The area in which the Park of the Jaguar is located.
The federal government officially registered the creation of a 2,258-hectare nature reserve in the northeastern part of the municipality of Tulum in Quintana Roo on Tuesday.
The Park of the Jaguar, whose development plan was announced last December, is part of an attempt by the national government to curb the urban expansion and development taking place near the city of Tulum. New development and population centers will now be forbidden within the park’s boundaries as well as any activities that contaminate the area or disrupt, divert, or contaminate water sources there.
Mexico’s newest natural protected area is home to 928 species, many of them endemic, and some in danger of extinction. One of those, the jaguar, is the park’s namesake. While the states that make up the Yucatán peninsula have the highest concentrations of jaguar populations in Mexico, the species is still in danger of extinction from loss of habitat.
In an attempt to safeguard the plants and animals in the park, the new decree makes it illegal to introduce genetically modified organisms or invasive species, and forbids the extraction of plants, animals, or the area’s soil or ground cover. Any destruction of habitat can now be punished and future mining or extraction activities within the protected area are forbidden.
The new park is indicated in dark green.
Instead, officials hope to take advantage of the park as a source of sustainable tourism, and using for studying the ecosystem for scientific and educational purposes, and to measure future environmental impacts on local flora and fauna. Officials will now begin the process of building a boundary wall that will surround the new park.
Flights on the two routes will begin in late August with a promotional price of 799 pesos (US $39). deposit photos
Yucatán Peninsula travelers will soon have more options for connecting flights in the area, thanks to two new routes to be offered by the Mexican airline Aeromar.
The first route, connecting Mérida and Chetumal, will operate six times a week starting August 21. Another flight between Mérida and Cozumel will be offered four times a week starting August 22.
Tickets for both routes are now on sale, starting at the promotional rate of 799 pesos (US $39). Aeromar is also offering a new international route between Mérida and Havana, Cuba, starting at 2,835 pesos (US $139).
Aeromar continues to require the use of face masks for both domestic and international flights.
At a press conference on Tuesday, caretakers of the monarch butterfly sanctuary near El Rosario, Michoacán, told the press that the monarchs are not endangered.
The joint owners of the El Rosario communal lands in Michoacán, who are charged with protecting the habitat of the millions of monarch butterflies that overwinter each year next to their land, say that the monarch is not in danger of extinction; it’s their route that’s in danger, they say.
“[The monarchs] are present in 24 countries,” said the treasurer of the ejido’s governing body, Humberto García Miranda. “What is at risk is the migratory route, which is the responsibility of the farmers.”
Ejido is the Spanish word for a communally owned land parcel.
On July 21, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature placed the migratory North American monarch butterfly on its Red List of threatened species and classified them as endangered. The IUCN is a network of private, public, and nonprofit groups that work for nature conservation around the world.
The Red List, created in 1964, is a way to categorize the danger of extinction for various species and shed light on the reasons for their endangerment — in this case, climate change, loss of habitat due to urbanization and commercial agriculture, pesticide use and invasive species.
But residents of El Rosario, who are paid by the government to protect the monarchs’ overwintering ground, refute that claim. Instead, they insist that problems threatening the butterflies exist along the insects’ migratory routes in the United States and Canada, a factor that was included in the announcement from IUCN. However, IUCN did also mention in that press release that legal and illegal logging has already destroyed “substantial areas” of the butterflies’ winter shelter in Mexico and California.
During a press conference on Tuesday, García said that “the species would never go extinct because females lay between 400 and 500 eggs, of which 80% survive, with only 20% being part of the food chain.”
While females do generally lay between 300 and 700 eggs in their lifetime, scientists generally agree that only between 5% and 10% of eggs survive to adulthood.
The El Rosario stewards called on the Mexican government to denounce their northern neighbors for bad practices that they feel have led to declining monarch numbers. They also blame external factors outside of the Michoacán forests that are beyond their control.
García said that he and 50 other owners work to care for the forest “day and night” but did also mention problems like cutworm infestations in the trees where the monarchs overwinter.
He added that the monarchs could change their migratory path in the next 10 or 15 years.
Jalisco authorities on Tuesday presented evidence that suggested that a woman who died from severe burns last week wasn’t attacked by others but rather set herself on fire.
However, Attorney General Luis Joaquín Méndez Ruíz stressed that there was no concrete proof that Luz Raquel Padilla was responsible for inflicting upon herself the severe burns she suffered to 90% of her body.
At a press conference, Méndez presented video footage that showed that Padilla bought two 500-milliliter bottles of medicinal alcohol and a cigarette lighter on the same day she sustained burns to 90% of her body. She died in hospital on July 19, three days after her body was badly burned.
Méndez said that authorities had no evidence that a man who allegedly threatened to burn Padilla alive was in a Zapopan park when the victim was set alight. He noted that the man himself, as well as his mother and sister, have denied that he was there.
Any hypothesis that Padilla set herself alight is inconsistent with testimony from witnesses cited in media reports last week. They said that four men and one woman doused Padilla with a flammable liquid before setting her on fire. A Zapopan municipal police report also said that Padilla had had a discussion with four people who allegedly attacked her in the park.
For his part, Méndez said that authorities hadn’t identified anyone directly involved in a “possible attack” on the now-deceased victim.
However, the man who allegedly threatened Padilla – a neighbor who is believed to have scrawled messages such as “I’m going to burn you alive” and “I’m going to kill you, Luz” inside common areas of their apartment building – is currently in custody in connection with an alleged previous attack on the victim.
Sergio Ismael I. is alleged to have physically and verbally assaulted Padilla on May 5, after which the latter obtained a restraining order against him. The attack supposedly occurred after Padilla poured a bucket of water over the man’s dog.
According to #YoCuidoMéxico, a caregivers’ advocacy organization, Padilla received constant death threats from neighbors because her young son, who is autistic, made noises during his “moments of crisis” that annoyed them. It said last week that Padilla, who belonged to #YoCuidoMéxico, previously survived an attack in which her chest was doused with bleach.
A judge ruled Tuesday that Sergio I. must stand trial for the alleged assault in May and remanded him in preventative custody. A complaint against him for threats was dismissed by the same judge.
Méndez said that the state will continue to investigate until it has certainty about what happened to Padilla. He emphasized he wasn’t making any conclusion based on the evidence that the victim bought two bottles of alcohol from a pharmacy and a lighter from a liquor store, both of which are located close to the park where Padilla sustained her injuries.
“The intention isn’t ever to re-victimize or criminalize anybody, neither Luz Raquel nor the person who is detained, who has rights too,” Méndez said.
The attorney general noted that the mother and father of Sergio I. had both filed complaints against Padilla for her alleged aggressive behavior toward them. The mother told authorities that she and members of her family were victims of threats made on social media.
According to Méndez, she provided police with her own security camera footage that apparently showed Padilla setting paper on fire outside her apartment door. Footage also shows Padilla changing the angle of a security camera in her building to conceal an interior wall on which the threats against her later appeared. The implication is that she – rather than Sergio I. – was responsible for scrawling the threats.
Padilla’s death came almost three weeks after an attack on a Morelos woman who was set on fire, allegedly by a family member, on July 1. Margarita Ceceña Martínez died in a Mexico City hospital on Sunday.
The soup known as sopa tarasca has long been considered a very hearty food in Michoacán. V&V Supremo
Despite its millennia-old history and important culture, Michoacán still does not get the attention from visitors it deserves.
But it is every bit as rich as Oaxaca and preserves much of its indigenous heritage. What generally holds the state back is its reputation for narcos, but if your first visit sticks with places like Pátzcuaro and Morelia, you will be fine.
And its food alone makes it worth the trip.
In 2010, UNESCO recognized Mexican cuisine as part of the world’s Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. The recognition is for the cuisines of the entire country, but its decision is strongly based on the oldest regional traditions; UNESCO mentioned Michoacán’s cuisine by name.
Uruapan-style aporreadillo with green salsa, a popular breakfast dish here. Alejandro Linares García/Creative Commons
This state’s gastronomy is still heavily based on the main staples of Mesoamerica: corn, beans and chile peppers.
Food is still cooked in traditional ways, using tools such as metates andmolcajetes, both a traditional type of mortar and pestle, as well as clay pots and comals (a thin, smooth metal griddle) and wooden spoons. But there are a number of unique aspects.
For millennia, the state’s diet included fish from its numerous lakes, rivers and shoreline, which is why Michoacán means “place of fish” in the Náhuatl language. Cooks here also make frequent use of aromatic herbs like spearmint, avocado leaves and nutrite (Satureja macrostema Bentn), the leaf of a bush herb that grows up to three meters tall.
There has been little, if any, effort to bring Michoacán’s traditional cuisine into the 21st century, either in homes or restaurants. That does not mean that Michoacán’s food is the same as that of before the conquest.
Corundas are something like Michoacán’s take on the tamal. Alejandro Linares García/Creative Commons
The Spanish did introduce a number of foodstuffs here, in particular pork and cheese. If you have had cotija cheese, you have had Michoacán’s version of parmesan.
The state’s food does vary by region, but that of the heart of the former Purépecha (Tarascan) Empire takes center stage.
That area is centered on Lake Pátzcuaro, the cultural and tourist center of the state today.
So what should you sample first? There are five must-trys for absolute beginners.
Carnitas are almost always chopped fine on a wood block before being served, usually in tacos. Gastronomia Mexicana/Creative Commons
Any preparation with charal fish — this name covers a number of freshwater species under 12 centimeters in length, dried whole after being caught. Michoacán still produces over 50% of all charal sold in the country. It can be eaten in a variety of ways: in its dried state as a crunchy snack or reconstituted to be fried in tacos or cooked in salsas. My recommendation for a first try is as a snack or taco. Close your eyes if need be to avoid seeing the critters’ faces, but it is worth it.
Carnitas might well be Michoacán’s gift to the rest of Mexico; it certainly is to Mexico City’s street food vendors. Invented in the town of Quiroga, it is hog parts (choose maciza if you want simple meat) that have been cooked for hours in large vats of both liquid and fat, a cross between braising and confit. The liquid is water traditionally flavored with orange juice, but cola and even milk can be used. The most traditional carnitas are cooked in copper vats, said to give a particular flavor to the meat, but good luck finding such vats outside the state.
Michoacán’s tamales. I will likely get in trouble for categorizing these as “tamales.” However, both of the following are corn dough wrapped in some other part of the corn plant, then steamed — a very, very old cooking method in Mesoamerica. Corundasare the most common of the two, instantly recognizable by their small size and triangular shape, which comes from wrapping the corn dough with leaves from the corn stalk. They are not filled but rather covered with toppings such as salsa, stewed meat, beans, vegetables, cream or cheese. Ucheposare made with fresh corn and can be either sweet or savory. The sweet version mixes milk and sugar into the dough, topped with condensed milk and fruit preserves when served. The savory version is topped with cheese or pork along with red or green salsa.
Sopa tarasca is a hearty soup/stew which mixes chicken meat and broth with beans, tomatoes, onions, garlic, epazote and pasilla chile pepper. It is topped with tortilla strips, bits of avocado and sour cream.
Aporreado/aporreadillo is scrambled eggs mixed with shredded beef, sometimes pork. If you like northern machaca with your morning eggs, you will like this. Unlike its northern cousin, this version can often have tomatoes and other items mixed in, as well as salsa on top.
By no means are these five suggestions exhaustive of what the state has to offer, but they make a good place to start. If you come across any of these dishes below during your visit, by all means, consider trying them and let me know what you thought.
Churipo is a beef stew with red chile peppers and vegetables, a Uruapan specialty.
Olla podrida is a stew made with pork, chicken or beef cooked with various vegetables and the fermented alcoholic beverage pulque (or sometimes brandy).
Morisqueta is rice mixed with refried beans and covered in salsa. Sometimes it is served with pork.
Pozole batido is a red pozole variation made with pork or sometimes beef.
Caldo michi is a soup made with squash, onions, tomatoes, cabbage and catfish, the latter being a species recently introduced for fish farming.
Atapakua is a green chile pepper sauce that can be put on just about any meat or seafood.
And what should you wash all this delicious food down with? Like other places in central Mexico, Michoacán does produce pulque and mezcal, although theirs are not particularly well-known. The most traditional drink is charanda, an alcoholic beverage made from sugar cane.
A large platter of coated and fried charals ready for a taco, salsa or just in a cup to be eaten with the fingers. Alejandro Linares García/Creative Commons
By the way, the flavor, depending on where you are, can vary quite a bit, so even though it’s made with sugar cane, don’t necessarily expect “rum.”
Leigh Thelmadatter arrived in Mexico 18 years ago and fell in love with the land and the culture in particular its handcrafts and art. She is the author of Mexican Cartonería: Paper, Paste and Fiesta (Schiffer 2019). Her culture column appears regularly on Mexico News Daily.
It's believed the impressive ancient Maya city was at one point part of a trade network with other cities like Chichén Itzá.
An archaeological site in northeastern Yucatán that state authorities believed would spur tourism has been forgotten, according to residents of nearby communities.
The Yucatán government announced in early 2018 that the commencement of the final stage of restoration work at Kulubá – an ancient Mayan city set amid jungle in the municipality of Tizimín – was imminent. The site opened to the public later the same year, but more than four years later, not all of the planned work has yet been completed.
“Kulubá will be the 18th archaeological zone that Yucatán will have, and we will allocate significant investment to it because we hope that it will spark the tourism potential of the east of the state,” Saúl Ancona, the state’s former economic promotion minister, said in January 2018.
Rolando Zapata Bello, Yucatán governor between 2012 and 2018, said in March 2018 that he expected Kulubá to enjoy similar success to the Ek Balam site, which opened in 2000 and went on to become the state’s third most visited archaeological attraction.
This image of Kulubá was a Photo of the Day on INAH’s website in 2020, but otherwise, it’s not well promoted. Few people know it exists. INAH
But four years later, the only visitors that reach Kulubá are intrepid adventurers because the access road is in poor condition, residents of nearby rural communities told the newspaper Por Esto!
The residents recalled that Zapata visited Kulubá in 2018 and announced an investment of approximately 18 million pesos (about US $877,000 at today’s exchange rate) to carry out restoration work at the site, which includes structures including pyramids and a large palace. At the time, the state government signed an agreement with the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) to collaborate on restoration projects at Kulubá and other Yucatán archaeological sites.
The residents also recalled that the then governor said that local Mayan people would benefit from the opening of Kulubá, located about 40 kilometers east of the city of Tizimín. However, the ruins are now forgotten, Agustín Mex, a local agricultural worker, told Por Esto!
While the site is open – entry is free – residents noted that the planned restoration work hasn’t been completed.
The site opened to the public in 2018, but more than four years later, not all of the planned restoration work has yet been completed and access is difficult. INAH
They also said that plans to promote Kulubá as a tourist attraction never came to fruition, possibly due to the change of state government in late 2018, when National Action Party Governor Mauricio Vila succeeded Zapata, who represented the Institutional Revolutionary Party. With few tourists visiting, the opening of the site hasn’t generated any employment opportunities for locals, the residents added.
Adventurous tourists who make it to Kulubá will find plenty to explore. There are some 400 structures at the site, which was once within the sphere of influence of Chichén Itzá, the imposing ancient Mayan city near Valladolid. They include 15-meter-high pyramids and a palace east of the main plaza that was discovered just three years ago.
The palace was likely used by the elite of Kulubá, INAH said in late 2019, adding that relics found in and near the structure suggest that it was occupied between the years 600 and 1050 AD. Some of the other structures are still covered by vegetation, including large trees.
INAH archaeologist Alfredo Barrera Rubio acknowledged that more work needs to be done to restore the site and improve access given that the road is currently in terrible condition. The residents didn’t express any optimism that those projects would be completed anytime soon.
As Google Earth’s satellite imagery reveals, Kulubá is mostly surrounded by thick jungle. The only way there is an unpaved access road.
A Veracruz woman got her dying wish last Saturday when a giant penis sculpture was erected atop her gravestone in Ignacio Zaragoza, Misantla. Catarina Orduña, called Doña Cata by friends and family, was surely laughing in her grave, as she often did in life according to her family, at the sight of onlookers taking photos with the larger-than-life penis that now decorates the local cemetery.
Doña Cata was known for her humor, sharp tongue, and sometimes racy conversation. She was a long-time political activist and could often be found talking to local politicians both during their campaigns and after they won.
According to her family, she lamented the fact that there were so many public monuments to politicians, lawyers, doctors, and teachers, but none to the penis, a reproductive organ she considered worthy of honor and reverence. She even believed that the penis should have its own holiday when its importance as a tool of pleasure could be celebrated by all. Her family said that Doña Cata was never embarrassed by talking about sex and didn’t believe that others should be either.
The woman requested before she died that they erect the penis sculpture atop her grave to remind all who knew her of her joyful and playful character in life. The sculpture, created by architect Isidro Lavoignet, was well-received by the cemetery according to the family. They said they knew of no other monument quite like it in another cemetery in the country.
Doña Catarina was born in 1921 and lived to 100. She had nine children and many grandchildren, one of whom, Álvaro Mota Limón, went on to be the mayor of Misantla in the early 2000s.
Drought is taking a toll on livestock in southern Coahuila: one farmer saw 50 of his goats die this year and sold the rest of his famished herd for a pittance because he couldn’t afford to feed them.
Nearby is the small town of Hipólito, where 73-year-old Silverio Alférez Piña began raising farm animals 25 years ago.
“There’s never been a drought like now,” he told the newspaper Vanguardia. Alférez described the current conditions as “ugly” before bluntly declaring that “there’s no water” in Hipólito, located 70 kilometers northwest of state capital Saltillo in the municipality of Ramos Arizpe.
Growing fodder is consequently impossible, meaning that local farmers have to buy feed for their animals. Alférez, however, reached a point at which at which he could no longer afford the feed his goats, cattle and horses needed.
With insufficient food, goats in his 140-strong herd, including pregnant does, began to die. Alférez admitted that his stubbornness led him to soldier on as a farmer but after approximately 50 of his goats had died he realized he couldn’t continue. He sold his scrawny surviving goats for a total of just 800 pesos (US $39).
Alférez also lost cattle due to the drought as well as some of his mares. “I sold all my [surviving] mares, about five of them died on me,” he said. “I sold pure [skin and] bones and … [the buyers] paid me as they wished,” he said.
Alférez has kept a couple of calves but is now out of the commercial farming game because turning a profit became impossible. He now runs a small store, which he opened with money he saved from his pension.
Other Hipólito residents also had to sell their farm animals because they didn’t have the money to feed them, Vanguardia reported.
Located about five kilometers from Hipólito on the border between Ramos Arizpe and the municipality of General Cepeda, the empty El Tulillo dam – which went completely dry four months ago – serves as stark testament to the drought the region is currently enduring, the worst in at least 20 years.
“It’s all dry,” said Eusebio López, a local official. “Not just the dam, the entire … [area], there’s nothing for the animals to eat.”
This model apartment in a building in the Roma Norte neighborhood is being advertised as an income generator in that the real estate company expects the buyer will rent it to travelers.
Foreigners — especially United States citizens – are changing the face of some Mexico City neighborhoods where they have recently settled and from which they work remotely.
Large numbers of mainly young Americans have moved to the capital during the pandemic, taking advantage of flexible work arrangements that allow them to live in Mexico while earning in dollars. According to the remote worker website Nomad List, a resource for digital nomads that claims over 10,000 paid subscribers, Mexico City is No. 5 on one of its lists of the fastest-growing remote work hubs in the last five years.
In 2021, once the COVID-19 pandemic began, Nomad List says the number of its subscribers who checked in from Mexico City grew 125% and grew 65% more in 2022.
According to the site, the pandemic influenced numbers in 2020 and 2021.
Foreigners, mainly people from the United States, are more than ever a familiar sight in places like this cafe in Polanco.
“For example, places with less travel restrictions (like Mexico) have grown faster for that reason, amongst others,” it said.
Many of these foreigners who are staying temporarily in Mexico City now live in trendy, central neighborhoods such as Condesa, Roma and Juárez, where renting an apartment is out of reach of most Mexicans but comparatively cheap for Americans armed with dólares.
A Milenio newspaper report noted that the sight of U.S. citizens at businesses such as restaurants and cafes in those neighborhoods, as well as Santa María la Ribera and the historic center – all of which are in the central Cuauhtémoc borough – is now commonplace.
It also said that businesses, especially those in Condesa, are adapting in order to cater to the large number of gringos living in the local area.
Long-established barberías now have “barber shop” signs for English-speaking eyes. Restaurants have English menus, and yoga studios offer bilingual classes, Milenio said. The self-proclaimed “healthy” restaurant Mora Mora, where “clean & green bowls” and “superfood sandwiches” are on the menu; the restaurant Ojo de Agua, where fresh food and free WiFi are on offer; and the Condesa branch of the cafebrería (cafe/bookstore) El Péndulo are all popular places among Americans who left the U.S. for a variety of reasons, including high living costs and the impact of the pandemic on their social lives.
An El Péndulo waiter told Milenio that at least half of all customers in recent months have been gringos. “The bad thing is that they don’t leave very good tips,” he said.
In an interview with Milenio, the president of the Mexico City branch of the Mexican Association of Real Estate Professionals said the arrival of Americans and the consequent influx of dollars has helped the rental market recover from a pandemic-induced downturn.
“They don’t have a problem paying 30,000, 40,000 or even 50,0000 pesos rent [per month],” Laura Zazueta said.
Mexico City has been considered an appealing destination for digital nomads since the mid 2010s, but this chart shows that its popularity during the first year of the pandemic shot up. Nomad List
At the current exchange rate (one greenback buys about 20.5 pesos), 50,000 pesos is $2,435. That’s almost 10 times Mexico’s monthly minimum wage, which is currently set at just under 173 pesos (about US $8.50) per day.
Zazueta acknowledged that Condesa, Roma, Juárez and the historic center are the most popular neighborhoods among foreigners, although some have ventured outside the Cuauhtémoc borough “bubble” to live in places such as swanky Polanco and nearby Anzures, both of which are in the Miguel Hidalgo borough.
Americans like neighborhoods such as Condesa and Roma because of the art deco architecture and the wide variety of dining options, she said. “[Roma] is also very attractive because the movie Roma was filmed there,” Zazueta said.
The industry group president said that account managers, bankers and office employees of multinational companies are among the foreigners moving to Mexico City. “They install themselves here because it’s not at all expensive for them, due to the exchange rate,” Zazueta said.
Most foreigners living in Mexico while working remotely for foreign companies enter the country as tourists, meaning that they shouldn’t stay here uninterruptedly for longer than six months, provided they were given a 180-day permit. Getting a 180-day permit was once all but guaranteed, but many travelers have reported that they were allowed 30 or fewer days.
While Americans and other foreigners living and working in the capital inject significant quantities of money into the local economy, their presence is far from welcomed by all Mexicans.
When a visitor from Austin tweeted in February that remote working in Mexico City “is truly magical,” a storm of indignation among Mexico City residents about remote workers from the U.S. pushing locals out of their own neighborhoods ensued online, Mexico News Daily reported earlier this year in a story about a Roma sandwich business’s battle against the seemingly unstoppable forces of gentrification.
A huge shipment of cocaine bound for Los Angeles was seized by police in Mexico City on Tuesday, officials reported, adding that the confiscated 1.68 tonnes made for the largest cocaine bust ever in the capital city.
The contraband came by sea from Colombia and entered Mexico in the Oaxacan coastal city of Puerto Escondido, the newspaper El País reported. From there, according to media reports, it was transported by two freight trucks to Mexico City, where some of the drug was going to be distributed in the Tepito neighborhood, though the bulk of the 3,704 lbs. of cocaine was on its way to L.A.
“This represents a strong blow to the financial structure of criminal organizations,” said Mexico City Police Chief Omar García Harfuch, who noted that the cocaine had a street value of about 400 million pesos (US $19.5 million).
Four people were detained and three vehicles, one of which was escorting the two trucks, were seized, one of them with secret compartments to hide the cocaine, El País reported. Some media reported that those arrested are Colombians, while others said they are from Durango.
Though Mexico City officials admit their city is used as a shipping point, they claim drug cartels do not operate as brazenly there as they do in other parts of Mexico.
In images shared by the police, agents are seen hammering the top of the vehicles and discovering hundreds of packages of cocaine. The bust took place in the Gustavo A. Madero borough, where Mexico City’s Norte bus station is located, and was aided by authorities from nearby México state.
However, the Minister of Public Security did not cite the Sinaloa Cartel or any other criminal organization by name. But noting that several drug trafficking routes have been identified, García did say intelligence work will lead to more busts going forward.
Two years ago, García was hit by three bullets when a vehicle he was traveling in was riddled by more than 400 gunshots. Two escorts from the Public Security Ministry died in that attack, as did a woman who was caught in the crossfire. Since then, 14 suspects identified as members of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel have been arrested, El Pais reported.
