The weather wasn’t too good, cloudy skies with intermittent light rain. No views of the volcano over Lake Villarrica from the front porch of our cabin yet. Fortunately, it’s still possible to enjoy a visit to the hot springs that are famous in these parts despite the clouds and light rain every now and again. Based on the number of recommendations, out of all the options available we settled on the Termas Geométricas as our destination and it turned out to be a good choice. It was a very nice experience and we all had a very good time. The setting was quite and the way the individual pools were set up, blending in to the natural surroundings. Very picturesque and serene, everything you imagine a good spa would be (not that I have much experience ... read more

After three previous failed attempts to travel to the Lakes District, we finally made it! Way back in 2004 a work conflict arose which forced the first cancellation, then the weather forecast was so poor that travel to the lakes would have been too disappointing so we diverted at the last minute to Buenos Aires and Santiago (a change we took advantage of by making time to take in Valparaíso and Viña del Mar, and also to stay at the Casa Real Hotel located right on the Santa Rita Vineyard in the Maipo Valley which turned out to be quite an awesome experience), and then the earthquake of January 2011 occurred about a week prior to our next scheduled departure so we were forced to cancel for the third time. Needless to say, after almost 10 ... read more

We leave Guadalajara around 8:30AM and drive. We drive and drive. And drive some more. The scenery is nice: flat and open, some mountains in the distance. Cell phone coverage gets better as we continue moving further north. The rest stops on the tollway get nicer. There are Subway sandwich shops and 7-11's. Some of the toll booths even take US Dollars. There are mountains as we approach Saltillo and Monterrey and the roads get curvy (the sign in Spanish describes them as sinuosa, a cool word I think). The highway here gets very windy, there are dust devils. I don't know what they are now--Dave tells me later--but it's pretty wild to see the wind kicking up huge plumes of dust at the foot of the mountains in the distance. The wind shakes the van. ... read more

Today we ride the famous Tequila Express train from the FerroMex train station in Guadalajara to the Amatitan valley. Supposedly the birthplace of tequila, the town is home of the Casa Herradura tequila distillery at the Hacienda San Jose del Refugio. The tour is extremely well organized, the assembled group is divided among four packed train cars, all very modern. We are in the red car. As we line up to board we are greeted by a mariachi band, Los Toritos (they actually have songs available for download on napster). Like tequila, mariachi also traces its origins here and is another of Guadalajara's famous exports to the world. The train ride is about 1 hour 45 minutes during which we are serenaded by the mariachi band. The train passes through nice country, filled with farms of ... read more

Day Seven: We left Teotihuacan around 8:15 for the drive to Guanajuato. We had to head back toward Mexico City and didn’t know how bad the traffic would be even though we were going to be skirting around the north side of the city. We found the roads without any problem but just as we were entering the highway toward Queretero (which we need to pass through along the way), we had our first experience with police corruption. A couple of Policia Federal cars parked along the side of the entrance ramp pulled us over and showed me what looked like a traffic law book that prohibited cars with foreign plates from circulating within the D.F. between 5 and 11 AM. When he mentioned that we were only 40 km from the border of the D.F. ... read more