WELCOME TO THE BIG CITY: GUADALAJARA

Arriving at the new bus station in Guadalajara after the laundry fiasco in Barra de Navidad, we jumped in a cab and headed to the fancy hostel I had stayed in when I spent a night in Guadalajara before San Blas.

Unfortunately, the owners hadn’t checked their email so didn’t get my reservation, but fortunately they had lots of room. We moved into the same four bed dorm I had stayed in earlier and didn’t have any other company for our three nights there, so we basically had a private room.

Upon recommendation from one of the owner’s, we walked up the street to a restaurant specializing in pastor meat, where we proceeded to order two very large plates of meat with a few bits of vegetables, and beer of course. We ended up eating leftovers as late night snacks the next two nights as there was so much food.

The next morning we walked about 45 minutes to the historic centre, where we wandered around the countless plazas and took fun photos with public art pieces. As it was a Monday, the museums were closed again, but we weren’t that concerned.

We stopped for lunch at a market and had the biggest sandwiches ever, which seemed to be bakery style buns filled with chicken, grilled, then with a tomato sauce poured over them, topped with cream. Healthy, no doubt. But hey, they were delicious and filling, and at $2 a sandwich, we couldn’t complain. Apparently these were a version of the torta aboghada (drowned sandwiches) popular in the area.

The rest of the afternoon was spent at the hostel, which I swear had more to do with the fact that I had to do a couple hours of work, rather than the fact that we’d just ate a whole chicken and half a loaf of bread each. Which meant we had lots of time to make it for happy hour on Chalpuetec street, the university, bar and late-night area.

A couple of cheap beers later we tested out our pool skills, which turned out to be a 2.5 beer optimum for Marieke and a 3.5 for me. Jon was consistently good. I was consistently bad with the exception of the one game I managed at the 3.5 beer mark.

WELCOME TO THE TOWN OF TEQUILA

Our final day in Guadalajara was spent in Tequila. No, this doesn’t mean we swam in tequila because it was so cheap, and no it doesn’t mean we drank so much we pretty much drowned in it, it means we took a 1.5 hour bus to the town of Tequila, which the drink was named after. Apparently tequila means obsidian, as the town borders a volcano and you can see the rock around town.

Upon arrival at the main square, we were forced with the difficult decision of choosing our mode of transport to the tequila tour: a chile pepper or a guitar. As you can imagine, the conversation went something like this:

Me: Do we want the chile bus or the guitar bus?

Marieke: A guitar? We’re going to take a guitar to the factory?

Me: No, we’re going to take a bus. A guitar bus.

Marieke: What?

Luckily, they had photos of each vehicle so we could make an informed decision. We went for the guitar bus, mostly based on the fact that we decided we wanted to see the factory rather than the blue agave fields we had seen in abundance on our bus ride to the town of tequila. Of course, we also made sure both tours were in English, which we were assured they were, followed by the assurance two minutes later the “city tour” (also known as interesteing anecdotes about the town en route to and from the factory) was in English, but the factory tour was not. Shocking really.

The factory tour itself wasn’t amazing, but was interesting nonetheless. It could also be the fact that Marieke and I have been on a ridiculous number of factory tours throughout our travels, from coffee tours in Colombia to cigar factories in Nicaragua to paper factory tours in India, that it didn’t seem all that unique. However, it’s unlikely we will forget the sample of 55% alcohol tequila. My lips are still burning.

We headed back into town on the awesome guitar bus (after picking up some tequila to bring home of course) and found a spot to refill our cancheitos drinks (tequila, Squirt pop, fruit and lemon juice) and browsed the Jose Cuervo estate. They did have some cool souvenirs, and what I’m sure is really good tequila, but I just couldn’t see myself wearing a shirt advertising what is known as the cheapest tequila at home.

We grabbed photos of every tequila sign in town and grabbed a bus (and nap) home. It was a cheesy trip, but I kind of loved it. Time to head to Morelia.

TRIP PICTURES