Monarch Butterfly Migration
It was a great decision to take a break from working on issues of migration of people and spend a day photographing and watching the migration of 20 million monarch butterflies, as they gather in one of several reserves in the Mexican state of Michoacan for the winter. We were lucky, unlike this fellow Fulbrighter, and the day was sunny which meant the butterflies were full in flight, and moving all around us….simply amazing.
The butterflies are so many that you can hear the flapping of their wings as the move around over and under. Anywhere there was water, several thousand would gather sipping from the natural springs that bubbled up at over 10,000 feet above sea level. Unfortunately, I didn’t have my video camera, which I think is the best way to show it, but we were able to put some clips together with Missy’s point and shoot (and with some silly music) put together a video below.
The butterflies stay in Mexico through March, and I highly recommend this to anyone! Thanks to our friends Meghan and Liam for transportation, setting up the whole weekend, and great company….and as usual, Missy’s blog has much more information than mine….
Morelia
Last weekend, we went off to Morelia with friends Liam and Meghan for a three-day weekend to visit the monarch butterly sanctuaries. We stayed in the capital of the state of Michoacan, in Morelia, which was a beautiful place to get away from Guadalajara. We only visited the historic center, but loved the colonial buildings, the lack of grafiti covering everything, and the amount of activity in the plazas on the weekends. I’m nearly convinced that every photo in Mexican tour books that isn’t taken at the beach or in the desert may have been taken in the center of Morelia.
It was Valentine’s weekend, so the balloon vendors were out in full force, as we were treated to a children’s dance performance.
Guachimontones
For a day trip, we took a excursion to Guachimontones an archeological site about 35 miles (read 3-hour bus ride) from Guadalajara. The trip itself was a little frustrating because it took SO long, and our bus driver was a maniac, but it was wonderful to be out of the city. The site is very unknown as far as who lived there and who built it, but it’s an amazing place, peaceful and quiet (the opposite of Guadalajara). Visit Missy’s blog for more info (as always).
Quinceañera
Our good friend Octavio invited us to a quinceañera of one of his in-laws’ nieces a few weeks ago. The ceremony began as a religious one with mass, and moved into a full-party atmosphere, with blaring music for hours on end. Octavio filled us in on what we were to see, which was a well-choreographed dance with the 15-year-old girl and her five-guy entourage, complete with canes for added affect.
Teenagers dove into bottles of tequila placed on every table, and I watched a 14-year-old open a beer bottle with his teeth and slam every last drop down in one gulp. Finally, we were exhausted from the level of audio of the music and too much fried pasta, peanuts and pork, so we begged for a ride home from Octavio’s brother.
Going Bananas
For a few months I’ve been working on and off with a Huichol family (mother Maria, pictured) from Jalisco, who comes periodically to Guadalajara with their youngest daughter, Paola, who is need of surgery to correct a condition of hydrocephalus, which is when fluid builds up in the head around the brain. Soon, she’ll have a shunt put in to drain the fluid, but in the meantime, the three of us, and a family friend, Gladys (not pictured) spend a hell of a lot of time waiting outside the Hospital Civil Viejo sifting through Mexican bureaucracy waiting for a real appointment. The other day, I bought a few bananas for us to pass the time.