Toluca, Toluca, Toluca
After leaving behind the butterflies and Michoacan, we entered the state of Mexico and stayed in its capital, Toluca. Although it was only a little over 90 km of riding between Zitacuaro and Toluca, we took two days because we hit another endless hill the first day out of Zitacuaro, where we went straight up, gaining 1000 m of altitude in the first 20 km of our ride. Most of the rest of the ride to Toluca was relatively painless, but rolling hills kept us from getting there too quickly.
In Toluca, we stayed with a great guy named Moises that we met through the Couchsurfing website. We arrived on Sunday afternoon at his house, and after a welcoming shot of tequila, he wisked us away to the nearby town of Tenango to eat and visit some ruins. We went to a market where once we entered we were surrounded by cries of “joven, joven!” (young person) and various people sticking meat out in front of us, trying to get us to eat at their stall. We had barbacued sheep with tortillas and soup, and ate until we were stuffed. Then we started walking through town toward a hill, ascending via a path surrounded by small crowded houses. We must have taken the back way, because there were no signs at all to indicate what we’d find at the top—a large set of ruins located atop a hill (most of the ruins we’ve seen are at the top of hills, due to their superior visibility and defensibility).
The next day, Moises had to work, but his mother and sister offered to be our tour guides through downtown Toluca and the nearby town of Metepec. Neither of them speak English, so Cindy and I got to practice our Spanish some more. They tried to speak very slowly and clearly for us, which is still helpful at this stage of the game. I think the highlight of downtown Toluca is the Cosmovitral (link in Spanish), a botanical garden built on the site of a former market. But what makes the building amazing is not the plants, but that the entire building is surrounded by stained-glass. The windows represent the sun and daylight on one side and the moon and nighttime on the other side. Another highlight was getting to stop at our first Costco in Mexico! I think Cindy and I were a little underwhelmed…we had hoped that there might be some unique twist to Costcos in Mexico, it was pretty much the same as the ones in the US. Except the signs were in Spanish. Oh, and they sold a lot of really good tequila in the liquor section.
We found out before we left Toluca that we had a little problem to fix. Back in Morelia, we had shipped some items to ourselves back home that we had bought in and around Patzcuaro. Well, because it was a holiday (President Benito Juarez’s birthday), the normal post office was closed, so we tried to ship via a money exchange/shipping joint. Fast forward to Toluca—we got an email from my mom saying that they had gotten a phone call from someone who was a relative (english speaking, living in the US) of the people who were supposed to ship the package, saying that they didn’t collect enough money from us for shipping. Although we were a little upset at the snafu, we were glad that they somehow managed to track us down! Moises talked to the shippers for us, and his family helped us to make a remote deposit into their bank account for the shipping balance. In all, it cost more than we paid for the merchandise to ship it back to the states, but even with the additional cost, everything was still relatively inexpensive.
We’ve decided to take a pass on riding over the pass into Mexico City, and we’re going to catch a bus into town. Then we’ll stay for a while with the family of our former roommates Teresa and Max. Both of us are looking forward to exploring the gigantic metropolis that awaits.
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