Patzcuaro was an important ceremonial center of the indigenous Purepechas people during the pre-Hispanic period. We stay in the heart of this beautiful town close to the two main plaza squares. In the morning we take a boat from the pier to Janitzio Island. The Patzcuaro Lake in known for its white fish and we see fishermen using their traditional butterfly nets for fishing.
After visiting the Sierra Chincua Monarch Sanctuary, we spend the night at the village of Angangueo. A booming mining town at one time, Angangueo is located at an altitude of about 8,400 ft. Around this same time last year, this village was devastated by heavy rains and accompanying mud slides, which closed the whole village for several days causing economic hardship to the local folks dependent of tourists visiting Monarch butterfly sanctuaries. Remnants of the damage cause by the mudslide are still visible.
We start from Morelia early in the morning northeast towards Tlalpujahua to Sierra Chincua. The drive is approximately three hours. One of five publicly accessible sanctuaries, Sierra Chincua is the wintering site of millions of Monarch butterflies that fly south to hibernate during the winter months, from November to February.
Planting Seeds in the Dirt at Wide Ruins, acrylic on canvas, 30" x 30", 2010.
Story Keeper: Works by Melanie Yazzie marks the first of an innovative, year-long look at contemporary Native arts that explore ideas and issues facing today’s American Indian communities.
This new body or work created by Melanie Yazzie (Dine, the term Navajo use to identify themselves) tells plant-inspired stories. While colorful and whimsical, her work has serious undertones, and references Native post-colonial dilemmas. She often brings images of indigenous women to the forefront, alluding to matrilineal systems and pointing to the possibility of female leadership.
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Bear with me if you want a free tree: I kid you not! But first…scroll back the clock to late August when Mike Bone and I had the privilege to wander the sandy steppe of Northeasternmost Kazakhstan near the Altai Mountains. One of the strangest plants we encountered was a somewhat schizophrenic cottonwood: Populus diversifolia. If you look carefully in the picture above you will see the leaves at the top of the tree are shaped somewhat like our native cottonwood (more, perhaps, like the bigtooth Aspen of the eastern states) while the lower, juvenile leaves are linear. Another example, perhaps, of that biological principle that “ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny” (translated as “the development of the individual repeats the evolution of the species”: a doctrine not to be taken too literally, perhaps).
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As this popular trip offered by Denver Botanic Gardens and Reefs to Rockies returns this year, I am pleased to lead this trip again. Joining me are seven enthusiastic patrons of the Gardens and nature lovers. What is a trip without any travel glitches? Icy conditions in Houston, cancelled flights, delayed and missed flights….these were some of the few glitches we experienced, but everyone got to Morelia on time and with good humor. And so our first scheduled day of the trip starts without a hitch!
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Mt. Hood with manzanita in foreground (A. patula)
Manzanitas have been a persistent theme in my life since my childhood visits to California: I could write a small book (and maybe will some day) about how these amazing native shrubs have impacted my life.
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Erica
Tower Fountains
Think back…way, way back to when the sun shone, the weather was balmy, and flowers were in bloom. That’s right, I’m talking about last weekend.
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