Wednesday  Janitzio  and Ihuatzio

 

Janitzio is one of the places that has a long history of celebrating Dia de Muertos in the traditional manner.  It is the largest of the islands in Lake Patcuaro and is the most populated and visited.  Previously, the people survived on fishing.  The fish population has declined draatically but the tourist population has increased dramatically.  Now tourism is the main industry.  It is a leisurly boat ride over to the island.  When we get to the island, we go to the cemetery.  It is about 1/3 of the way up the hill.  The graves are very close together with narrow little paths.  Every one is decorated with marigolds, fruite, special bread and maybe a bottle of soda, some candles. 

We continue on up to the top where there is a park with a playground, places to eat and of course, the statue of Morelos.  Inside the statues are murals of events with Morelos (mostly war related.)  Michelle, Wynne, Dean and Melanie climb to the top into his arm.  The wait is long as the top is very small and only 1 person at a time fit. 

There are many ways up to the top.  Some are longer and less steep, some are pretty direct and are lots of stairs.  As long as you chose one going up, you’ll get there.  The same goes for going down.  Pick any path and keep choosing the path down and you’ll get back to the water.  We have lunch there on the island at one of the many places serving food.  .  On the boat back, someone is running a trivia type game with facts about the area.  Juan and Ginger both win a prize. 

Next stop is the archaeological site of Ihuatzio, flourished from about 600ADto900AD.  There is evidence of Toltec influenc.  What we see now is a very large plaza with tiered walls on 2 sides and the third side has two twin pyramids with center stairclases.  We can see the construction with a center of rock ruble, then a more organized layer of flat stones. Followed by a layer of cut blocks which would have been covered with stucco.  Outside of the plaza we can see small mounds that haven’t been excavated. 

There are a few iconic things for Morelia. One is the mile long aqueduct, another is a fountain of 3 Tarascan women and the third is the cathedral.  Our hotel is across from the cathedral but the other 2 are further away.  On the way back to town, we go past the aqueduct and fountain and stop at the church of Guadalupe.  Unfortunately, ths detour put us right in the middle of Dia de Muertos traffic.  More on that later.

The Iglesea de Guadelue is baroque. Every inch of the interior is covered with decoration.  Another difference is that there weren’t any marigolds inside the church.  The churches we saw in Santa Clara and Patzcuara were decorated inside with lots of marigolds.  The difference is that they are in more traditional indigenous areas instead of the city which is influenced more by a purer form of Catholicism.

 

The traffic back to the hotel was horrendous!.  Our driver dropped us off a block from the hotel.  Oh dear, we can’t cross the stree to our hotel!  Parade route complete with barriers to keep people from crossing during the parade.  We decide to walk away from the main square and find a restaurant for dinner and hope that by the time that we finish dinner, we’ll be able to make our way back to the hotel.  We end up in a small little place with a very limited menu.  Really all they have is beer, beans and cheese.  Not our best meal but it did serve the purpose and we were able to weave our way through the crowds back to the hotel. 

A big full day.  Time to rest up for tomorrow.