Sept/Oct 2022 – The pyramids and history of Puebla (and a brief return to San Miguel de Allende)
- Trevor
- Nov 6, 2022
- 10 min read
Since we’re spending so much time in Mexico, it made sense to us to find some medical providers in country. So, when we put together our itinerary for the fall, we included 1 week back to San Miguel de Allende. Both Sandy and I had our teeth cleaned (it really hasn’t been long enough since our last visit, but we won’t be back in the area until next spring) and Sandy also had a visit with an endocrinologist. All went well, and the week in San Miguel allowed us to transition back to life in Mexico without the added complexity of learning a new town.
The biggest difference since we left has got to be the weather. When we left, everything was hot and dry. But Mexico has now gone through its rainy season and everything is cooler, wetter, and most-definitely greener. We stayed in a small studio condo outside of San Miguel and this time we did not really need AC. Because we only stayed for a week, our lodging costs were a bit higher at $73 per night. And because of all the travel and higher lodging costs, September was our more expensive months of the year (the highest was January, when we travelled from the U.S., paid for our 1-year Temporary Residence cards, and spent a month in Mazatlán). We did get to observe Mexican Independence Day (September 16) in San Miguel. Similar to the U.S., the day was dominated by parades and fireworks.
After a short week, we drove further south to Puebla (the city and capitol of the state of Puebla). Why Puebla? First, nice weather in the summer and fall. After we found unexpectedly hot weather last spring, I spent some time researching locations that have temperate weather in the summer or year-round. There are a number of nice cities in the Mexican highlands, and Puebla is one of them. Puebla has an elevation of about 6,000 feet, and is located about 2 hours southeast of Mexico City. The high temperatures are between 70-75 year-round, with lows between 45-55. We arrived towards the end of Puebla’s rainy season and had a number of days with drizzle and a couple of days with very heavy rain. Puebla is also rich with Mexican history. It is the primary location where the Mexicans fought back against the French in the 1860’s to reassert their independence. Though these battles are not widely recognized in the rest of Mexico, Puebla continues to remember these efforts each year on Cinco de Mayo.
When looking for a condo, I found that many of the expats prefer suburbs outside of the city, with many in the area of Cholula. We ended up in a nice “fraccionamiento” (gated condo community) about 10 minutes north of Cholula and about 20 minutes west of downtown Puebla. It ended up being a good location – easy to access Cholula and Puebla, as well as getting on the major highways to the other towns and attractions in the area. In hindsight, we wished we were closer to Cholula and able to walk the town without having to first drive to a parking lot in town.
Our condo was a nice find, with some grass out front, a washing machine, good wifi, and a nice patio on the roof. The wifi was fast and stable enough for streaming video. We had our own Netflix account plus access to the Airbnb hosts’ HBO+ and Disney+ accounts, as well as a reasonable supply of rainy days to catch up on some movies and shows. The condo’s rooftop patio was one of its original selling points, but we didn’t use it as much as we had hoped, probably because we had to go up 2 flights of stairs and away from the other amenities of the house. There was also no furniture on the patio, but we had our nice beach chairs from Puerto Vallarta. From the patio we had a great view of the nearby Popocatépetl volcano, which would typically have a small puff of steam coming from it.
The fraccionamiento was quite nice, with parking in front of our condo, a playground across the street, and active security monitoring. One of the few negatives of the area was that the rules for dogs were not clearly explained to us. We learned that we couldn’t just let him relieve himself anywhere, but had to walk him about 500 feet to an open space near the front gate. That worked most of the time, but we were fined once (550 pesos!) for him making a mess on the sidewalk. We also got our first lesson in breaking a furnishing in our Airbnb. We knocked over a decorative piece but were honest with the host, who billed us through the Airbnb platform. All went fine, but we think the host was pretty upset that it happened. Our thought is that hosts shouldn’t put anything in their rental units that they’re not willing to replace….
We found the food in Puebla to be very tasty and quite different from the areas we’d been to previously. First, “poblano” is a term meaning “from Puebla”, so it’s no wonder that poblano chiles are very popular in the area. They form the basis of mole poblano (very similar to mole in U.S. restaurants, with chocolate and a bit spicy) as well as the unique “chile en nogada” – a chile stuffed with fruit and vegetables, smothered in a walnut cream sauce, and topped with pomegranate seeds – which we tried for the first time at Mural de Poblanos in the historic Centro of Puebla. It’s a seasonal dish, usually served in September and October, and the red-white-green of the dish is reminiscent of the Mexican flag. We also discovered some local specialties such as “tacos arabes” – pork seasoned with middle-eastern spices and cooked on a vertical spit like gyro meat, then served in pita bread instead of a tortilla – as well as “tacos al pastor”, which are basically the same thing but using adobo sauce for the seasoning. We also found a very good “pozole” (Mexican stew) restaurant, aptly named Pozoleria Matamoros, and a few nice places for traditional Poblano dinners, including some traditional pre-Hispanic food at Koatlikue Pachamama and some dishes made with huitlacoche, a mushroom that grows on corn kernels. The pre-Hispanic food was tasty, interesting, and entirely plant-based. We continue to average $20-$30 for our meals out, with the occasional nicer place coming in around $40. We also found a great craft brewery called Crazy Moon – our favorite was their Tripel, malty, sweet (we learned it’s made with local “canela” brown sugar), and fermented with a nice flavorful Belgian yeast. While we really enjoy craft beer, and prefer it to the local lagers, the prices are similar to the U.S. - $4-$5 per beer – so we don’t tend to visit them as often as we’d like! For our time in Puebla, we ate out about 2/3 of the time. The other 1/3 was at the condo, often leftovers from our meals, or the occasional pizza or bucket of chicken. We often planned ahead for those days at home, typically when the weather forecast called for rain.
We found a lot of interesting things to do in Puebla. There are two forts and multiple museums focused on the Battle of Puebla / Cinco de Mayo. We visited most of those, plus a railroad museum and an Army / Air Force museum. We found the Fort Loreto Museum to be very worthwhile, with large exhibits and a lot of explanations in English. However, Fort Guadalupe, the focus of the battles, was much emptier and had very minimal explanations in English. All of the museums in Mexico are reasonably priced, typically only 40-80 pesos ($2-$4). We also enjoyed walking around the town, looking at the Baroque-style buildings and the many murals and churches. Close to Puebla’s Centro we found a nice artists’ district, some artisan stalls with colorful crafts and shirts, and a more modern shopping district. We found Puebla’s Centro to be very walkable and were surprised to find some walking/biking routes in the surrounding parts of Puebla as well. Many of the newer highways are divided with paths in the middle, including some elevated walkways to assist with crossings. Puebla was also large enough to have some nice amenities like a Costco, multiple shopping malls, and a great upscale grocery store called La Comer. Grocery prices seem to have gone up a little bit – water now costs us 47 pesos for a 20-liter garrafon ($2.50 for 5 gallons) and our grocery costs averaged $8 per day.
There are a number of pre-Hispanic pyramids in the Puebla area. The largest hill in nearby Cholula is actually an old pyramid. For 85 pesos each ($4.50), we were able to take a self-guided tour of the well-maintained grounds, restored portions of the pyramid, and also of the Catholic church built atop the pyramid mound. A short distance northwest of Puebla, we explored the archeological site of Cacaxtla. This is the largest single structure that we’ve seen in Mexico, and the entire area is covered by a metal roof to protect the excavations and murals. Renovations are ongoing, and our self-guided tour through the ruins was well worth the 85-peso admission fee. We also walked through the ruins of Xochitécatl on the adjacent hill, with 4 separate structures. Admission was included in the fee for Cacaxtla.
Overall, we really enjoyed our time outside of Puebla more than in town. In addition to pyramids and archeological sites, we took a number of field trips to the surrounding towns of Huamantla, Tlaxcala, Atlixco, and Chipilo. Huamantla has an extensive bullfighting history, with many statues and a nice museum in town. Our visit to Tlaxcala started at the small archeology zone of Tizatlán, where the primary exhibit is a series of painted murals, and finished with us huddling in a doorway to avoid an intense rainstorm. Atlixco is a small town southwest of Puebla. The Centro is well-maintained and very walkable, and we had a nice relaxing lunch of traditional Poblano food on the patio of Don Porfirio, where we could watch locals and tourists wander the Centro. The town of Chipilo has an interesting backstory. Due to a large influence from Italians recruited to help Mexico rebuild after their war with the French, a large proportion of the town have some Italian heritage and many of the restaurants on the main street are Italian.
We also spent a number of days in nearby Cholula. We found a nice parking lot just east of the pyramid site – typically mostly empty, lots of space between cars, and only 50 pesos for the entire day. The parking lot was right next to Parque Cholula, so it was easy to take our black lab, Gunner, for a nice walk through the park and then into town where many of the restaurants were dog-friendly. We also found a decent hiking area west of Cholula on Cerro Zapotecas. As with most of the hiking areas we’ve found in Mexico, there’s no official place to park, limited markings on the trails, and sections of the trail are often steep and gravelly. Though we enjoyed our hike, and the view of town from the top of the hill, we didn’t return for any other visits.
One of our best field trips was the pleasant surprise we found at the Africam Safari park southeast of Puebla. This park is primarily a self-drive route through a safari park filled with animals from Africa, Asia, and the Americas. In most of the park you can drive with your windows down, at your own pace. It’s easy to pull over and watch the animals for as long as you like. There was one short section for more aggressive animals like lions and bears where we had to roll our windows up, but we could still sit and watch the animals in a semi-natural environment. At the end of the safari, there is a walkable zoo area, which was interesting, but not nearly as good as the drivable portion. Overall, the experience was well worth the 350 peso / $17 entry fee (each).
With all of the time we spent in and around Puebla, we were surprised that we saw very few expats - only a handful of tourists wandering around Cholula and a few more in Pueblo’s Centro. Of all of the places we’ve been so far in Mexico, I think it’s the least amount we’ve seen.
The main complaint we had about Puebla was driving. Mexico has a reputation for looser driving rules than in the U.S., but we also found some Puebla drivers to be impatient and aggressive. It was not uncommon to be waiting in a left turn lane and to have a driver use the middle lane to pass all the waiting drivers and put himself in the front of the line of cars to turn! This would also happen when turning right – cars would often queue to my left, making me nervous to pull out when traffic cleared because there were now two of us turning side-by-side. Even though I’ve been driving in Mexico for over 6 months, and have gotten used to many of the differences, the aggressiveness of the handful of Pueblan drivers was too much for me. As a result, we would generally take our car only on the longer road trips (highways are not too bad) or to nearby Cholula (with low speeds). For Puebla, we ended up using Uber to get around. The rates weren’t too bad, usually $6-$10 for a 20–30-minute ride.
We took care of a few expat/travel items in Puebla as well. We are continuing to work on our Spanish, but Sandy has switched from bi-weekly Zoom classes to Duolingo. Because she got a family plan, I’ve been working with Duolingo as well, and I can tell that I’m improving compared to the limited studying I was doing in the spring. Sandy and I completed our absentee mail-in ballots for South Dakota and were able to submit them by sending them to the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City, who then took them to Texas, where they were put in the U.S. mail. We’ve since checked, and they were received in South Dakota about 3 weeks after we mailed them. We also learned how to receive packages at a local DHL courier office. Gunner needed some medication, and I found that we could have them shipped to any DHL office, where they would be held for pickup. I just needed to show my ID, the same as picking up an Amazon order. (We’re getting good at this expat shipping and mailing!). Last, we retained an immigration facilitator for later in the year. Our Mexican Temporary Residency was granted for 1 year and needs to be renewed in December. While the actual renewal should be fairly easy and straightforward, it can be challenging to get the appointments needed to complete the tasks. By retaining a facilitator, we already have the appointments we’ll need to get everything done, plus they’ll fill out all the forms and coordinate payments for us. I’m still trying to convince myself that the convenience is worth the fees they charge, which I’m embarrassed to put in my blog. (But if you’re planning to relocate to Mexico and need a facilitator in Playa del Carmen, let me know, and I’ll pass along all the info.)
Overall, we enjoyed our time in the Puebla area. We loved the cooler weather and it was nice to have found a location that we could relax in any time of the year. We would return to the smaller town of Cholula, or perhaps to Atlixco, but would likely not spend much time in the city of Puebla unless we found a condo close to the system of walkways in the suburbs. Puebla does have some interesting areas but we really did not care for the traffic and effort required to get into the city, other than the short drives needed to stock up on groceries or at Costco. The small, walkable towns, with nice parks and good food suit our lifestyle better than the city did.
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