Yesterday, we spent the day as tourists, showing Daddy some of the must sees in the city before his departure. We had a wonderful day wandering the city. The weather has warmed considerably and it was a glorious mid-winter day. We visited the Mina El Eden, a silver mine founded in the 1580s. They have a great tour, where you ride a mine car in and then walk through various levels before taking an elevator to the top. A. is a veteran mine-tourer, and she loved it.
From there we rode the teleferico (aerial tram) up to the top of La Bufa, the peak which sits above the city. The views from the teleferico and La Bufa are incredible. Pearched on the top is a chapel which houses Nuestra Senora de Zacatecas, an observatory, and the Museo de La Toma de Zacatecas. The museum details an important battle during the revolution, wherein Pancho Villa and his rebel associates defeated 15,000 federales on the slopes of the peak and secured access to Mexico City. Of course, Zacatecanos feel special pride in hosting Villa in this capacity. But then Zacatecanos feel pride in just about everything...
We ended the walking (at times almost crawling) tour with a stop at the Museo Rafael Coronel, which houses Mexico's most extensive collection of masks, as well as a bunch of other stuff. I think the most incredible part of the Museum is the setting. The Ex-Convento de San Francisco served as a staging ground for all of the missionary expeditions into the great northern unknown. De Anza, Coronado, Kino, Escalante, all them passed through here. The convent has been restored to a state of arrested ruin. It is an amazing piece of architecture--you can see the inside of walls, layers of paint, roofless cathedrals. The interior is a garden with agave, bougainvillea, palms, and flowers growing over, through, and around walls, doors, and ceilings...
The entire Centro of Zacatecas is a dense maze of colonial buildings and winding streets and walk-ways all pitched across steep hillsides. Every time I come back, I'm surprised at its beauty...
Yesterday, we spent the day as tourists, showing Daddy some of the must sees in the city before his departure. We had a wonderful day wandering the city. The weather has warmed considerably and it was a glorious mid-winter day. We visited the Mina El Eden, a silver mine founded in the 1580s. They have a great tour, where you ride a mine car in and then walk through various levels before taking an elevator to the top. A. is a veteran mine-tourer, and she loved it.
From there we rode the teleferico (aerial tram) up to the top of La Bufa, the peak which sits above the city. The views from the teleferico and La Bufa are incredible. Pearched on the top is a chapel which houses Nuestra Senora de Zacatecas, an observatory, and the Museo de La Toma de Zacatecas. The museum details an important battle during the revolution, wherein Pancho Villa and his rebel associates defeated 15,000 federales on the slopes of the peak and secured access to Mexico City. Of course, Zacatecanos feel special pride in hosting Villa in this capacity. But then Zacatecanos feel pride in just about everything...
We ended the walking (at times almost crawling) tour with a stop at the Museo Rafael Coronel, which houses Mexico's most extensive collection of masks, as well as a bunch of other stuff. I think the most incredible part of the Museum is the setting. The Ex-Convento de San Francisco served as a staging ground for all of the missionary expeditions into the great northern unknown. De Anza, Coronado, Kino, Escalante, all them passed through here. The convent has been restored to a state of arrested ruin. It is an amazing piece of architecture--you can see the inside of walls, layers of paint, roofless cathedrals. The interior is a garden with agave, bougainvillea, palms, and flowers growing over, through, and around walls, doors, and ceilings...
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