Day Trip To The Mountains (Just About)

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Up we went!

I'm not sure what happened yesterday but I made the comment that I was going stir crazy.  The next words were, "Let's go for a drive".   That didn't take long.  I had come home from my 10k walk and so I hopped in the shower and off we went.

A photo from a few years back of the Laguna with Juan, David and Cam.

The top of the mountain is called Laguna de Sanchez where there really is a laguna.  Some years because of drought it might go dry but it has been full the last couple of years.  Off we went up the winding road.  It's in pretty good shape except for one small area above the Cola de Caballo (Horsetail Falls).  The road was actually built over the waterfall so in heavy rains it causes mudslides.  When they clear the road it really tears up the asphalt and so about 100 meters is slow going. 

Although businesses were allowed to open up this week it has been slow going.  I'm sure that the tourist stalls near our house will not be back, it was just too long to be out of business and they weren't big businesses anyway.  The furniture stores are open and the buffets, well they will eventually reopen.  

As you head up the mountain there is another tourist area where you find lots of carved wood such as rustic tables and chairs and some small restaurants.  Again, a few people hanging out (no masks of course), but no one is really open.

With all the rain we've had, we passed a couple of good waterfalls along the way.

I'm not sure if any of you know, there is no beer in Mexico right now.  The breweries shut down and there just isn't any.  You may find the hoarders who are selling a six-pack for 600 pesos or $30 USD.  Lines are long and people of all economic levels are in the line.  In the south, a group of people died from drinking bootleg.  I checked the recipe to make vodka but it's too much trouble and wouldn't be worth it to me.  We stocked up in December for some unknown reason.  Juan had come home from SMA to take care of some business and there was a sale.  He bought a couple of cases.

A famous stopping point on the way up to the mountaintop is Puerto Genovevo.  It's way down in the canyon and can only be reached by four-wheel vehicles.  They call it a town, but there are only 13 residents.  As we came up to the turn off there was a blockade.  The police were stopping cars and turning us around.  There haven't been any COVID cases in the town of Laguna de Sanchez (250 residents) so they want to keep it that way.

Well, we did get turned around but we were able to get out in the air and the green.