Guadalajara, Mexico--Day 125

Today I went to the Guadalajara Zoo first thing in the morning. To my luck, I got there just in time as it was opening and the hippos were situation right in the front of the zoo! I go to their enclosure and found both of them still in their pen eating their breakfast. Perfect! This just meant that I had to wait for them to walk out so that I could get some pictures of them.

It didn’t take long before the male wandered out and down into their water hole that was just filling up. So I took lots of pictures of him and then waited for the female to show herself. She finally did after a while and went straight to the faucet that was filling up the pool and started to clean her teeth with the water spray. It was so funny and luckily the hoards of school children had passed at this point so I didn’t have to fend off anyone or push small children out of the way to get some good pictures.

Also to my luck there was a woman zoo worker who was situated in a booth right by the hippos so I asked her what their names were (Felipe and Maurilia) and soon thereafter I was on my way back to my hotel to get these pictures organized and sent on their way back to the United States.

However the taxi driver didn’t know where my hotel was this time so he dropped me off at a shopping mall nearby which walked around for a bit before catching another cab just down the street to my hotel.

I got back to the hotel but it took a while to get the pictures ready and then to organize FedEx from the hotel. But finally they were all done and sent on their way, and I had some free time. I decided that I wanted to change my flight from here back to Tucson for a day earlier since I will only have just barely 2 days back in Tucson before leaving for Vienna next Thursday. I originally was supposed to arrive in Tucson on Tuesday afternoon, then leave on Thursday afternoon, but I changed my flight to leave on Monday instead. So this meant that I had to track down the American Airlines building and change my ticket in person. Just as I showed up a group of three walked in right before me so it took much longer than expected and I had to wait (and my taxi driver who insisted on waiting for me had to as well, which meant that I was going to have to pay him extra for waiting). Oh well.

Finally I got my new ticket and was on my way to the Chamber of Commerce here in Guadalajara because I decided that I wanted to go on this thing called the “Tequila Express” tomorrow, which is an old train that takes you down to Tequila where you can then go on a tour of an old factory which still produces Tequila. I thought that it sounded like fun, if not very touristy, but that for all my friend’s sake, funny that I will have been at THE place in the world that is responsible for creating and contributing to so many crazy (should I say drunken?) college memories. So I got dropped off (he didn’t wait for me this time) and wandered around this huge nice building looking for the Tequila Express ticket booth. Kind of embarrassing when everyone is wearing suits and you are walking around going, um, I’m looking for tequila. Thanks.

So I finally found it and after some confusion with the ticket girl, I finally got and paid for a ticket for the Tequila Express for tomorrow. I also met three really nice people from Washington D.C. who are in Guadalajara for 2 weeks of Spanish training for their new jobs. William, Cory (that’s her last name that she goes by) and Swati were all really nice and also going on the Tequila Express tomorrow so we got to talking and I ended up sharing a cab ride with them to more or less the center of town. It was really nice to get talking with people and knowing that I would have people on the tour with tomorrow to talk with as well.

After walking back from where the cab dropped us off into town, I then got something to eat for dinner and walked around a bit more before returning back to my hotel for the night.



(c) 2004 Sarah Galbraith. All Rights Reserved.