Discover Mexico Walking Tours

On Nov. 2, 2019, as part of the Day of the Dead celebration, the church bells in San Andrés Mixquic, on the southeast edge of Mexico City, rang to remind the spirits that they must return to Mictlán, land of the dead.

On Saturday, Nov. 2, I went on a tour sponsored by Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) to the small town of San Andrés Mixquic, on the southeast edge of Mexico City. It is well known for its elaborate decoration of graves, next to the church, for Day of the Dead. Among the décor is the smell and smoke of copal incense, and the orange cempasúchil (marigold) flowers and petals, which offer paths for the dead to follow. When night falls, the church bel...ls ring (see video) to remind the spirits that they must return to Mictlán, land of the dead. The celebration is a combination of beliefs and practices from centuries ago from both European/Catholics and indigenous Mexican peoples. We also stopped in San Antonio Tecomitl, where graves are often dirt mounds; photos show graves of children, and a child's grave with a family in the background decorating a grave. This is an agricultural area, where there is still a remnant of Chalco, one of the five lakes that existed in pre-Hispanic times. Among the things they grow are amaranth, a grain that the Spaniards outlawed because it was used by the indigenous people to fashion images of their deities. My view: I'd say the Day of the Dead celebration is really a festival for life. At one point our tour guide said: People don't want to die, but they also don't want to be forgotten. So, I think people take part in this tradition to be remembered. If grandma participates with her children and grandchildren in remembering her late husband, in years to come when she is buried next to her husband, her family and friends will show up on Nov. 2, and they will preserve her memory and pass on their knowledge of her to her great grandchildren, and so on. They might talk about how she made the best mole, and how one day someone played a trick on her and hid the chicken she was going to cook, and how her husband made pulque, and perhaps, perhaps sometimes had too much of that alcoholic beverage. Thus: Memories, lessons, life. ¡Salud!

Monday, Feb. 16, I went to the Monarch butterfly reserve known as Piedra Herrada, about 65 miles west of Mexico City. One video shows butterflies congregating in the sunshine along a path in a mountain at about 8,000 feet elevation, and another shows two of them mating; one photo shows our guide holding two dead butterflies (male on left, female on right), and another shows a confetti-size tag that had been on a butterfly's wing. Tag data can be submitted at https://monarchwa...tch.org/ The Monarchs that we saw are known as Methuselah butterflies because they live around 7 or 8 months, compared to about 4 or 5 weeks for other generations. According to the World Wildlife Fund, it is the long-lived butterflies that migrate from the north and central U.S. and southern Canada (east of the Rockies) some 1,200 to 2,800 miles to the mountains of central Mexico. They overwinter here from November to early March, when they head back north. It takes several generations for the Monarchs to finally reappear in Canada and the U.S. The north-bound females lay eggs in their last phase of life, and those eggs become the next generation, which travels further north. Finally, a generation will be born in the U.S.-Canada region, and around September those super-butterflies, which have never been in Mexico, will embark on the long journey south again.

Monday, Feb. 17, I went to the Monarch butterfly reserve known as Piedra Herrada, about 65 miles west of Mexico City. One video shows butterflies congregating in the sunshine along a path in a mountain at about 8,000 feet elevation, and another shows two of them mating; one photo shows our guide holding two dead butterflies (male on left, female on right), and another shows a confetti-size tag that had been on a butterfly's wing. Tag data can be submitted at https://monarchwa...tch.org/ The Monarchs that we saw are known as Methuselah butterflies because they live around 7 or 8 months, compared to about 4 or 5 weeks for other generations. According to the World Wildlife Fund, it is the long-lived butterflies that migrate from the north and central U.S. and southern Canada (east of the Rockies) some 1,200 to 2,800 miles to the mountains of central Mexico. They overwinter here from November to early March, when they head back north. It takes several generations for the Monarchs to finally reappear in Canada and the U.S. The north-bound females lay eggs in their last phase of life, and those eggs become the next generation, which travels further north. Finally, a generation will be born in the U.S.-Canada region, and around September those super-butterflies, which have never been in Mexico, will embark on the long journey south again.