El Camino del Paste, Hidalgo, Mexico Part 1
Church in Mineral Chico
So when I got to Pachuca, like I usually do, I hopped in a taxi and went to my hotel, which was about 10 minutes from the bus stop. Making small talk with the taxi cab driver I asked him “If you only had one day here what would you do?” He surprised me by saying he wouldn’t stay in the city at all and proceeded to list like 8 different things up in the mountains.
He called it El Camino del Paste, the Pasty Trail. Pasties are a state dish in Hidalgo. This intrigued me and so I said how much would this cost and he said $2,500 pesos (about $125 USD), so I said OK let’s do this and that is how we started this adventure up into the twisty mountain roads that cross through the state of Hidalgo.
The first town we visited was Mineral Del Chico. To get there we had to travel through the Mexican National park of El Chico. It was slightly raining while we went up and there were lots of rivers, streams, and even random waterfalls. Mineral del Chico is an interesting town to visit. It is a Pueblo Magico and so it is very unique. It has a small and has a church, plaza like most Mexican cities, but what sets it apart was that most of the buildings were made out of wood and had slanted roofs. As the name implies it used to be a small mining town and so on the outskirts of town you can see remnants of it’s mining history.
Colorful painted houses on the outskirts of Pachuca.
Church in Mineral Chico
City Hall, Mineral del Chico.
This is a Tlayuda. It is about the size of a steering wheel and has a green corn tortilla, salsa, chorizo, cheese, and flat steak.
All the different food you can get at the Mercado in Mineral del Chico.
The next town we visited was called Omitlan de Juarez. This town distinguished itself during the French invasion for being a hold out down. Omitlan had a beautiful plaza with hedges shaped into many different things like animals and dancing people. It had a little hilltop church with a little cemetery.
Jose Maria Perez and his army helped the Republican forces resist the French invasion into Mexico.
I loved the sculpted hedges in Omitlan plaza.
Kiosk at Omitlan de Juarez
A little cemetery in Omitlan.
Omitlan church.
A small river runs through Omitlan.
An old warehouse.
The gardens are very well kept.
From Omitlan we drove out into the forest some more on a very bumpy road next to a rock quarry and ended up at Zembo lake. Zembo lake is a very small lake, I would almost call it a pond, but you can go fishing there and there are these little restaurants that will cook your fish on the spot. It cost $30 mxn a day to camp or just visit. While we were there a little kid with a little bit of string and a worm showed us how to catch a carp. I enjoyed walking along the stream that fed the lake.
I have never seen orange trout before.
There are different levels of the fish hatchery.
Lake Zembo was so glassy you probably didn’t noticed I posted this picture upside down.
A wooden bridge at Lake Zembo.
Lake Zembo is a very tranquil place to visit.
This young man showed me how to catch a carp.
A small procession of horses started to form outside of Lake Zembo.
Lake zembo is also important because it is a trout fishery that supplies most of the local trout to the area.
In the mountains there were a lot of horses. As we were leaving Lake Zembo we saw a little procession of horses. Little did we know this was going to be something bigger, but that is for the next post.
To get around the horses we diverted around a lake called Presa San Antonio, which is also where they have a Hacienda called Hacienda Santa Maria Regla. Today the old hacienda is a hotel and it is semi famous because they filmed part of the movie the Mask of Zorro on location.
Part of the Mask of Zorro was filmed at Hacienda Santa Maria Regla.
It costs $85 MXN to get into Sta. Maria Regla.
Our destination by the lake was Las Prismas Balsaticos, a UNESCO world heritage site, which is actually kind of a beautiful tourist trap. You pay $100 pesos per person and you go to this park that is nothing but tacky knick nack shops. Which you have to walk through to get to where you want to go which is the waterfall. The waterfalls were made when a lava flow hit a river, it reminds me a lot of Devil’s Post-pile near Mammoth in California.
Crossing a rope bridge at Prismas Basalticos
This is what happens when a lava flow and a river hit each other.
The comes down very heavy.
Prismas Balsalticos is recognized as a UNESCO world heritage site.
You can hike down the valley to get different views of the falls.
The mountain roads in Hidalgo are very twisty.
Well, this was part one of our Camino del Paste tour, thank you for visiting. I have a little video below to get some more visuals. In the next blog post we will explore some more mountain towns and you will see why my taxi cab driver called it the pasty road.
Video:
What a great way to figure out where to go–ask a taxi driver. It looks like it turned out very well! I don’t know about that Tlayuda, though. It looks like enough food for about four people.