A Tale of Two Breakdowns - Tepic to Tequila

 

Making our way inland, we first hit the town of Tepic, the capital of Nayarit state. We parked in a grassy field behind a suburban mall. We were at the edge of the city, but tucked in a tiny field-like enclosure with full grown trees and charcoal grills. We got excited about the idea of BBQ'ing, but just as we were getting ready to shop, we  discovered our first van problem: a flat tire.

Hard to believe it but this is camping in the city, Tepic-style

We pumped the tire then inched our way carefully  to the closest Llantera, which is a Mexican tire shop. The one we'd found on google maps was for motorbikes, so a kind gentleman in a stationary store (yes! they still have those here, pens, pads and all!) guided us to the end of the street to a tiny corner lot. 

Ivan pulled the van in and hopped out while pointing to the tire. His feet had barely touched the asphalt when, without a word spoken, a fifteen-year old boy pulled a red jack out of the shop and had the van propped. Grandfather offered me a tree stump to sit on. I'd barely sat down before father and son had pulled off the tire, fixed the leak, and sent us on our way. It  took all of seven minutes- and $7 CAD - before we were back on the road. 

Our Llantera team - granddad, son, father

The next day we toured Tepic museums and outlet malls. The streets and markets were crowded, and an international food festival was taking place. My personal highlight was eating a gourmet chef's (actually two gourmet chefs') menu at a renowned Tepic restaurant called Emiliano's with Mexican wine pairing. For the foodies among you, menu attached.

Braised Mexican rib, carrot puree and yogurt crema, served in tortillas

Inside courtyard of Emiliano's

Statue at the Tepic Modern Art Museum

Giant paper-mache hummingbird at the People's Museum

Food festival menu and pairings

From Tepic we went to a place we'd been eyeing for some time: Tequila! After navigating some tourist-filled bar wagons shaped like curing barrels, dodging cowboys on horseback, and rattling our way over cobblestone streets, we arrived at an old artisanal tequila farm called Distilador Puntual.  Puntual in Spanish is like punctual, but means more "right time", as opposed to "on time".

Our host, Jose, told us that his farm was handed down from his great-grandfather, to his grandfather, to his father and then to him. When asked who would take it over now, Jose, the father of two daughters, wasn't sure. But then he pulled a prize certificate from behind the bar, noting that it was his youngest daughter's; she'd just won a prize in a tequila sommelier competition sat the age of 17. So it looks like the farm may continue in the family for some time still.

Old iron gates of the distillery

The agave fields at sundown

The pool with its resident pet duck

Jose in the agave fields

As part of our stay at the farm, Jose took us on a tour of the agave fields. He stressed that unlike a lot of the big players, his farm was focused on small-batch tequila made the old fashioned way. This meant no pesticides or fertilizers - instead he relied on cows and horses to circulate the rows between the plants.

One of the animals "working" on the farm who demonstrated "natural fertilization while Jose talked

 Our host had been mayor of Tequila back when Mexico first ran democratic elections (in the 1990s) while he was still in his twenties. He was one of the younger generation farmers proud to have the area protected as an Appellation of Origin, meaning that only Tequila made from Tequila agave in Tequila can technically be called Tequila.

From the fields we went to the factory, where Jose walked us through the distillation process from "pina" (the harvested bulb of the agave) to curing barrel. 

Then came the best part: tequila tasting. Jose explained that there are four main types of Tequila, depending on the aging process:

Blanco: Also called Silver or Plata, this tequila is unaged or aged for a maximum of 60 days.

Reposado: Aged in oak barrels for a minimum of two months and up to one year. .
 
Añejo: Aged in oak barrels for one to three years.

Extra Añejo: Aged in oak barrels for a minimum of three years (Jose's was aged 10).

There is also Joven (Gold), a blend of Blanco with aged or unaged tequila, sometimes with added coloring or flavorings like caramel, but I don't think Jose considers that a REAL tequila. Likewise, he explained that there is liquor of tequila and other blends. But again, he does not recommend. Ivan, however, disagrees and says a jug of tequila for $20 pesos isn't so bad. Just don't try the eye test with this one (see below).

The type of tequila Jose recommends NOT buying from a street stall in Tequila.

We were joined by a German couple on a year's tour of America and two Belgian couples, one with children, who were driving through the Americas and blogging about their journey. All three groups, once they knew we were from Canada, agreed on one thing: they had spent way too long in Canada ("Why did we have to make it so big,", they wondered aloud to us, with the French adding, "and with so little in it?".) I agree that Ontario may be a wee bit too big, but I disagree on the "nothing" part.

Anyway, the Germans were great company and the Belgians asked good questions and insisted on half glasses. Which left more for us. It was all fun once the fourth (full for me, Ivan and the Germans, thanks!) glass of tequila was shared. 

Cool things we learned:

1. The Eye Test: To test the quality of a liquor - any liquor - do the "eye test". Or the "morning after headache gauge", as I prefer to call it. Put your eye in the glass (not the other way around, Jose clarifies). If your eyeball burns, there's methanol in there, which means that the liquor's fermentation was chemically accelerated and you will have a terrible headache the next day. If your eyeball doesn't burn, you have a pure liquor that has been naturally fermented and your headache is slightly less. 

Ivan trying the eye test

2. Harvesting cannot be mechanized. Tequila is made from the bulb of the plant. It usually takes 7 - 9 years to grow before it's harvested. A man who harvests agave, called a jimador, can pluck that bulb out in roughly 8 minutes, whereas it would take most normal people a day. When an agricultural company tried to create a machine to harvest the plants so as to make the process more efficient, they could never get it to work because of the size variety of agaves and the skill required. So it is still harvested by hand today, by men and women whose job security, they can be certain, is not yet threatened by AI. Watch the process of harvesting here 

Pina in the cooker - cooks at high heat and pressure for several days before being processed

Close-up on the pina

 3. The Agave fruit is delicious. As a palette cleanser between tastings, we were given a single agave fruit cut into fourths. It tastes something between a barely-ripe green apple and a slightly citrusy feijoa. Turns out that the lime and salt chasers we Canadians know from our tequila shot days are not traditional. Traditional in Mexico are sangritas, mixes of fruit juices with chili. Our German friends told us that Germans do the lime and salt for tequila blanco, but for aged tequila they use an orange slice and powdered cinnamon. Jose said he's heard of people using unsweetened chocolate as well. So many options. 

Tequila shot with agave fruit for palette cleanser

The next day wasn't too bad a hangover (thanks, natural fermentation) and we had to hit the road. Only when Ivan checked under the car, he noticed that the roads and the infamous "topes" - Mexican speed bumps that are rarely signed, often almost invisible, and remarkably jarring - had taken their toll. Our muffler was barely hanging on. 

Cracked muffler

There was nowhere to fix the car in Tequila, so Ivan patched the muffler with tape and we drove onwards.

Taped muffler

On Jose's recommendation, we drove to a small, and I mean tiny village, called Santa Elena. There we stayed at a Swiss expat's place called Charly's RV Park and Restaurant. 

In the town of Santa Elena, there was a church, a square, two convenience stores selling local tortillas that appeared blessed at the local church, and a chicken place that we had thought would sell us fried or grilled chickens but instead sold frozen chicken pieces across a plastic picnic table. And that was all it sold.

Territorial terrier on the roof

In our walk to town, we encountered our first (but not last) watch dog barking from the roof (they seem to put the aggressive ones up there to teach them boundaries) and got caught in the afternoon "rush hour" traffic of cows taking themselves home through the cobbled street to be milked.

One of several cows we had to wait to pass before continuing on our way back to camp

But the RV park was lovely, and we were able to have wine, real wine for once, and Swiss food for a change. Plus we got to explore the incredible gardens.

Our camp site among the gardens

Just one of the spectacular gardens!

The best part was that one of the owners, Denise, got us a mechanic in town. We were due for a service, and so arranged to head to a nearby almost-but-not-quite-so-small town for a quick service (or so we thought) and maybe some advice on our muffler.

When we arrived, there was no one but chickens, a horny rooster, some skinny dogs and a lot of dead cars. Not that promising. After a lot of misunderstood Spanish exchanged with a kindly neighbour, and much What's App'ing, the mechanic drove in from his roadside stop on his Vespa with his black sheep dog at his feet. This dog went everywhere on that scooter, apparently. Once he arrived, more Spanish, confusion, calls back to the RV park, failed attempts at Google Translate, and it turns out that our van, being diesel, took oil he didn't have and, well, this would take time. All in all, it was five hours for an oil change. We gave up on muffler advice and are still riding with our muffler in a cast as we speak.

Vanny in the Mexican mechanic's

I could stay here forever, but ...

By Sunday, the rumours had started: a trucker strike was coming on Monday. Already the semi's were lining the highways. The Campesinos would be joining them this time, and the roads would be shut down for God-knows-how-long. We could be stuck for days. In a town with three shops, one of them selling only chicken pieces. Flashbacks to the Ottawa occupation started to come back...

We had to move on, despite the offer of a Tuesday lasagna with our camp mates, so that if we were stuck, at least it would be in one of my favourite places in the world: Patzcauro. More on that the next post!

Hope you are all well and managing through the cold. We think of you all often! 

Making it to the Mexican Mainland

 

We finally peeled ourselves off the Baja beaches and decided to head to the real Mexico.

But first we had to get to the ferry, which meant getting out of the Magic Pueblo of Loreto. Which wasn't easy.

There's a lot to do in Loreto, home to yet another amazing Mexican national park and marine preservation area. We were too early for the whales, so instead, after catching several sea lions bobbing in the harbour, and seeing flying giant tunas leaping into the air avoiding said sea lines, we headed into the nearby desert to hike the most spectacular (and tough) canyon climb I have ever completed. 

We were told to look for cairns (or, as Ivan thought they were called, "Karens", as though some middle-aged white woman was going to pop out of the wilderness and tell us where to go) but couldn't find more than half a dozen on the four-hour hike. Basically, you go up, however you can, scrambling a Jurassic-looking river bed that reminded me of the Flintstones, with every rock MASSIVE and all crazy colours from light blue to brick red. Then there were three rope climbs. Three. And these are Mexican ropes, keep in mind. But at the top: paradise. Small lagoons with clear, cool water, the air filled with fluttering butterflies.

One of the lagoons near the top

After my rather messy descent

Topping second rope climb

At the top of our hike we met with a family of Albertans, an aunt, uncle and their niece and nephew. The niece was all made up, her eyes painted in a "butterfly style" (yes, I had to google that), with orange glitter on her lids. She was carrying a Ziplock bag full of all the dead insects she'd found along the way. Obviously, we became fast friends. I showed her my Seek by iNaturalist app, which identifies thousands of species, and we geeked out about the Insectarium in Montreal. Then, on the way down, Ivan spotted this beauty:

Texas black-spot tarantula! 

I had never seen a tarantula in the wild before, and figured Michaela (that was butterfly girl and my new spirit child) hadn't either, so we waited to show her. She was if anything more excited than I was.

The start of our trip

In the All Trail reviews, many had turned back at that first rope, so I thought I was pretty tough completing that climb. But then, just as we began our descent, a very tanned French man in nothing but a G-string speedo and a towel on his shoulder, as though he'd just come from the Riviera, passed us on the way to the lagoons. I don't even want to imagine the rope burns he risked on his way up. 

The end of that trip was kind of weird, though, because for lunch in the most surreal development in Peurto Escondito. It was at a marina full of yachts, the expensive kind, and there were all these wide, palm-lined streets, but not a single house. Not even a foundation. The town, which was surrounded on all sides by beautiful, treed hills, was empty except for one Mexican fisherman and two concrete workers fixing a curb on a street with no name. Anyway, give it five years and all the not-quite-rich-enough-for-Cabo will no doubt have their condos there. 

Wednesday it was time to leave that Peublo Magico, Loreto. Which was tough, given that the microbakery opened that day. I had my first slice of real bread in weeks, plus the most astounding concha (affectionately called it conchillia) I have ever tasted. It was like pain au chocolat but (sorry, my French relatives) actually better.

Our campsite at Pallo Altos

The Mircrobakery, only open Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays.

Chocolate concha

From Loreto we went straight to La Paz, just for the night. While we were there, we went to the hotel we'd stayed at when we were in our twenties, and I was pregnant with Sian: the Hotel Lorimar. Nothing looked the same, but when I asked the gentleman at the counter about whether this was the same hotel where they'd given us water guns upon registering so we could keep the resident parrot from entering our room, he said it was the very one. The real parrot had been replaced with a paper mache one. Which pretty much is all you need to know about how much La Paz has changed since we last saw it.

Hotel Lorimar today

La Paz, which had been sleepy and small in the old days, has become a hub for docking cruise ships that disgorge masses of tourists onto the malecón every day. Huge Mexican cocktails the size of your head, rimmed with sweet syrup and nuts and stuffed with gummy worms abound on the patios, and the taco places have salad bars and choose-your-own topics that just seem like a crazy idea in this heat.

 We were lucky to find a hippy campground in the city where we could park for the night squeezed tight between two other vehicles: two young surfers from England in a Subaru-like car, and a Spanish-German couple with adopted Mexican cat (on a leash), in a converted truck camper. I remember the first couple because their air conditioning was broken and they had finally realized they couldn't live without it. I remember the second couple most because they had installed air conditioning. For the cat, they said. Oh, how I wished I was their cat.

El Malecon, La Paz

Mural outside our hostel

Happy hippy hostel

La Paz was in the middle of a heat wave and I was in the middle of an airless parking lot jammed between two cars. I spent the night feeling like I was that frog in the parable slowly being boiled alive, cursing Ivan (who slept soundly, like a baby, not a freaking drop of sweat on him) as I took cold showers to bring down my body temperature and googled how much it would cost to fly one way from La Paz back to Ottawa.

But I survived. And after one hydrolyte and two coffees the next morning, I was able to speak civilly to Ivan again, who promised to install the fan for me (and did). After spending the morning reminiscing and regretting our taco choices, we headed to the ferry. 

There are two ways to travel to the mainland: cheap, and you sleep in your van, or expensive, and you sleep in a bed, with a bathroom, shower and - YES - air conditioning. My wedding ring may only have cost $25, but Ivan knows by now what he'd better not cheap out on. 

Getting on to the ferry, as getting anything bureaucratic done in Mexico, was very confusing, poorly-signed, time-consuming, mostly illogical and required a lot of mangled Spanglish. I was sent onto a bus, Ivan was ushered forward with the van. No one explained what was happening and we could only hope we would see each other again before we landed. But, as always seems to happen in Mexico, it all worked out. Eventually, we and everyone else got on, with time to spare. Soon the bar was open, Mexican rap was pumping, and it was more like we were all heading into a party instead of a 15-hour ferry ride. 

Evening on the ferry

Mexican flag flying

Ferry Terminal

Me in what Ivan calls "Coiled Cobra" pose, working on my rewrite

Fifteen hours later we were in Mazatlán, and it was wonderful, chaotic, Mexican madness. I couldn't stop smelling the fishy air for the joy of being back. We didn't stay in the city though, but drove to San Blas, following our old itinerary, and lucked out to find three days camp at a resort with two pools, clean toilets, Saturday-night dance DJs, and our own resident pony and goat. 

Pony and goat cuddle and siesta beside our van

San Blas waves

San Blas commuters

American Crocodile at the crocodile sanctuary in San Blas

Juan's Banana Bread  - a local specialty

San Blas was nothing like the Baja beaches. Here there are crashing waves that seem to crest forever. They grind the sand into you, deep in your pores, so it's almost impossible to wash out. And all around you is jungle. Juicy flowers, plump and swollen leaves, and exploded, ripe fruits all over the place. Here you buy vegetables on the street or in small stalls, not supermarkets like in the Baja, and the women serving you check your tortillas before you buy them to make sure they're still fresh. They won't sell them to you if they aren't. Peanut vendors spoon the freshest peanuts you've ever tasted into small sacks the size of your palm for a mere 10 pesos, and ceviche is stacked three inches high on tostadas. It is a riot of abundance.

The great thing about Mexico is that you can travel the whole country going beach to beach. But south of us begins the huge tourist towns, so instead we decide to follow our old route and make our way upwards into the Mexican highlands.

More on that in the next post because - spoiler alert - Tequila really does deserve its own post.

I hear it will be a white winter at home. Thinking of you all as I drive by plastic Christmas trees and blow-up Santas in the tiny highway stalls. They do look surreal in this heat.