November 27, 2008

We're in San Miguel de Allende at the moment and plan to spend about a week here with friends Rosa and Alan Mack.



What a nice little city. All the streets are real stone and very narrow. Rosa and Alan have a gorgeous home in a nice area of the city with a great view from the rooftop patio. To access their home you come through a gate from the road which puts you into a private courtyard. Their home (Rosa designed it) has several doors that open onto the courtyard so their living space is really large especially when you have all the doors open to combine both the indoor and outdoor spaces. The house is 3 floors high and we feel like we've hit it pretty lucky to be staying here for a few days :)



This afternoon we visited the centre of town and the big cathedral that is in the heart of the city. It is very old (built in the 1500's) by the Spanish. We also visited the centro market, which is massive and has everything you could ever need to purchase within it. The combination of flowers and fruits that greet you as you enter the market are amazing; both the sight and the fragrance.



Lots of Americans live in San Miguel de Allende so that influence shows up in that there is a Starbucks, a MacDonalds, and a Subway recently added to the businesses in this city.



We're planning to take it pretty easy while we're here and just enjoy this time with our friends as well as taking in a few sights.

Just realized that I neglected to include any info on a mine we visited while in Tlalpujuahua. It is called the Two Star Mine and is known for it's ranking within the top four producers of both gold and silver in the world. It is located at the museum in Tlalpujuahua and you can actually go right into the original mine shaft. It was a very interesting place to visit and some of the memorable mentions include:
- the temps in the mine shaft were so hot (over 40 degrees) that the workers wore only underwear to work in the shaft.
- the mine claimed inumerable lives during it's operation of approximately 100 years. On average 3 men were killed in the mine each day.
- that the water from underground weeps through the rock walls within the mine shaft causing a constant flow of water coming from the mine.
- in the 1930's a tragic mud slide killed 300 townspeople when the mine caused a slide of 80 million tonnes of mud to cover 1/3 of the town killing anyone in its path. We visited the site of the original church where only the steeple remains above the current ground level. After this tragedy, the mine was closed so no one knows what treasures still lie within this old mine.
- the town is really proud of their mining heritage (there is another mine in operation there today) and so they are very supportive of tours of the old mine and the stories that go along with it.



till next time.....

Lorrie