I awoke grumbly and later than usual, due to being up way too late trying to get uploads done with the sporadic internet. I’d changed rooms in the hotel from a double to a single to save money and also to get to enjoy the balcony doors open to the street below. Usually the echoing sounds of old trucks, roosters and the like wake me up each morning, but not this time.
I spent some time trying to finish up the online stuff and get my camera batteries charged and ready, so by the time I got on the street it was nearing 10:30. Again the sun was bright and the skies clear with a crispness in the air. I wandered the streets until I saw tortillas being made by hand on the grill in a doorway and went in for breakfast. I was the only patron at the moment, but café de ollá and dos gorditas con huevos y queso were a good way to start my day.
She made the tortillas by hand and watched the street, while the sound of music from street vendors echoed in the town. Real gets a fair amount of tourists from Mexico to attend various religious festivals, so there are plenty of little streetside vendors.
The tortillas slowly rose like puffer fish on the griddle until the steam poured out, the señorita quickly grabbing them, slicing them open and filling them with all the goodness I needed.
As the place began filling with patrons, I finished up and wandered across the street to the art and history museum and paid 10 pesos for entry - about 50¢. It occupies the old mint, with an upper floor dedicated to the history of the area and some great old photographs of the Huichol Indians, along with artifacts and such. The lower floors are galleries and exhibits of artists and their works.
Exiting, the attendant pointed across to the large church and gave me hand signals where to go and repeated “milagros” several times. I thanked him and though I’d been several times, I wandered over to visit again. The church is much larger than the older original on the edge of town but is impressive in itself. It was empty, save for four who knelt for prayers.
I watched in reverence and walked slowly on the wooden plank floors which squeaked loudly under my weight no matter how slowly I moved. The loud echoes seemed a inappropriate with the piousness of the worshippers. And about those floors, there is some debate as to what they are, as they appear almost as wooden doors or lids with hand holds in them, the purpose unknown.
In a room on the left side of the sanctuary are hundreds, maybe thousands, of hand written and hand painted letters from those who testify of their healings and miracles. It is quite impressive to see.
As I made my way back into the main sanctuary, I stopped to change lenses and of course dropped a rear lens cap, only to watch it roll like a tiny wheel straight into the nearest hole in the floor. At last the mystery of the wooden floor and its holes was revealed - a trap for anything dropped apparently.
Crass as it may seem, I waited until the worshippers left before getting on my knees in the main aisle to see if I could find it in the hole. I could see it and actually touch the top of it with my finger, but my hand was too large to gain the extra 1/2” needed to catch it between two fingers. I tried to fish it out with my sunglasses to no avail and even looked around to see if there might be something I could use, but I’d have had to disassemble some holy relic so I decided not to.
I prayed for a “milagro” to no avail. Though I was alone for the moment, I was aware that inevitably someone would walk in while I was on my hands and knees in the main aisle, so I made sure my back was towards the door and they might think I was in reverent prayer…
I could barely feel the lens cap and like the way a raccoon is trapped by its hand in a bottle, unable to release whatever it has grasped, I realized the potential to become the Quasimodo for this Mexican cathedral, forever on my knees in the aisle with my hand in the hole, tourists tossing food scraps to me and screaming in fear as I reacted.
Fearing my future, I decided I’d spent enough time on my knees in the main aisle and gave up.
From the church I walked to the fountain in front of the municipal building, then down another street until I spotted a young vagabond couple, the girl wrapped like a gypsy and the boy dirty, burned dark and disheveled. In the U.S. I’d say they were homeless and living on the streets, but here they’re just another traveling Bohemian couple. They were in a heated argument in perfect English, debating their website's design, internet traffic patterns and promulgation while they worked on their MacBook laptops. I had to chuckle at the sight.
I wandered the streets and checked out a few other hotels for future trips that were a bit cheaper than my current hotel, as much as I love it.
Aside from my tush, the only other casualty from our horse trek a couple days previous had been the small camera pouch I used in my tank bag. My cranky horse chose to bash it (and me) repeatedly into the other horses with ferocity, actually ripping the seams out on the innocent pouch. I’d been through a couple of shops looking for a suitable leather replacement the day after, but nothing was right. I’d stumbled into a shop owned by an Italian leather maker to see if there was any pouch I could use for a camera bag.
He had been gone to lunch that day, but was in his shop today. In broken English we discussed my problem and he said he could make me a simple pouch to carry one camera body with lens mounted along with a second lens. He drew the design on paper and said he’d have it ready in the morning. I thanked him and wandered out, excited to get it the next day.
As I neared the hotel, a dog lay casually in the street and as we looked at each other, a guy selling jewelry on the sidewalk spoke to me in a French accent, telling me the dog’s name.
Guillaume was from Switzerland, young and sporting the gypsy look that is the style of young and old non-locals living in the area. While we spoke, a darkened Hispanic man with tattoos and piercings arrived with tortillas, cheese and avocados. The man introduced himself and asked if I would like some of the food. He, Guillaume and a third young man all lived in the same house in the little village of Los Catorce further down the mountain. They all shared their food and made jewelry to sell on weekends. Indeed each had a blanket with their own styles of handmade jewelry on it. I thanked him for the offer of food and he responded that I was welcome to stay at his home the next time I came to visit the town.
It was late in the day when I took my seat on a stone curb and watched the setting sun skim across the building facades and the faces of those who passed by.