Guanajuato, Mexico

The City that Shines in All Colors


Domes
afternoon shadow
The Basilica and the University
Guanajuato Blues
Architecture
Friends of the Bouganvileas
Callejon del Beso
El Pipila
Future Student Museum
Frida and the Mono
La Valenciana Mine and Church
La Valenciana Church
The balcony
Face vs Back
above Guanajuato
old mine
street of all colors
The Precious House
the Quincenera
View over the Center
During the XNUMXth century, it was the city that produced the most silver in the world and one of the most opulent in Mexico and colonial Spain. Several of its mines are still active, but the impressive wealth of Guanuajuato lies in the multicolored eccentricity of its history and secular heritage.

Over time, Guanajuato became a city of rituals.

We have them for all tastes. Those who, like us, have recently entered there, begin by surrendering to the ascent-pilgrimage to the Cerro del Pipila.

The first of the ascents, we do it in the panoramic funicular, departing from the back of Teatro Juárez. We had already circled the avenues, streets and alleys, from the almost edge of the Jardin El Contador to the central and neuralgic Jardin La Unión.

As the small cabin climbs the western slope, it reveals something different: the stratification of the houses of Guanajuato, the bright but harmonious shape as it was molded to the capricious relief of the Sierra de San Gregorio, located in an area of ​​the center of the country that Mexicans know it as Bajio.

This, despite being above 2000m altitude.

The Dazzling Multicolor Casario de Guanajuato

The change in perspective reveals how its squares and urban veins are more intricate than they appear.

It exposes us to successive levels of undulating houses, homes above homes, buildings and more buildings perched, vying for the parched slopes.

The Purépecha Indians who inhabited this heart of Mexico, upon the arrival of the Spanish conquerors, knew it for quanax huato, translatable as frog hill(s). The Europeans adjusted both the phonics and the spelling.

The cabin leans against your dock. We walked through a few interior corridors. Then, others, exterior, aimed at the apex of the viewpoint.

When we conquered it, the last light of day gilded high and fortunate sections, sometimes of the houses, sometimes of the arid slopes.

We leaned over the balcony.

We looked from one end of the heights of the valley to the other, looking for the pockets of color that the shadow spared.

Meanwhile, a crowd swelled which the dusk made festive. Mexican outsiders and Gringos they gave themselves to selfies endless, with the scenery in the background.

El Pípila, the Hero of the Mexican Independence of Guanajuato

And to others that framed the towering statue of Juan José de los Reyes Martínez, El Pípila.

El Pípila is, par excellence, the independence hero of the city. At a time when the movement's leader and father of the Mexican homeland Miguel Hidalgo was opening the hostilities against the Spanish Crown and the Loyalists, the latter were fortified in a grain silo.

Hidalgo's forces achieved the famous Siege of Alhondiga.

However, the loyalists shot back anyone who approached the building. So it was, until the miner El Pípila tied a stone slab to his back.

Protected at the height, he crept to the entrance with a tar jar and a torch and set fire to the wooden doors of Alhondiga. The collapse of the doors paved the way for the conquest of the building, the city and the independence of Mexico.

El Pípila and the courage he showed are immortalized in the large stone statue, adorned with the saying “aun hay other garlics for burning".

Around the monument, divided between dozens of stalls, different fires and smoke abounded.

The End of Day Party at Cerro del Pípila

Instead of revolution, those of Mexican gastronomy, of its snacks and others, chapulines (locusts) fried with lemon and spicy, champurrados e atole (fermented corn drinks) flavored with marzipan, peanuts and others.

And the most banal tacos, foreigners and burritos, pushed with lively conversation and the unavoidable micheladas.

We wait for the win of the twilight. We went down, on foot, with no definite direction.

To the gaudy and exuberant historic center demarcated by the Basilica of Nª Srª de Guanajuato, the Juárez Theater and the University.

The affinity we feel with Lisbon when admiring the house amphitheater from the viewpoint, we feel it again when we get lost in the alleys and alleys, aware that, as long as the path remains descending and steep, it would end up in the smooth center of the city. .

When we arrive at the sort of trimmed triangle at Jardin La Unión, the party do El Pipila Hill has an extension.

Musicians mariachis in glossy black and yellow shirts they play popular themes from table to table, confident in the generous gratifications of spectators.

Street artists performed different acts.

The Students, the Student Women and the Tunas of Guanajuato

Guanajuato is, at the same time, one of the main academic cities in Mexico, comparable to Coimbra.

It houses almost thirty-two thousand students who follow the motto “the truth will make them free” and one of the most peculiar and impressive central university buildings in the world. face of the earth.

There we stopped to appreciate a lengthy delivery of diplomas.

In the same street, young members of the students, press tickets for their famous callejoneadas.

There are tourist, musical, comical, picturesque tours in which the hosts guide the participants and entertain them by playing an array of instruments and a little bit of everything.

Nearby, we come across Sebastian, dressed in traditional attire and in the company of his father José Manuel. Invite us in.

For a house overflowing with trophies, gowns, cassocks, instruments, diplomas, photos of tuna exhibitions in other countries, an endless number of academic items.

“We are in the process of cleaning up, don't take this the wrong way”, they confess. “If all goes well, this chaos will give rise to the Student Museum of Guanajuato.

The future museum is located next to another emblematic place in the city, also frequented by the callejoneadas.

The Sanctuary to the Concurrent Love of the Callejon del Beso

O alley of the kiss it's a tight alley, just 68cm wide.

He became famous for the forbidden passion of a couple, Ana and Carlos, who their respective families forbade to see each other.

Gifted with the proximity of their balconies, Ana and Carlos met and kissed often. Until Ana's father caught them in the middle of a kiss and killed his daughter with a dagger in the heart.

Today the alley of the kiss it is seen as a sanctuary of love.

For much of the day, visitors line up there to photograph themselves kissing.

And yet, in its genesis, Guanajuato had little time for romance and feelings.

Guanajuato and the Endless Wealth in Silver and Gold

The city grew out of silver and gold. It improved from the record-breaking wealth that the region hid in hyperbolic veins, deposited on the slopes.

When the Spaniards arrived, in 1540, the natives were already exploring them without difficulty. Narratives that reached the invaders asserted that the natives found nuggets of gold on the surface of the ground.

Mineral deposits proved so rich that conquerors rushed to recruit defenses and erect forts.

The objective was to repel the attacks of the fierce Chichimeca natives to the newly named post of Real de Minas de Guanajuato, shortly afterwards, promoted to the city of Santa Fé de Real de Minas de Guanajuato.

News of the abundance of gold and silver traveled through Mexico. Soon, they arrived in Spain. Immigrants from Spain, Creoles, mestizo and native workers made the city grow.

With more hands to prospect, other veins were found and new mines opened.

Mines and More Mines Around a Wealthy City

San Barnabé was followed by Raias. Certain mines originated respective neighborhoods: Cata, La Pastita, San Luisito and Valenciana.

The pioneer mine, that of San Barnabé, produced almost half a millennium, until 1928.

Others, more recent, have proven even more profitable and continue to generate wealth.

This is the case of Valenciana, operational from 1774 and which, until the beginning of the XNUMXth century, produced two thirds of the world's silver.

On one of the days dedicated to Guanajuato, we visited it. Contrary to expectations, the short trip is made up the slopes, towards the northern top of the city, where the houses almost touch the sky.

We passed majestic churches, commissioned with funding from the families that owned the mines, in gratitude to the divine for their good fortune.

Here, the church stands out. churrigueresque (Mexican Baroque style) of La Valenciana, built in the XNUMXth century next to the opening of the homonymous mine.

With its right tower still unfinished, unlike the walls and the bastion that, further down, made it possible to defend the wealth from the bandits.

We descend to a depth of 70m from one of the wells. There we felt the claustrophobic atmosphere in which around 3500 indigenous people were kept working, sometimes for more than fifteen hours a day.

As explained by the guide Edgar, precious metal veins and open mines appeared all over the place.

Not all excavations in the city were made for the direct reason of gold and silver.

Guanajuato, the City of Tunnels

Guanajuato is based on an extensive and intricate network of old tunnels, with almost 9 km, if you add the lengths of El Pípila, El Minero, La Galereña and the rest.

These tunnels were opened for a primary reason: the fulminant rainy season in these parts of Mexico and the floods generated by the thickening of the Guanajuato River.

They form a strange underworld that, in spaces, opens up to the sky and from which houses and buildings with post-colonial legos look emerge again. Guanajuato has all these dimensions and colors.

In almost five hundred years of history and of a wealthy colonization, it hides many more.

Barrancas del Cobre (Copper Canyon), Chihuahua, Mexico

The Deep Mexico of the Barrancas del Cobre

Without warning, the Chihuahua highlands give way to endless ravines. Sixty million geological years have furrowed them and made them inhospitable. The Rarámuri indigenous people continue to call them home.
chihuahua, Mexico

¡Ay Chihuahua !

Mexicans have adapted this expression as one of their favorite manifestations of surprise. While we wander through the capital of the homonymous state of the Northwest, we often exclaim it.
Real de Catorce, San Luis Potosí, Mexico

From New Spain Lode to Mexican Pueblo Mágico

At the beginning of the XNUMXth century, it was one of the mining towns that guaranteed the most silver to the Spanish Crown. A century later, the silver had been devalued in such a way that Real de Catorce was abandoned. Its history and the peculiar scenarios filmed by Hollywood have made it one of the most precious villages in Mexico.
Real de Catorce, San Luis Potosí, Mexico

The Depreciation of Silver that Led to that of the Pueblo (Part II)

With the turn of the XNUMXth century, the value of the precious metal hit bottom. From a prodigious town, Real de Catorce became a ghost. Still discovering, we explore the ruins of the mines at their origin and the charm of the Pueblo resurrected.
Yucatan, Mexico

The End of the End of the World

The announced day passed but the End of the World insisted on not arriving. In Central America, today's Mayans watched and put up with incredulity all the hysteria surrounding their calendar.
Campeche, Mexico

200 Years of Playing with Luck

At the end of the XNUMXth century, the peasants surrendered to a game introduced to cool the fever of cash cards. Today, played almost only for Abuelites, a lottery little more than a fun place.
San Cristóbal de las Casas a Campeche, Mexico

A Relay of Faith

The Catholic equivalent of Our Lady of Fátima, Our Lady of Guadalupe moves and moves Mexico. Its faithful cross the country's roads, determined to bring the proof of their faith to the patroness of the Americas.
Champoton, Mexico

Rodeo Under Sombreros

Champoton, in Campeche, hosts a fair honored by the Virgén de La Concepción. O rodeo Mexican under local sombreros reveals the elegance and skill of the region's cowboys.

Mexico City, Mexico

mexican soul

With more than 20 million inhabitants in a vast metropolitan area, this megalopolis marks, from its heart of zócalo, the spiritual pulse of a nation that has always been vulnerable and dramatic.

San Cristobal de Las Casas, Mexico

The Home Sweet Home of Mexican Social Conscience

Mayan, mestizo and Hispanic, Zapatista and tourist, country and cosmopolitan, San Cristobal has no hands to measure. In it, Mexican and expatriate backpacker visitors and political activists share a common ideological demand.
Cobá to Pac Chen, Mexico

From the Ruins to the Mayan Homes

On the Yucatan Peninsula, the history of the second largest indigenous Mexican people is intertwined with their daily lives and merges with modernity. In Cobá, we went from the top of one of its ancient pyramids to the heart of a village of our times.
Tulum, Mexico

The Most Caribbean of the Mayan Ruins

Built by the sea as an exceptional outpost decisive for the prosperity of the Mayan nation, Tulum was one of its last cities to succumb to Hispanic occupation. At the end of the XNUMXth century, its inhabitants abandoned it to time and to an impeccable coastline of the Yucatan peninsula.
Izamal, Mexico

The Holy, Yellow and Beautiful Mexican City

Until the arrival of the Spanish conquerors, Izamal was a center of worship for the supreme Mayan god Itzamná and Kinich Kakmó, the one of the sun. Gradually, the invaders razed the various pyramids of the natives. In its place, they built a large Franciscan convent and a prolific colonial houses, with the same solar tone in which the now Catholic city shines.
Campeche, Mexico

Campeche Upon Can Pech

As was the case throughout Mexico, the conquerors arrived, saw and won. Can Pech, the Mayan village, had almost 40 inhabitants, palaces, pyramids and an exuberant urban architecture, but in 1540 there were less than 6 natives. Over the ruins, the Spaniards built Campeche, one of the most imposing colonial cities in the Americas.
Mérida, Mexico

The Most Exuberant of Meridas

In 25 BC, the Romans founded Emerita Augusta, capital of Lusitania. The Spanish expansion generated three other Méridas in the world. Of the four, the Yucatan capital is the most colorful and lively, resplendent with Hispanic colonial heritage and multi-ethnic life.
Campeche, Mexico

A Bingo so playful that you play with puppets

On Friday nights, a group of ladies occupy tables at Independencia Park and bet on trifles. The tiniest prizes come out to them in combinations of cats, hearts, comets, maracas and other icons.
Yucatan, Mexico

The Sidereal Murphy's Law That Doomed the Dinosaurs

Scientists studying the crater caused by a meteorite impact 66 million years ago have come to a sweeping conclusion: it happened exactly over a section of the 13% of the Earth's surface susceptible to such devastation. It is a threshold zone on the Mexican Yucatan peninsula that a whim of the evolution of species allowed us to visit.
Uxmal, Yucatan, Mexico

The Mayan Capital That Piled It Up To Collapse

The term Uxmal means built three times. In the long pre-Hispanic era of dispute in the Mayan world, the city had its heyday, corresponding to the top of the Pyramid of the Diviner at its heart. It will have been abandoned before the Spanish Conquest of the Yucatan. Its ruins are among the most intact on the Yucatan Peninsula.
Creel to Los Mochis, Mexico

The Barrancas del Cobre & the CHEPE Iron Horse

The Sierra Madre Occidental's relief turned the dream into a construction nightmare that lasted six decades. In 1961, at last, the prodigious Chihuahua al Pacifico Railroad was opened. Its 643km cross some of the most dramatic scenery in Mexico.
Chichen Itza, Yucatan, Mexico

On the Edge of the Cenote, at the Heart of the Mayan Civilization

Between the XNUMXth and XNUMXth centuries AD, Chichen Itza stood out as the most important city in the Yucatan Peninsula and the vast Mayan Empire. If the Spanish Conquest precipitated its decline and abandonment, modern history has consecrated its ruins a World Heritage Site and a Wonder of the World.
Masai Mara Reservation, Masai Land Travel, Kenya, Masai Convivial
Safari
Masai Mara, Kenya

A Journey Through the Masai Lands

The Mara savannah became famous for the confrontation between millions of herbivores and their predators. But, in a reckless communion with wildlife, it is the Masai humans who stand out there.
Aurora lights up the Pisang Valley, Nepal.
Annapurna (circuit)
Annapurna Circuit: 3rd- Upper Banana, Nepal

An Unexpected Snowy Aurora

At the first glimmers of light, the sight of the white mantle that had covered the village during the night dazzles us. With one of the toughest walks on the Annapurna Circuit ahead of us, we postponed the match as much as possible. Annoyed, we left Upper Pisang towards Escort when the last snow faded.
Music Theater and Exhibition Hall, Tbilisi, Georgia
Architecture & Design
Tbilisi, Georgia

Georgia still Perfumed by the Rose Revolution

In 2003, a popular political uprising made the sphere of power in Georgia tilt from East to West. Since then, the capital Tbilisi has not renounced its centuries of Soviet history, nor the revolutionary assumption of integrating into Europe. When we visit, we are dazzled by the fascinating mix of their past lives.
Adventure
Volcanoes

Mountains of Fire

More or less prominent ruptures in the earth's crust, volcanoes can prove to be as exuberant as they are capricious. Some of its eruptions are gentle, others prove annihilating.
knights of the divine, faith in the divine holy spirit, Pirenopolis, Brazil
Ceremonies and Festivities
Pirenópolis, Brazil

A Ride of Faith

Introduced in 1819 by Portuguese priests, the Festa do Divino Espírito Santo de Pirenópolis it aggregates a complex web of religious and pagan celebrations. It lasts more than 20 days, spent mostly on the saddle.
Ponta Delgada, São Miguel, Azores, City Gates
Cities
Ponta Delgada, São Miguel (Azores), Azores

The Great Azorean City

During the XNUMXth and XNUMXth centuries, Ponta Delgada became the most populous city and the economic and administrative capital of the Azores. There we find the history and modernism of the archipelago hand in hand.
Meal
World Food

Gastronomy Without Borders or Prejudice

Each people, their recipes and delicacies. In certain cases, the same ones that delight entire nations repel many others. For those who travel the world, the most important ingredient is a very open mind.
Saphire Cabin, Purikura, Tokyo, Japan
Culture
Tokyo, Japan

Japanese Style Passaport-Type Photography

In the late 80s, two Japanese multinationals already saw conventional photo booths as museum pieces. They turned them into revolutionary machines and Japan surrendered to the Purikura phenomenon.
Swimming, Western Australia, Aussie Style, Sun rising in the eyes
Sport
Busselton, Australia

2000 meters in Aussie Style

In 1853, Busselton was equipped with one of the longest pontoons in the world. World. When the structure collapsed, the residents decided to turn the problem around. Since 1996 they have been doing it every year. Swimming.
Motorcyclist in Sela Gorge, Arunachal Pradesh, India
Traveling
Guwahati a Saddle Pass, India

A Worldly Journey to the Sacred Canyon of Sela

For 25 hours, we traveled the NH13, one of the highest and most dangerous roads in India. We traveled from the Brahmaputra river basin to the disputed Himalayas of the province of Arunachal Pradesh. In this article, we describe the stretch up to 4170 m of altitude of the Sela Pass that pointed us to the Tibetan Buddhist city of Tawang.
Resident of Nzulezu, Ghana
Ethnic
Nzulezu, Ghana

A Village Afloat in Ghana

We depart from the seaside resort of Busua, to the far west of the Atlantic coast of Ghana. At Beyin, we veered north towards Lake Amansuri. There we find Nzulezu, one of the oldest and most genuine lake settlements in West Africa.
Got2Globe Photo Portfolio
Got2Globe Portfolio

life outside

Rabat, Malta, Mdina, Palazzo Xara
History
Rabat, Malta

A Former Suburb in the Heart of Malta

If Mdina became the noble capital of the island, the Knights Hospitaller decided to sacrifice the fortification of present-day Rabat. The city outside the walls expanded. It survives as a popular and rural counterpoint to the now living museum in Mdina.
Curieuse Island, Seychelles, Aldabra turtles
Islands
Felicité Island and Curieuse Island, Seychelles

From Leprosarium to Giant Turtles Home

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Maksim, Sami people, Inari, Finland-2
Winter White
Inari, Finland

The Guardians of Boreal Europe

Long discriminated against by Scandinavian, Finnish and Russian settlers, the Sami people regain their autonomy and pride themselves on their nationality.
View from the top of Mount Vaea and the tomb, Vailima village, Robert Louis Stevenson, Upolu, Samoa
Literature
Upolu, Samoa

Stevenson's Treasure Island

At age 30, the Scottish writer began looking for a place to save him from his cursed body. In Upolu and the Samoans, he found a welcoming refuge to which he gave his heart and soul.
kings canyon, red centre, heart, australia
Nature
Red Center, Australia

Australia's Broken Heart

The Red Center is home to some of Australia's must-see natural landmarks. We are impressed by the grandeur of the scenarios but also by the renewed incompatibility of its two civilizations.
Sheki, Autumn in the Caucasus, Azerbaijan, Autumn Homes
Autumn
Sheki, Azerbaijan

autumn in the caucasus

Lost among the snowy mountains that separate Europe from Asia, Sheki is one of Azerbaijan's most iconic towns. Its largely silky history includes periods of great harshness. When we visited it, autumn pastels added color to a peculiar post-Soviet and Muslim life.
Mount Denali, McKinley, Sacred Ceiling Alaska, North America, Summit, Altitude Evil, Mountain Evil, Prevent, Treat
Natural Parks
Mount Denali, Alaska

The Sacred Ceiling of North America

The Athabascan Indians called him Denali, or the Great, and they revered his haughtiness. This stunning mountain has aroused the greed of climbers and a long succession of record-breaking climbs.
Goiás Velho, Legacy of the Gold Fever, Brazil
UNESCO World Heritage
Goiás Velho, Brazil

A Gold Rush Legacy

Two centuries after the heyday of prospecting, lost in time and in the vastness of the Central Plateau, Goiás esteems its admirable colonial architecture, the surprising wealth that remains to be discovered there.
Characters
Look-alikes, Actors and Extras

Make-believe stars

They are the protagonists of events or are street entrepreneurs. They embody unavoidable characters, represent social classes or epochs. Even miles from Hollywood, without them, the world would be more dull.
New South Wales Australia, Beach walk
Beaches
Batemans Bay to Jervis Bay, Australia

New South Wales, from Bay to Bay

With Sydney behind us, we indulged in the Australian “South Coast”. Along 150km, in the company of pelicans, kangaroos and other peculiar creatures aussie, we let ourselves get lost on a coastline cut between stunning beaches and endless eucalyptus groves.
Glamor vs Faith
Religion
Goa, India

The Last Gasp of the Goan Portugality

The prominent city of Goa already justified the title of “rome of the east” when, in the middle of the XNUMXth century, epidemics of malaria and cholera led to its abandonment. The New Goa (Pangim) for which it was exchanged became the administrative seat of Portuguese India but was annexed by the Indian Union of post-independence. In both, time and neglect are ailments that now make the Portuguese colonial legacy wither.
Train Kuranda train, Cairns, Queensland, Australia
On Rails
Cairns-Kuranda, Australia

Train to the Middle of the Jungle

Built out of Cairns to save miners isolated in the rainforest from starvation by flooding, the Kuranda Railway eventually became the livelihood of hundreds of alternative Aussies.
Creel, Chihuahua, Carlos Venzor, collector, museum
Society
Chihuahua a Creel, Chihuahua, Mexico

On Creel's Way

With Chihuahua behind, we point to the southwest and to even higher lands in the north of Mexico. Next to Ciudad Cuauhtémoc, we visited a Mennonite elder. Around Creel, we lived for the first time with the Rarámuri indigenous community of the Serra de Tarahumara.
herd, foot-and-mouth disease, weak meat, colonia pellegrini, argentina
Daily life
Colónia Pellegrini, Argentina

When the Meat is Weak

The unmistakable flavor of Argentine beef is well known. But this wealth is more vulnerable than you think. The threat of foot-and-mouth disease, in particular, keeps authorities and growers afloat.
Cliffs above the Valley of Desolation, near Graaf Reinet, South Africa
Wildlife
Graaf-Reinet, South Africa

A Boer Spear in South Africa

In early colonial times, Dutch explorers and settlers were terrified of the Karoo, a region of great heat, great cold, great floods and severe droughts. Until the Dutch East India Company founded Graaf-Reinet there. Since then, the fourth oldest city in the rainbow nation it thrived at a fascinating crossroads in its history.
Passengers, scenic flights-Southern Alps, New Zealand
Scenic Flights
Aoraki / Mount Cook, New Zealand

The Aeronautical Conquest of the Southern Alps

In 1955, pilot Harry Wigley created a system for taking off and landing on asphalt or snow. Since then, his company has unveiled, from the air, some of the greatest scenery in Oceania.