Guadalajara 2/4-2/7/2011

We took a weekend trip to Guadalajara for two nights. Our purpose was to go on the tequila train and to do a little sight seeing in Guadalajara. We drove in a caravan from our Newcomers club so that if we got lost, we were all lost together. The drive was very uneventful and there wasn't much to see until we came across this plateau. I remember learning about them in school, but am not sure I ever saw one before.

We also came across these cowboys out in a field playing around with their horses. It is hard to see in the picture, but they were making the horses go around in a circle, like on a dime. You never know what you'll see along the highway inMexico!

We arrived at the outskirts of the the city faster than we had ever expected, It helps to get places quickly when the head car travels areound 100mph!

As we were entering the outskirts of the city, we went to a smaller town called Tlaquepaque. It is known for wonderful hand work, artists, etc. This is the park in the center of town with a church.

In the park there was also this bandstand.

This is the church from the opposite side. This statue was erected for Pope John Paul whenever it was that he visited ..

I loved this shop..the artwork was all done with these rolly polly people. They were miriachis, children, people riding bikes, etc. I did not come home with one, eventhough I really thought about it, but they were EXPENSIVE!!

This is a whole miriachi band outside of another shop.

Then it was onto our hotel, well, sort of. Everyone was checking in, but the hotel could not find our reservations. We had made them and paid for them back around Christmas time, but we were inthe states when we made them. Problemo! They were totally booked for the night and did not have space for us so they sent us to another hotel that was supposedly equal...'supposedly' was the word. As the bellboy was taking us to the other hotel, the streets started to look nowhere near as nice and there was a lot of writing on the walls and buildings. I asked if it was safe to go out for a walk after we settled and the bell man said only in one direction from the hotel. Needless to say, Mark and I stayed in our hotel room for the night, which was decorated a lot like Motel 6 or Knights Inn back in the 60's. Dang, I just deleted two pictures! And it is too difficult to post them. I may just stick them in the next post. Anyways, we were safe for the night and went back to the hotel where we were supposed to be staying at to meet everyone else for breakfast and to move our belongings back to the original hotel as they had space for us the second night.

This is our room for the second night back in the original hotel. Absolutely no comparison to our Motel 6 room!

This is the view from the center courtyard of the hotel by the fountain looking up

This is a church in the center of the city in walking distance from the hotel

Another view of the church from the front side.

This is inside of the church by the dome.

Another view of the inside.

A view from the backside of the church

A closer view of the dome.

We also walked through the market in Guadalajara on Sunday morning. It is about 5 stories high and has anything you would ever need. Fruits, veggies, meat, fish , poultry..the whole sheep, pig, or whatever, skinned with head on, of course. It probably had 50 places selling shoes, all basically the same, clothing, CD's & DVD's, pirated of course.

Very interesting. And fun was had by all. The post following this one is of our tequila train experience

Guadalajara and the Tequila Train 2/5/2011

We boarded the Tequila Express train in Guadalajara at 9:30 am, yes in the morning, and were greeted by margaritas, or anything else we wanted with tequila. the train was bound ofr Herdurra Hacienda for us to learn about the tequila maaking process, have a wonderful lunch, entertainment, and drink, and drink, and drink tequila. Some did that more than others! until the train returned back at 5pm

At the train station and aboard the train we were entertained by a

miriachi band. It was loud, but fun!

At the hacienda, they showed us how they harvest the agave in the fields. It is still done this way by hand. It takes about 8 years for a plant to mature. they keep out the very center to replant(kind of like a pineapple). Then they cut off the exterior 'leaves' and use the inner core that resembles a pineapple. Those cores then get roasted squished and juiced for fermentation. We tasted the roasted agave, ithad yellowed, gotten soft, like ripe pineapple, and taseted really sweet! A nice treat!

Smile for the camera!

It is not tequila yet, it must go through the fermetation process. These are the three stages and have very differnt alcohol and sugar content. The names of the stages translate into death, ordinary and white tequila. The difference in the different types of tequila, blanco,reposada, anejo, is the length of time it ages....in Kentucky oak barrels! White is aged 2 days, reposada is a few months and anejo is a year or more, I think

After out tour we were fed a huge 'comida' That is lunch around 2 or 3 pm, that really is the size of dinner. We had every kind of typical mexican food, and of course te tequila was flowing well. While enjoying our food and for a couple hours after we were entertained by miriachi, dancers, lasso ropers, and singers. It was then back to the train..tequila flowing of course, and we arrived back to our hotel around 5 or 6pm!!
A great time was had by all! Click on the next picture to watch a video of our entertainment! It was