Hola from San Miguel de Allende, Mexico
This entry was posted on 8/12/2007 7:46 PM and is filed under Mexico.
When it came time for a "family vacation" this summer Bowie suggested that we go to Mexico and find a cooking school where we could all expand our culinary skills. While we were still in Australia we found a tour company on line that offered just such a course. www.onthegotours.com
We signed up the Peapods, Joss, Bowie, Malia, her beau Christian, and our dear friends Kate McGarry and Keith Ganz from New York. Together we all rendezvoused in Houston on August 10, 2007 and flew off to Leon in the state of Guanajuato. From there we were picked up by Alberto and Daniel from the tour company and driven almost 2 hours to San Miguel de Allende. 
San Miguel de Allende is a small colonial town in the Bajio mountains of central Mexico, about 170 miles northwest of Mexico City. Founded as "San Miguel" in 1542 by a San Franciscan Monk named San Miguel El Grande, it became a centerpiece in the war for Mexican independence from Spain. It was renamed San Miguel de Allende after Ignacio Allende, a hero of the independence movement.
In 1926 it was named a heritage site and declared a national monument by the Mexican government in order to preserve its unique character and restrict building in the town's historic centro district. Home to about 85,000 people, it is now a tourist destination, an art colony, and a
retirement community for a few thousand foreigners, mostly Americans,
Canadians, and Europeans.
It's a gorgeous and quaint town with colorful buildings, narrow cobblestoned streets which seem impossible for cars to navigate, fabulous churches, beautiful artisanal shops and wonderful food.
It's a town where fireworks go off day and night. The churches found that the morning bells no longer worked to awaken their congregation so they took to letting off LOUD fireworks at 5am to rouse them. Then off they go again throughout the day to celebrate one of the many Saint's Days or one of the holidays honoring a certain profession. It's not unusual for them to go off at midnight either. And if it's not the fireworks, it's the car alarms and house alarms which seem to go off randomly and regularly.
Here's the magnificent parish church of St. Michael de Archangel in the center of the main square...
The same church at night...
We're staying in a modern large 4 bedroom home just a few minutes walk from the main "jardin" (center garden square of town). There's plenty of room for all of us and it comes with a breakfast cook named Olga and a housekeeper named Rosa. We could stay here for a long long time.
Here's our main living room...
Breakfast room...
One of the 4 master bedrooms, each with their own private bathroom...
Keith, Kate and Joss making music...
Dinner at Tia Luca with the "family"...
It's been a terrific 1st day here.
