After a enjoyable day and a half in Zacatecas, we set off for the city of Patzcuaro, described by our guidebook as a colonial gem. It would take us over an hour out of our way, but how could we resist a colonial gem? The trip was only about 300 miles and SCT (previously mentioned in Back in Mexico) estimated that the trip would take 5 hours and 16 minutes. After 9 hours of stressful driving, we finally arrived in Patzcuaro to find a pleasant enough town but not quite the gem we had hoped for.
The longer than expected drive to Patzcuaro was due to unwanted forays through towns along the way. Normally, the toll roads divert you around the cities. Either by our error or by design, we ended up in one of those cities along the toll road. (Irapuato, you might be a nice enough city normally, but getting through you back to the highway sucked!) And the last 100 miles off the toll road took us through many towns. Normally, these entail a simple, albeit slow, drive through town. However, on this day, every city seemed to be doing construction and set us off on long, poorly signposted detours. Getting through each of these cities took anywhere from 20-60 minutes. Luckily, just when we were sure we were lost, we’d finally see another sign for the highway.
When we finally arrived, we found Patzcuaro to be a small, quiet town that pretty much shut down by 9pm. Aside from the requisite church on the zócalo (main plaza), all the architecture looked pretty much the same. In fact, everything in the historic center was painted white and burnt orange to look the same. Nice, but a bit boring. To be fair, we didn’t spend much time in town so we may very well have missed some of its’ nicer features.
On the bright side, we were accepted at the first hotel we tried despite the front desk clerk’s fear of cats. We’ve often suspected that many Mexicans are either afraid of cats or just plain don’t like them. We often see horror in the eyes of front desk clerks upon mentioning our gata. Bringing a cat into a Mexican hotel room seems to be about the equivalent of trying to bring a pet alligator into an American Holiday Inn.
After a brief night in Patzcuaro, we planned to head off for a night in the town of Cuautla, about 50 miles from Mexico City. Cuautla is known for its’ hot springs, which we planned to soak our tense muscles in, and is a popular weekend escape for Mexico City residents.
[...] But Mexico is full of surprises. 4 1/2 hours into our drive to Cuautla (previously mentioned in Long & Winding Road), we found ourselves in Mexico City. In Mexico, all roads lead to Mexico City. Avoiding it requires getting off the toll roads and using two-lane highways (one lane each way) usually with no shoulders, but sometimes with potholes. Everyone, and their brother who drives a huge truck traveling at 35 mph, takes these roads. Getting past these slow trucks requires speeding into the opposing lane of traffic to pass. A number of Mexicans seem to have a different sense of spatial relations than we do, as they take chances when passing that make our hearts race. These highways also take us through small towns, which have speed bumps, which have enterprising and daring souls selling items ranging from handmade hats to chile peppers to batteries. It can make for a very interesting drive … but not a drive you make when you’re in a hurry. [...]