Do You Believe in Magico?

Wood carver from a Pueblo Magico

 On this sojourn, we have traveled to a number of Pueblos Magicos.  On first hearing that title, we thought of tidy little white-stuccoed pueblitos perched on mountaintops where folklorico dances take place on the hour, while demonstrations (and sales) of local crafts, catering to the tour bus crowd, constituted the primary activity of happy, colorfully dressed nativos. We didn’t stitch that vision strictly out of whole cloth. In fact, the brochures offered by the Tourist Information kiosks in Puebla and other larger cities seem to promote that Edenic notion pretty consistently.

By no means did we turn our noses up at the idea of visiting these places just because they might be tourist Meccas. Many of the places we’ve been to over the last few years – much more cosmopolitan - do a healthy tourist trade, and yet almost always have something truly unique and rewarding to be discovered. Still, this time, we thought we would make a real effort to get to some of the more out of the way places and try to see what puts the magic in magico.

Lynn & Pico Orizaba

To get our feet wet, we visited a couple pueblos magicos outside of Xalapa, (Xico and Coatepec) which we mentioned in a previous blog. We also spent several days in Orizaba, a pueblo magico at the foot of Pico Orizaba, an impressive 18,000 ft volcano jutting up from the Sierra Madre Oriental mountain range. All three of these places were easy to get to by bus and certainly had their charms. Orizaba was probably the most scenic and had the most noticeable mix of beautifully dressed folks from the nearby Atlas Mountains and city dwellers. 

Lynn has a panic attack in Orizaba

In Orizaba, we particularly liked the riverside walk that felt almost European with rows of colonial houses on either side of the river. Bridges, both stone and the more anxiety-inducing rope bridges, made access to both sides of the river very easy. The rope bridges were kind of fun but they did seem to sway back and forth and sideways with an alarmingly unpredictable motion, especially when large Mexican women taking giant steps would follow closely behind Lynn  – jump, swing, lean to and fro – Madre de Dios! The walk also had a zoo strung along either side with a pretty impressive assortment of birds and mammals. It was fascinating, sad, and/or beautiful, depending on how you feel about zoos. We found some parts heartbreaking. The awesome jaguars pacing frantically back and forth in their cages, for instance, seemed totally wrong to us. Still there was much to see.

Climbing up up up...

We took the teleferico ski lift up to an ecological park and viewpoint above the city and climbed a kind of fire tower to get a good look at Mt. Orizaba. 

We stopped and talked with a native woman who was in traditional dress and who, very sweetly agreed to let us take her picture in her finery. She explained that each decoration on her blouse had meaning - her pueblo, marital status, how many children she had could be interpreted by other Atlas mountain villagers

Traditional dress of Atlas Mountains

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Coffee at Eiffel's Iron Palace

In the city itself, we paid the usual visit to the main cathedral. Where the hell did they get all that Palacio de Hierro  (the Iron Palace) that had been designed by Gustave Eiffel. It was an elegant building that had a great outdoor café that was perfect for people watching - an unlikely site in a small Mexican puebla. We saw a particularly touching interaction while having coffee there one afternoon.

A kind hand from a poor woman to a friend

An elderly beggar woman had taken up a spot on the sidewalk, directly in the sunlight. Another elderly woman, possibly some kind of health worker, or just a concerned citizen stopped to talk with her. The gist of the conversation seemed to be that the helpful woman was very concerned about the amount of sun the beggar lady was getting on her skin. After a good 20 minutes or so of conversation, she managed to get the woman to move just a few feet further down the sidewalk to a shady spot before wishing her a good afternoon.  Later, the woman gave a handshake to an equally needy friend. We’ve seen these interactions before in other places and we felt a kind of wistfulness about it. How rare that seemed at home.

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Of course, like every Mexican city, Orizaba had a grand park, lots of benches, fountains, pedestrian-only streets, and strange cartoon sculptures. By the time we left, we felt it was the best magico we’d seen so far. It was beautiful, small and friendly. Yet, we did not feel quite connected to it. We had only managed a few interactions with the locals, the best one being a bargaining session with a couple from the Atlas Mountains who were selling scarves and blouses in the artisanal Mercado.  In fact, we didn’t actually bargain, we never do that. We just kept trying to find excuses to keep talking to them while Lynn took pictures and Eric posed questions about family, work and life. But we wanted to get a better feel not only of what day-to-day life was like in such a place. We still wanted an answer: what was magic about the magicos? We looked towards those mountaintop villages north of Puebla that we had read about -maybe we should just go there.

She tells him how to write our receipt - some things never change!

Locals travel by foot and collectivo

Getting there. Um, yeah. No problem if you want to sign up for a guided tour and spend a day   Or, if you are intrepid (read that f***ing crazy), you can rent a car and drive there. People do that and some magicos are fairly accessible, but, from our perspective and from our steadfast determination to collect EVERY LAST PENNY of Social Security that we could, we flatly rejected the rental car option (or actually Eric rejected it – Mr. Race Car Driver, huh.) and Lynn went along with it. After all, it’s not an appealing idea to drive yourself when you want to get way back into the hinterlands. The mountain roads are REALLY mountain roads, treacherous and unregulated, except by Darwinian laws and gravity. The locals drive them with varying degrees of abandon- often in mechanically dubious vehicles- and, apparently, with an unwavering belief in the afterlife. Even the bus drivers have crucifixes dangling from their mirrors or plastic saints, virgins, what have you, adorning their dashboards. Not exactly confidence builders. So, the only realistic plan we could agree on was to take public transportation and stay several nights someplace taking it all in and then go from there. Even with that plan, you cannot count on any kind of bus service from one mountain top magico to the other. The locals have their way and, in some cases it can be done, but it takes a lot of savvy to make it work. For example, to travel between pueblos magicos Cuetzalan and Zacatlan – not a long distance as the crow flies -requires knowing which collectivo to board, which crossroad to get off of to wait for another collectivo (in the mountains mind you) that will get you to a bus that takes you there. Given that there have been State Department reports of  “criminal activity” in the area – more on that later- the best laid plan seems to require an exhausting excursion back to a big city, such as Puebla, reboarding a bus that takes you directly to the other mountaintop, something like 5 hours to go a few miles.
digging the village vibe while being stewarded around then return to the big city by nightfall. The one-day guided tour bus thing just isn’t our way.

Collectivos are mom & pop operations that typically charge about 12 pesos (50c) to go any distance. Nicer collectivos even have color coordinated themes but no seat belts!

With all that to think about, we settled upon a multi-day visit to Cuetzalan. We decided that if there was some urgent reason to extend our trip further into the mountains, to other magicos, we would find a way, even if it meant doubling back, etc, etc. From everything we had read and heard, we thought that Cuetzalan would be our best choice. So here we go…

Volodores plan their flight

After a whirly gig bus ride, we get our feet back on solid ground, check into our rustic hotel and head out to see what we can see. There is a mountain mist circling the village, which gives it an even more isolated feeling.  Through the mist, we see some unusual activity going on up in the zocalo and decide to check it out. Hmm. Voladores again, only there is something very different about them. First of all, there is no big crowd around. The flyers are quietly preparing for a performance in a corner of the zocalo close to the church, but what’s the occasion? In another corner, there is a huddle of people fooling around with a serious looking video camera and, good grief, a drone!

Traditional woman & techno drone meet

Everyone in the huddle seems to be deferring to a middle-aged fellow who is shuttling between the voladores and what is, we finally realize, is a film crew. We watch the fellow as he straps a Go Pro camera on the wrist of one of the flyers. Our curiosity is so piqued, we have to get to the bottom of this. So, naturally, we zero in on the middle-aged fellow, who courteously greets us and invites us into his busy corner. Turns out he is Mexican director, Ricardo Benet, who is making a documentary about the voladores using cutting edge technology to look at this ancient performance from heretofore unseen angles. He seems to pick up on the disconcerted glances we exchange. Go Pros, drones? Really?  He’s obviously aware of the discontinuity and reassures us that this project is the culmination of a lot of discussion and thought between him and the voladores.  He invites us to hang out with him and even offers to let us watch the performance from the perspective of the drone. Quick note here: something like this would NEVER, EVER happen in the US with a Hollywood director and crew. The area would be cordoned off and guarded. You wouldn’t be able to watch from a block away. Yet, here we are, director by our side, offering minute-to-minute commentary on what is about to happen. Amazing.

90 feet, no net

Even though we’ve talked about voladores before, we learned that the tradition first began in Cuetzalan. Instead of the usual metal pole, like those we’ve seen in Cholula and Papantla, this pole is actually made from a huge tree – about 90ft tall. Each year, a tree is cut, hauled down from the mountains and placed in the deep hole in the plaza just in front of the church. Before it goes in, a live turkey is dropped down the hole along with assorted herbs and vegetables. This is done in case a voladore should fall (they don’t work with nets). The turkey and trimmings are a pre-Columbian tradition to ensure that the unfortunate voladore will have food for his journey to the next life.  

Once the pole is in place, the finish work is completed. Volodores carefully tie ropes around their waists before climbing steps up to the top that are simply rough pieces of wood nailed into place. At the top, from the perspective of the drone, one can see a small rotating square of wood upon which all of the performers sit except the piper. He stands on the very top of the pole on a one-foot circle of wood in the middle of the wooden square. He performs a ritual that requires him to play the flute while leaning almost in the shape of a “C”. At one point, he stretches both arms, still leaning over backwards and chants an invocation. Looking down from the drone at this is hypnotic and absolutely terrifying. That done, the piper then tends to the preparation of the flyers, who with nothing more than a rope strung around their waists and through their legs, begin the falling, spinning dance.

We are watching this through the mist and fog, so the flyers seem to slip in and out of the clouds. Without being able to see their ropes from time to time, it literally looks like they fly around the pole. The eerie buzz of the drone with its black silhouette and green flashing lights add to the otherworldliness of the ritual. It is almost too much for us.

Safely on the ground once again, the young flyers are jovial and chatty and generous. They pose for pictures and go about their business seemingly not aware that they have done something so courageous and so spiritual that it’s enough to bring tears just trying to speak to them. Director Benet is happy with the take and congratulates the performers as he retrieves his Go Pro. Within a matter of minutes, he and his film crew disappear, the voladores melt away, and the zocalo fills with local vendadores, and other townsfolk. Had we arrived just a half hour or so later, we would have never seen this.

Pyramid behind the swing

Angelique makes a sale

Over the next few days we let ourselves swim in the life of the puebla, taking in a neighborhood ruin believed to be a precursor and model for El Tajin. It is very small. Just next door is a school and a playground with children on swings, just feet from the steps of one of the pyramids. In the cab, on the way back, the driver stops here and there so that we can take in the stunning mountain views and Lynn can take pictures. At one place, we take in the view and watch a family in the distance trodding a footpath into town. The senora carries some kind of load on her back while the children skip along behind her. It feels like a timeless moment. Again and again we come back to the zocalo. It’s just what you do here. While hanging out one afternoon, we encounter Angelique. She is a sturdy street vendor who clearly has the selling game down. She starts with the usual trinkets, one of which we buy so that Lynn can take her picture. She happily obliges, but Eric notices she has cast an avaricious eye on him. She knows she has a live one. One load of trinkets disappears into her wrap and out comes another, bigger one. Not getting the “buy” sign, she pulls out some leather goods she has stowed. Still without success, she reaches deep into her shawl and produces a five-pound bag of oranges. At first glance, she seems like a nice, plump village lady until we realize that much of her bulk is trade goods. She is not the least bit deterred by our refusals, but she is also not insistent. She talks to us for some time and then resumes the hunt elsewhere. When we see her later, she still tries for a sale, but when we decline again, she bids us a good afternoon with a big smile, no hard feelings whatsoever. We keep having encounters like that in the most unexpected places.

Yum! Eric enjoys gift from Miguel y Miguel

One night, we go to dinner at a promising looking café. We sit down, order drinks and food. At another table two young guys are reading the menu and one of them requests a round of drinks. He looks over at us, makes the universal sign for cheers, and then asks in Spanish, he speaks no English, if we have ever tried a couple of local specialties: vino de café, and Yolixpa (herbabuena) liquor. We have not, so he orders a round for us.  We invite him and his companion to our table. Both are named Miguel, so by agreement we call one Miguel A and the other Miguel B, which seems to suit them just fine. We struggle a bit with our Spanish but eventually learn that A&B work for CFE, an electrical company that brings Wi-Fi, TV and all things “wired” to this part of Mexico. They are very interested in us and, as the drinks loosen our tongues (Yolixpa is one hell of a drink!), we hit upon a plan to visit the local ruins together and then have dinner after they get off work the next day. So sad to report that it was not to be, for try as we did, we could not work out a satisfactory meeting place or time using text messaging and our lousy Spanish. Nevertheless, they kept in touch for several days after we left Cuetzatlan, finally wishing us “Buen Viaje”.

Traditional market costume for men

More days pass. We meet an American couple just passing through on their way to Oaxaca and spend a pleasant afternoon conversing without translation. Later, after a friendly chat in the zocalo, Lynn finds a local, English-speaking guide, who doubles as a part-time shoe shine man, willing to take us on a nature hike to a swimming hole and waterfall up in the mountains. At first, the idea sounds good and we agree to it. Alas, Eric’s paranoia about the recent violence throughout Mexico, along with his homegrown hyper vigilance, causes him to spend a sleepless night pondering the idea of being lead into the wilderness by a stranger…etc, etc. Bottom line, by the next morning, Eric is a mental and physical wreck. Lynn, ever the adventure girl, is still up for the excursion, but Eric is insistent. Finally a compromise: Lynn will go with Jaime (the guide nee possible murderer) to some of the local spots, but ONLY in and around town, while Eric collapses in a heap to get some badly needed sleep and to restore his shattered perspective. Nobody said travel was easy.

Jaime's friend chats with us at the market 

We all meet up later in the day and Lynn is positively glowing. She has had, with Jaime’s help, a series of encounters that were utterly authentic and deeply revealing. Her photographs (Eric speaking here) capture the intimate, person-to-person moment of encounter: a man holding with hand-carved birds, a local fruit vendor, and an elderly gentleman with such a look of sagacity and acceptance it is almost Buddha-like. Jaime has acquainted her with the proper etiquette for taking photos and given her a much better sense of the mutuality and tolerance that are part of life in this place.

She sells cinnamon bark, vanilla, homemade liquor & blouses

Eric, for his part, finally recovers his senses, including the humor one, and finds a coffee spot to people watch, write and continue to contemplate magico.  Oddly, The Beatles are playing in the background.

On the corner there’s a café near the zocalo, where the locals come and go, and stop and say hello…a policeman plays a tune on his whistle but who is it for? The cars ignore him and the people just go their way. Very strange! Coffee smells swirl through the air, balloons strain at their strings, kids laugh, voladores fly, people hawk their wares. Ah, yes, the magico…a parade for the ears and the eyes here beneath a turquoise Mexican sky. Nothing to do, nothing to look for, no fear of missing out. Here it comes. Take a seat.