MUSHROOMING AND MORE IN MEXICO
PART I: VERACRUZ

Bob and Barbara Sommer, October 2003


Photo by Cynthia David

We paid for our tickets with Frequent Flier miles. This limits options as to flights and departure times. On the LA-Mexico City portion, we were “required” to travel first class. Perhaps out of gratitude for our willingness to endure this imposition, the airline assigned us to first class the entire journey. Wow, were we spoiled! Can we ever to go back to steerage?

It won’t be easy. There is a separate check-in window for first class with no waiting (we walked past bitter, angry people lined up in the Los Angeles terminal), priority baggage handling, ample seat and leg room, clean restroom in the front cabin, a personal flight attendant for 6-8 people ministering to your every need, free drinks starting before the plane leaves the ground, snacks, and top drawer meals from a printed menu accompanied by Alsatian wine (our favorite) followed by liqueurs.


1st class leg room
 We did not feel guilty so much as lucky. For years we heard urban legends about people bumped to first class. Now it was our turn to hit the jackpot. Perhaps allowing in a few peasants is a way of silencing criticism of the corporate greedheads in the private airline clubs and first class cabins.


Sra. Bob!

Scenes in the Mexico City airport
Travel on first-class busses in Mexico is equally sumptuous. The large, modern, airy terminals in Xalapa and Puebla put bus stations in the US to shame. They are as nice as any American air terminal, and more conveniently located. They had several levels of services, clear bilingual signage, clean restrooms (for which we paid twenty cents a visit), a helpful information desk, kiosks to reserve an authorized taxicab, numerous shops and food stands, and ample seating.
Before the ride, we chose reserved seats from a computer screen (something we are unable to do on airlines), checked our bags, went through metal detectors (yes, this really was a bus station), with on-time departures and early arrivals, a stewardess on board handing out headsets, snacks, and beverages, and better movies than Legally Blond 2 which we saw on the air trip south. There was no movie on the 6-hour return air trip.

Candy store in the Xalapa, Caxa station
The mushroom foray to Veracruz was first rate too. Organized by the expat couple Eric & Gundi who led last year’s expedition in Tlaxcala, our group assembled on Sunday October 19 at the Hotel Colonial on the zocalo (central plaza) in Veracruz.

We arrived a day early so had the opportunity to walk around this port city founded by Cortez in 1519. The docks accomodate an active fishery and the waterfront area is being rehabilitated.
Palacio Municipal, Veracruz
On the plaza there are band concerts competing with cathedral bells, ceremonies, sailors in dress uniform, strollers, balloon sellers, a one-man band, and food vendors.
Ficus topiary
Indian women resting
(with bags of embroidered shirts)

Our Lady of Assumption (1721)
Next day we rode Golfo, our bus, driven by the very competent Tonio, to the La Mancha biological station. This is one of the few forests in Mexico that touches the sea. We hunted mushrooms in the steamy jungle heat. Rainforest fungi tend to be small so they can release their spore quickly in the extreme heat. One of our guides studies rainforest fungi so our pickings, though lean by our standards, were of keen interest to her. Bob sketched many tiny fungi, grouping them 3-4 to a page, so they wouldn’t be lost in white space.

Crepidotus sp.


Mycena pura
Clitocybe clavipes
Amanita, phalloides group

Picnoporus sanguineus

To Part II