We made a weekend trip to Puebla. Our friend Veronica, Anita and I caught a bus from our corner in Ursulo Galvan to Xalapa (10 pesos (90 cents) each). We got off on the west side of Xalapa. We needed to get over to the bus terminal on the east side; so we took a 25 pesos cab ride (total about $2.35). Finally we caught a bus to Puebla for 100 pesos each ($9.00).
We drove to Perote where we stopped for 10 minutes. The drive from Xalapa to Perote is beautiful – a lot like driving in the mountains of Southern Oregon (where Anita and I met). The drive beyond Perote to Puebla is lack luster – pretty much flat dry looking area with distant mountains.
There is a town just past Perote that is wall to wall trailer boxes and camper shells. An interesting point about towns in our area is that they get a common item to sell and the town takes on the character of that product. We have Noalinco – the shoe town. Monte Blanco – the bamboo town. Totalco – Truck cargo shells & camper town. This is close to the Veracruz Puebla border.
The bus stations are like airport terminals. I hadn’t taken a bus in years. These are large comfortable buses – some have banos (bathrooms) and movies. Because ours was a little beyond two hours with a stop in Perote there was no banos. It should be stated that you can take the buses with films and banos – but the fastest bus out of Xalapa was as described. At the terminal it is 3 pesos (27 cents) to use the building restrooms – it is a turnstile affair with a coin machine that dispenses change. Clean modern buses, terminals and restrooms. I noticed they were showing a movie in the Puebla bus terminal in the waiting area.
Veronica’s husband picked us up at the terminal in just a few minutes. Our mission was to enjoy an Oktober Fest celebration held at the preparatory school where Miguel is the headmaster.
Miguel is from Germany originally. Volkswagen sponsors 146 schools throughout the world. They usually are associated with plants which is the case here as Puebla has a Volkswagen facility. So of course an Oktober Fest is a natural in Puebla. There were more than 5000 participants. It seemed as though everyone was having a good time. I drank two 500 ml Schofferhofer HEFEWEZEN beer – more than my usual limit – good stuff. We participated in some drawings (for the school coffers) that yielded us three terrific Oktoberfest beer steins and a Humboldt Colegio –shirt (xtra large no less
I got a chance to put my new Canon camera to the test starting with Popocatépetl (commonly referred to as El Popo or Don Goyo) It is an active volcano and the second highest peak in Mexico after the Pico de Orizaba (5,636 m). Popocatépetl comes from the Nahuatl words popōca ‘it smokes’ and tepētl ‘mountain’, thus Smoking Mountain. As you can see smoke it does. El Popo is 40 kilometers or 25 miles west of Puebla.
El Popo () Here are some photos from the celebration. WARNING: Some of the ENLARGE files are VERY LARGE.
Well you get the idea. A good time was had by all! I file away the other 200 plus photos – Stay Tuned!