Spectacular day trip: wildlife sanctuary & pristine pyramids
Jaime Villa is a farmer who decided two years ago to start a wildlife sanctuary in the foothills of the Tequila Volcano. “The land,” he explained, “belongs to our ejido and it’s too rocky for farming. However, it’s extraordinarily beautiful and home to all kinds of animals and birds. So we applied to the government to set up a Management Unit for Wildlife Conservation (Unidad de Manejo para la Conservacion de Vida Silvestre or UMA) on 433 hectares of the land and our petition was granted. During the last two years, with the help of a grant, we’ve created a nature trail 350 meters long, a site for camping and picnicking, a hanging bridge, and a mirador with a spectacular view.”
I was about to start a game of racquetball with my friend Rodrigo Orozco when his cell phone beeped. The text message was from an unknown caller. “I’ve been bitten by a tarantula. What do I do?” were the words on the small screen.
My Coolpix camera was beginning to show signs of its age and I suspected it might freeze on me completely one day, no doubt right in the middle of some momentous event I was covering for the Guadalajara Reporter. Such a possibility was, of course, completely unthinkable, so I turned to Google to check out the prices of the new Coolpix AW100, which is waterproof and drop-proof with a built-in GPS: the perfect camera for a dangerous cliff-hanging trail or an underground river.
Members of Jalisco’s oldest hiking and camping club told me they had a mission.
Once again I had the pleasure of spending a day exploring the wonders of Western Mexico with students from the Waldorf School de Guadalajara. This time, the destination was La Toma Balneario where several room-temperature, spring-fed waterfalls cascade into swimming pools overlooking the deep, picturesque canyon alongside the town of Tequila.
The first book ever published on the geology of the Primavera Forest will be a real eye-opener for most people who live in Jalisco.
A new DVD with excellent sound tracks in English, Spanish and French brings to life fascinating discoveries on the origin of tequila, as well as a surprising new take on who was the first to distill this potent brew in the Americas.