We took a couple of days of for a family vacation / road trip through
the hills of Central Mexico. The overall trip does not look like
anything out of the ordinary
Other than the fact that Google forecasted we d take approximately
15.5 hours driving for 852Km that is, an average of almost 55
Km/h. And yes, that s what we signed up for. And that s what we
got. Of course, the exact routes are not exactly what Google suggested
(I can say we optimized a bit the route, i.e., by avoiding the
metropolitan area of Quer taro, at the extreme west, and going via San
Juan del R o / Tequisquiapan / Bernal).
The first stretch of the road is just a regular, huge highway, with
no particular insights. The highways leaving and entering Mexico City
on the North are not fun nor beautiful, only they are needed to get
nice trips going
Mexico City sits at a point of changing climates. Of course, it is a
huge city And I cannot imagine how it would be without all of the
urbanization it now sports. But anyway: On the West, South, and part
of the East, it is surrounded by high mountains, with beautiful and
dense forests. Mexico City is 2200m high, and most of the valley s
surrounding peaks are ~3000m (and at the South Eastern tip, our two
big volcanoes, Popocat petl and Iztacc huatl, get past the 5700m
mark). Towards the North, the landscape is flatter and much more
dry. Industrial compounds give way to dry grasslands. Of course,
central Mexico does not understand the true meaning of
flat, and the
landscape is full with eh-not-very-big mountains.
Then, as we entered Quer taro State, we started approaching
Bernal. And we saw a huge rock that looks like it is not supposed
to be there! It just does not fit the surroundings.
Shortly after Bernal, we entered a beautiful, although most crumpled,
mountain ridge:
Sierra Gorda de
Quer taro. Sierra Gorda
encompasses most of the North of the (quite small 11500Km total)
state of Quer taro, plus portions of the neighboring states; other
than the very abrupt and sharp orography, what strikes me most is the
habitat diversity it encompasses. We started going up an absolute
desert, harsh and beautiful; we didn t take pictures along the way as
the road is difficult enough that there are almost no points for
stopping for refreshments or for photo opportunities. But it is quite
majestic. And if you think deserts are barren, boring places well,
please do spend some time enjoying them!
Anyway At on point, the road passes by a ~3100m height, and
suddenly Pines! More pines! A beautiful forest! We reached our
first stop at the originally mining town of
Pinal de
Amoles.
After spending the night there and getting a much needed rest, we
started a quite steep descent towards
Jalpan de
Serra. While it is
only ~20Km away on the map, we descended from 2300 to 760 meters of
altitude (and the road was over 40Km long).
Being much lower, the climate drastically changed from cool and humid
to quite warm and the body attitude in the kids does not lie!
In the mid-18th century, Fray Jun pero Serra established five missions
to evangelize the population of this very harsh territory, and the
frontispiece for the church and monastery in Jalpan is quite
breathtaking.
But we were just passing by Jalpan. A short visit to the church and to
the ice-cream shop, and we were again on our way. We crossed the state
border, entering San Luis Potos , and arrived to our main destination:
Xilitla, the little town in
the beautiful
Huasteca where
the jungle meets surrealism.
Xilitla was chosen by the British poet and patron of various
surrealist artists
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_James. He was a British noble (an
unofficial grandson of King
Edward VII), and heir to a huge fortune. I m not going to repeat here
his very well known biography suffice to say that he got in love
with the Huasteca, and bought a >30ha piece of jungle and mountain
close to the Xilitla town, and made it his house. With very ample
economic resources, in the late 1940s he started his lifelong project
of building a surrealist garden.
And Well, that s enough blabbering for me. I m sharing some
pictures I took there. The place is plainly magic and
wonderful. Edward James died in 1984, and his will decrees that after
his death, the jungle should be allowed to reclaim the constructions
so many structures are somewhat crumbling, and it is expected they
will break down in the following decades. But for whoever comes to
Mexico This magic place is definitely worth the heavy ride to the
middle of the mountains and to the middle of the jungle.
Xilitla now also hosts a very good museum with sculptures by Leonora
Carrington, James long-time friend, but I m not going to abuse this
space with even more pictures. And of course, we did more, and enjoyed
more, during our three days in Xilitla.
And for our way back I wanted to try a different route. We decided
to come back to Mexico City crossing Hidalgo state instead of
Quer taro. I had feared the roads would be in a worse shape or would
be more difficult to travel And I was happy to be proven wrong!
This was the longest driving stretch approximately 6:30 for
250Km. The roads are in quite decent shape, and while there are some
stretches where we were quite lonely (probably the loneliest one was
the sharp ascent from Tamazunchale to the detour before Orizatl n),
the road felt safe and well kept at all times. The sights all across
Eastern Hidalgo are breathtaking, and all furiously green (be it with
really huge fern leaves or with tall, strong pines), until
Zacualtip n.
And just as abruptly or more as when we entered Pinal de Amoles We
crossed Orizatl n, and we were in a breathtaking arid, desert-like
environment again. We crossed the
Barranca de Metztitl n natural
reserve, and arrived to spend the night at Huasca de Ocampo.
There are many more things we could have done starting at Huasca, a
region where old
haciendas thrived, full of natural formations, and
very very interesting. But we were tired and pining to be finally back
home. So we rested until mid-morning and left straight back home in
Mexico City. Three hours later, we were relaxing, preparing lunch, the
kids watching whatever-TV-like-things are called nowadays.
All in all, a very beautiful vacation!
. Internet shutdowns impact women 
About 6 months ago, I decided to purchase a bike trailer. I don't drive and
although I also have a shopping caddy, it often can't handle a week's
groceries.
Since the goal for the trailer was to haul encumbering and heavy loads, I
decided to splurge and got a 
So far, I've used the trailer to go grocery shopping, buy bulk food and haul
dirt and mulch. To make things easier, I've purchased two 
Although my housing cooperative has a (small) indoor bicycle parking space, my
partner uses our spot during the summer, which means I have to store the
trailer on my balcony. To make things more manageable and free up some space, I
set up a system of pulleys to hoist the trailer up the air when it's not in
use.
I did go through a few iterations, but I'm pretty happy with the current 8
pulleys block and tackle mechanism I rigged.
All and all, this trailer wasn't cheap, but I regret nothing. Knowing Surley's
reputation, it will last me many years and not having to drive a car to get
around always ends up being the cheaper solution.
Uhm, salsa is not resolving:
Since some time I ve been thinking about making myself a top or a dress with a wide gathered neckline that can be work at different widths, including off-the-shoulders.
A few years ago I ve been gifted a cut of nice, thin white fabric with a print of lines and lozenges that isn t uniform along the fabric, but looks like it was designed for some specific garment, and it was waiting in my stash for a suitable pattern.
And a few days ago, during a Sunday lunch, there was an off-hand mention of a dress from the late 1970s which had an elastic in the neckline, so that it could be optionally worn off-the-shoulders.
And something snapped in place.
I had plans for that afternoon, but they were scrapped, and I started to draw, measure, cut rectangles of fabric, pin and measure again, cut more fabric.
The part of the fabric with large vertical stripes had two different widths: I could have made the back narrower, but I decided to just keep a strip with narrower lines to one side.
The fabric also didn t have a full second strip of lozenges, so I had to hem it halfway through it.
The casing for the elastic was pieced from various scraps, but at least I was able to match the lines on the center front and back, even if they are different. Not that it matters a lot, since it s all hidden in the gathering, but I would have known.
And since I was working on something definitely modern, even if made out of squares and rectangles, of course I decided to hand-sew everything, mostly to be able to use quite small sewing allowances, since the fabric was pretty thin.
In my stash I had a piece of swimsuit elastic that feels nice, looks nice and makes a knot that doesn t slip, so I used it. It s a perfect match, except for the neon yellow colour, which I do like, but maybe is a bit too high visibility? I will see if the haberdasher has the same elastic in dark blue, but right now this will do.
It was a quick project anyway: by the end of the working week the top was finished; I think that on a sewing machine it would be easy to make it in a day.
And it can be worn off the shoulders! Which is something I will probably never do in public (and definitely not outdoors), but now if I wanted I could! :D
As usual, the pattern (for what pattern there is) and instructions are 
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Welcome to the 41th post in the 
After many years of effort, I am happy to announce that 
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I m six months into my journey of building a business which means its time to reflect and review the goals I set for the year.