the tropical hotels one sees in movies. There weren't any screens on the dining room or kitchen windows, but screens did cover our bedroom windows. However, there wasn't much privacy if you wanted any breathe of air since the windows on one side faced a corridor, and those on the other side were on an open porch. Of course, that was before we had even heard of air-conditioning.

From Tehuantepec we made excursions to Juchitan and Salina Cruz. Sunday morning after breakfast at the hotel, we went to Juchitan, visited the market, which is the biggest on Sunday, as are many other markets in Mexico. At a metal working shop two men were bent over fine filigree gold work in what seemed to us very inadequate lighting. Continuing our tour of the area we went to a home where the colorful native costumes were being embroidered, and two of the girls modeled them for us, as well as allowing the young women in our party to try them on. Our guide then found a wedding whose festivities we could share. (I was appalled to see very young boys smoking here.)

That night we were privileged to attend a fancy ball arranged by one of the leading families of the town (14,600) and here many of the women wore their native costumes with much jewelry, which Jose said was made of gold chains hung with ten to fifty U.S. gold coins. The women's wealth is in these costumes. With the help of our guide we were able to talk to some of the guests, and all of them made us feel welcome.

Monday morning Jose took us to Salina Cruz which was a very important town before the Panama Canal was built as it was here cargoes were unloaded for transshipping by train across the Isthmus to Vera Cruz on the Atlantic side. It is a sleepy town now. Then we were taken to another place on the Pacific, a little village called La Ventosa, where we spent most of the day. The children and the girls went swimming in the ocean, and Burt and I took turns taking pictures and talking as best we could with the natives. These people seem very clean and intelligent although, of course, completely uneducated. The women prepared a lunch of fresh oysters, shrimp soup, rice, and for dessert, we had freshly gathered coconuts which our hosts chopped open with machetes. Meanwhile the men who had come in earlier with their catches of fish, now brought out their marimbas and played for us while our children and the three girls danced, and even two young native children danced with them.. Wednesday we drove to Cuernavaca, 45 miles from Mexico City, but once more we had to go over a pass 10,000 feet high. Instead of going to a cooler or warmer climate for vacations, Mexicans go to a lower elevation, and Cuernavaca at 5000 feet, is the vacation spot for wealthy people from Mexico City where the elevation is over 7000 ft. This is a beautiful city, with an even comfortable climate, and a great profusion of flowers, which they say are in blossom all year round. Bougainvillea covered porches and fences everywhere. We saw the Borda gardens and home, built by a wealthy immigrant who came to Mexico in 1716, and amassed a fortune from silver mining. The cathedral was built in 1529.

On our last day in Mexico City we went first to the Thieves' Market, where just everything was for sale from handmade baskets and rugs to expensive antique wares, quite probably stolen. Then our friends, the Mallerys', took us to the Floating Gardens of Xochimilco. Boats specially decorated with fresh flowers and poled by the natives carried the tourists as well as many local people around the island gardens. Some of the boats had marimba players for the entertainment of the boat passengers and coins tossed to the players were a welcome bonus for them.

Our hostess had prepared a picnic lunch which we ate on the boat as we floated about in this lovely place. This was a really romantic and happy experience for us. The Floating Gardens date back to the 14th Century and were a favorite pleasure place for Aztec nobility who built gardens on rafts and set them afloat on the canals. The gardens are no more, and it has lost its charm I've read, but flower bedecked boats still run through the canals.

Later that afternoon we went to a bull fight, another interesting novelty, but I am always very distressed to see any kind of cruelty to people or animals, so that was not the kind of entertainment I care to repeat.

The next and last week in Mexico took us to Guanajuato, the volcano of Paricutin, Patzcuaro Lake with its butterfly nets and Guadalajara. That's another story.