San Luis Potosi - Part 2

Sep 30, 2024

6 min read

Week two in SLP was jam packed with amazing things, so let's get started!

Huasteca tour

The Huasteca region encompasses a select part of a few Mexican states. It’s a region known for its cultural history, indigenous tribes (Téenek), and beautiful scenery. I am extremely grateful to have been able to join a tour exploring the region (shout out to Trotatours!).

We started off Day 1 heading towards Tamasopo…but not without stopping by a roadside establishment for breakfast gorditas! Tamasopo is an absolutely gorgeous waterfall. The park is wonderfully setup with seating areas, photo ops, food, and lots of spots to enjoy the falls and river. Because there were recently some very heavy rainfalls in the area, the water wasn’t as blue/clear as usual and the falls were much stronger making it extremely hard to wade through the ponds. But that didn’t take away from the adventure and beauty of this stop! I could have stayed here half a day, just relaxing and wading in the water. But alas, there was more to see!

We continued on to las Cascadas de Micos. Here, too, there was much more water than normal, restricting the amount of activities we could do. E.g. tubing is usally super chill there and you can go down the falls. This time, they were going to require 7 guides per 2 guests due to the danger of the currents. Soooo we let that go and just enjoyed a little dip in the accesible part of the water. We finished our day with a drive to the cute little town of Aquismon, a puebla mágica, and checked in to our hotel before having a night cap at the local bar.

Day 2 commenced with a roadside breakfast buffet on the way to more waterfalls. Now, when I heard the guide telling us it was a breakfast buffet I had a pretty continental picture in my head - eggs, bacon, pancakes, the works. But ooooh no. This was better than anything I could have ever imagined. A team of about 5 cooks working on various dishes, all served on a giant, woodfired stovetop. And of course two people in charge of the fresh tortillas. There was chicarrron in salsa verde, nopales (cactus), a number of potato dishes, an aaaamazing pork mole, steamed veggies, enchiladas, and more. SO good! After breakfast we continued the climb to the little town of Xilitla. Imagine lots of movement, vendors, colors, smells, views… absolutely amazing! A little further up the road we then got to experience the Edward James sculpture garden. Edward James was a surrealist artist from Scotland who built these amazing structures in the middle of the Mexican jungle. It’s hard to describe how mystical and magical this place felt. Another place I could have easily spent more time at, specifically to journal, draw, and meditate. If you are ever in the are - GO! It’s so worth it!!

Our next stop was the Sotano de Huahuas. Translated that means: giant sink hole of the Huahuas (type of bird). Our guide greeted us in one of the native languages before taking us on the hike to the sinkhole. After some huffing and puffing on the way up, we reached the overview…more like overhang. It was MASSIVE and quite scary. Definitely not recommended for anyone with a fear of heights! Since we arrived at dusk we did get to “see” some of the Huahuas flying in to nest for thr eveneing. Why “see”?! Well, these birds fly around 150-200 km/h meaning they’re super hard to spot. But you can definitely hear them in the air because they’re going SO fast!

The hike back to the car included seeing some wild vanilla beans, coffee beans, and getting soaked to the bone by an evening shower. The long drive back to our hotel had us all tired and we were happy to change and head out for dinner, followed by some beers, Mezcal, and being taught more important Mexican slang.

Day 3 and another amazing breakfast. This time a local Huastecan tamale: Zacahuil. It’s shredded pork or chicken in a thick tomatoe and corn sauce (no pica) wrapped in a banana leaf. While I liked it and loved how different the sauce was, it lacked a bit in flavor for me. But glad I tried it!

We had two more waterfalls to visit on day 3. First up was the Cascada Minas Viejas. Another beautiful spot with (usually) crystal blue waters and lots of spots to explore and swim. When we finally made it to the last waterfall of the trip - Cascada del Meca - I was kinda thinking “ok, how much different can this one be from the others?”. The answer is - lots different! The viewpoint of the Cascada del Meco from the road allowed you to look down on the falls and see/feel the massive force of the water (This very much reminded me of Niagara Falls). When we got down to the river access, nothing but fun was waiting for us. First, we all hopped into a wooden canoe and two guides started paddling us upstream towards the falls. The current was so strong and these guys were paddling like crazy, trying to make sure we didn’t crash into the rocky shore. We did hit a boulder here or there, but they maneuvered out of the situation quickly and got us to a safe spot were we could anchor the barge. From there we were able to jump into the water and float down the river back to the shore. SO fun!! They also had a tubing option without the massive dangers like at the other place. So, myself and two of the other people in our group decided to go for it. SO fun going down a few pretty quick rapids! So yeah, last day and last stop was the most adventurous and most fun - I LOVED it!!!

SLP City

The rest of the week I spent a good amount of time strolling around the old town, taking a trolley tour, and visiting the local historic museum, the national museum of masks, and the Leonora Carrington museum (which is actually in an old jail!).

I also got to connect with some friends of friends. Maria, the owner of the Silvestre Casa de Pan bakery. Absolutely amazing!! The Guyava Concha was yuuu-um and Ana was super sweet, fun to talk to, and an absolute inspiration!! Thank you for connecting us, Anne :) I also got to meet up with two other individuals for dinner and fun conversation - thank you Juan for connecting me!

But the absolute best part of my city exploration? Venturing out to the oldesst graveyard in SLP. I have documentation saying this is where some of my family members are buried. After not having much success in Monterrey, I wasn’t very hopeful that I’d find anything. I went ahead and stopped by the office to ask. Lo and behold the super helpful lady told me she didn’t have an exact plot number, but could point me in the general direction of my great-great grandparent’s graves. I couldn’t believe it!! She even connected me with one of the groundskeepers, who pretty quickly led me to my great-great-grandmother’s grave. I was in awe. How in the world?! I made sure to mark it on my google maps to come back to later, so we could go hunt down the second grave.

After probably about 30 minutes of weaving in and out of tombstones, weeds, and high grass we found a few graves from the same year (1902), but not the exact one we were looking for. The groundskeeper did tell me that if I could come back after Dia de los Muertos, everything would be cleaned up nicely and there’d be a better chance of finding the second grave.

I went ahead and bought some flowers, took them back to Adelaida’s grave, and enjoyed some time there. I stil can’t believe I found her. It was extremely powerful and emotional to be so close to one of my family members in Mexico.

Media Luna

To round off my time in SLP my fellow volunteer, Caro, who lives 2h away in Rio Verde, invited some of us to go to her neck of the woods to enjoy Media Luna. Of course we weren’t going to pass that up! So, we took a bus to Rio Verde and a Taxi to Media Luna where we met up with Caro. This was another magical place… swimming in and relaxing by the blue, super clear thermal water was the perfect ending to my SLP stay!