Lake Chapala with the village of Ajijic in the foreground   - photo by Mike D'Cruze

             

No advertisements--that's my policy--so I'm not going to break that rule now.  Instead, I'll tell you about the place I used to live and some friends of mine who just happen to have opened one of the loveliest bed and breakfasts on Lake Chapala. 

Ajijic, a village nestled in the Sierra Madre mountains, clings to the banks of the largest lake in Mexico.  Although thousands of expatriates from all over the world live on the shores of Lake Chapala, Ajijic is still very much a Mexican village. It's a place where a peddler plays a tin flute advertising his services as he strolls through town; where friends (and you will always run into a friend no matter where you go) stop on the cobblestone street to chat; where the market, offering a dozen roses for a few pesos and produce so fresh it's still warm from the earth, is a weekly event no one misses.  Yes, crime has touched parts of Mexico, but it's virtually unknown here.  This is a place that time seems to have forgotten although you'll find that hard to believe when you dine in one of the cosmopolitan restaurants catering to expats.

It's also the place where friends of mine have opened one of the loveliest boutique bed and breakfast's, with three very private suites, in the Lake Chapala area.  Mike, from England, met America, from Mexico City, when she was studying in London; after traveling the world, they relocated to Ajijic to fulfill a dream.  That dream, which took almost four years to create, is named Las Cupulas.

Their bed and breakfast, where beauty is only trumped by comfort, is just a few miles from Ajijic.  Here in this quiet retreat,  you can relax in the saltwater pool or watch the birds that congregate near the lakeshore.  Or you can do nothing at all but bask in the sun of Ajijic's perpetual-spring climate and wish that America's delicious breakfast arrived sooner than tomorrow! But no matter what you do while you're there, I do not think you will regret for a moment your decision to stay at Las Cupulas.

Practicalities - If you'd like more information about Ajijic or Mexico, my book, Retire in Mexico - Live Better for Less Money is available on Amazon.  See more book details in the column at right.

The “Real” Mexico

David sat in the living room last night reading the books I'd lugged home from the library. Since he's lived in San Diego all his life, just thirty miles from the border, the word “Mexico,” to him, means cities like Tijuana or the Baja coast where he and his buddies used to sail their catamarans. I'd brought home all the books I could find on Mexico because I wanted him to learn about other parts of the country, especially the central part where we will be in June.

He decided, though, to first read the general visitor information and kept calling out questions. Did you know that the gray and black scorpions aren't deadly, but the yellow ones require medical treatment? Is the water in all parts of the country unsafe to drink? Will we need to take our band aids and emergency supplies because this (pointing to the book) says we will?

It's not only David who is largely uninformed about our neighbor to the south; my friends have asked similar questions. When I told Nona where we were going, she said, “You mean you're going in June. Won't it be unbearably hot then?” Joan wondered if we would survive with all the drug violence, and Marissa suggested we not drink a single drop of water the entire month we were there. (I don't think she thought that one through!)

The truth is that Mexico is as diverse as the United States or Canada or France. Just as New York is different from Tucson, or Quebec is unlike Vancouver, or Paris is seemingly a world removed from Arles, so Tijuana is vastly different from Ajijic. Of course, it is possible to find parts of the country where you must fear yellow scorpions, tote your own water and medical supplies, suffer from tropical heat, and fear for your life, but there are just as many parts of the country where none of that occurs.