Sam And Saundra's Year Long Adventure - Part 37

Sam And Saundra’s Year Long Adventure – Part 37

Mexico 

2/7/09 – Veracruz – Fort - Cortez

Today, the planned, pre-paid activity sounded pretty boring – a tour of Veracruz.  But nope! It’s not.  We get ready for the tour bus to arrive and when it does – it is a big bright 60’s looking bus – although I don’t know how I could possibly know that.  We all get settled.  The bus looks nothing like the buses in the movies.  The seats are nice and comfortable and made to carry at least twice our number – so we have room to spread out.  Unfortunately, our tour starts with a traffic jam into Veracruz.  The jam was a reminder of the craziness of the driving practices in Mexico.  A fatal accident.  The government appears to be making an effort to get the natives to change, as evidenced by the constant road signs admonishing ‘why the speed’, ‘no pass’, and ‘slow down!’ There are even signs asking drivers to obey the road signs.  They also have signs reminding us to wear seat belts, as it is required. They need to keep working at it. That’s all I’m gonna say about that.

Fort San Juan De Ulua

One Of The Coral Blocks

The tour bus is the absolute best way of seeing Veracruz, a busy, big, city – obviously full of commerce and a major port for the country.  The guide indicated that even if you did not want to work, you would be able to live fairly comfortable in Veracruz, mostly because of the food available from the waterways/sea and good weather.   First, we go through a tour of Fort San Juan De Ulua, which is totally made of large blocks of cut coral.  Turrets, cannons, moat, church and torture chambers.  In the church section, our guide gave us a good impression of a tenor and demonstrated the great acoustics that the walls created. Stories of USA attacking (we were not nice in the stories) and pirates.  Next to the fort is the ‘now’ of the area.  Auto factories and ship yards all around.  Seeing this area makes it more understandable about the types of cars you see on the road. I was able to take pictures of two churches across the inlet. We toured the city.  A more modern city than most we have seen in Mexico.  A lot of the ‘high’ buildings that make the skyline seen from the RV park are empty.  They were started when economic times were good and the plan is that they will be completed when the economic times are good again.  The guide was optimistic that the good times were coming next year.  When you come visit, you’ll have to share with us the progress that was made. 

Veracruz

We climbed back into the air-conditioned bus and traveled to La Antigua.  This is about 30 minutes from Veracruz and is right on the Antigua River.  Hernan Cortez is said to have entered this river and landed here when he ‘found’ Mexico.  The village now is mostly uninhabited, but the church and house he built are still here, and kept up to a degree.  Whether he ever lived here is debated.  The area is full of beautiful flowering shrubs and trees.  We crossed a rope footbridge to get to the other side.  Yep! Just like the chicken.  We found artisan stands abounding.  We crossed back and after many pictures – took off back to Veracruz. 

Us on Footbridge

Housing has been a major emphasis in Veracruz.  At least two large, new housing areas were pointed out.  Although small, they seemed bigger than what we saw in Baja Mexico.  The ‘palapa’ areas were not as easily identified, so that the amount of actual living space was hard to estimate.  I did not see any indication of abject poverty.  No outward signs of slums.  The city has lots of trees, parques and schools.  The children are highly regarded in Veracruz, as well as in most other places in Mexico.  I did not see or seek out orphanages, etc. Baseball diamonds, basketball courts and soccer fields are all over, but Sam noted that almost all of the nets are missing or in need of replacement.  He may have a new goal.  We see the outside of The Cathedral of Our Lady of Assumption and courtyard.  We are given some time in the central ‘market/courtyard’ area of Veracruz.  Yipee! Free time!  Sam and I walk around several of the blocks window-shopping.  We buy ice cones (mine was mango, Sam’s was pino-coco) and quickly consumed them.  We met up with some other ‘Vags’ and went into one of the famous coffee shops.  They are all owned by the same family, but have different names because the daughter got married.  Huh.  We ordered café le leche.  We were promptly served large glass glasses that were filled about a quarter full of very thick, hot coffee.  I thought … oops!  We waited and waited, and our original waiter came back over and with a big smile started hitting my glass with a teaspoon.  He indicated we should all do this – which we promptly did.  After much racket and laughter by us and everyone around us, a man with a huge, gigantic, rather funny-looking silver, spouted tea kettle (could have been used by the Mad Hatter) came to the table, picked up our glasses and … while holding the kettle at least 3 feet away from the glass… filled it with steaming leche.  I was impressed.  What flair.  The grandeur of the gesture transformed the ingredients into a memorable experience to be remembered – and the coffee tasted good.  Sam bought a bunch of grounds from the shop next door, just before we got on the bus to our last destination:  Walmart!

Hippeeeeee!

You would think that would be it for the day, but we walked the beach when we got back to camp and Sam and some of the others were treated to loud, thumpy music all night – thanks to Des and Arlene (#6), although they claim it was some kids who were again driving on the beach.