3/27 – Pátzcuaro, Ihuatzio, Janitzio (yácatas, water, hot yams)
Friday, March 27
Lake Pátzcuaro is roughly the shape of an uppercase L (with serifs). Inside the angle of the L is a peninsula featuring a significant volcanic hill and the ancient Purépecha capital of Ihuatzio, now dwindled to a village of cracked adobe whose signal features are 1) a life sized (and therefore not very imposing) statue of a coyote on the way into town, and 2) on the other side of town, the remains of the yácatas that were once its hub. In the decades since our last visit, the central complex has been excavated and partially reconstructed, but it’s clearly not a heavy tourist draw: we jounced for quite a while along unsigned, unpaved, uninhabited back roads before we came across it. The corrugated furrows of the adjoining private fields were disrupted in several places by a scattering of sudden humps, all grassed over like playing pieces on a long-abandoned gameboard. To our speculative eyes it seemed obvious that they were the slumped remains of Ihuatzio’s ancient homes and shops. We longed to search for pre-Hispanic pottery fragments among the corn furrows, but had to content ourselves with sightings of a vermillion and an ash-throated flycatcher.
In the afternoon, on a whim, we hopped a public transport boat from the Pátzcuaro docks to la isla de Janitzio for lunch. Lake Pátzcuaro rests in the basin of a volcanic caldera, and the gumdrop of Janitzio Island is the remains of a volcanic cone. Completely covering the island, houses, churches and steep stone streets interlock with the dense geometry of a hive. Narrow lanes imagined by Escher twist, intersect and reappear in surprising directions, wreathing their way up the hill, sometimes morphing into stairways or rooftops. We decided the long steep hike to the enormous statue of Morelos at the island’s crown wasn’t worth it (even if you can climb up in his wrist). Instead we ate a surprisingly mediocre lunch of the famous tiny charales and a watery seafood soup and boated back to the mainland. The boat trips were fun: about 40 of us sat on two benches along the sides of the covered launch, while a rickety four-piece band (guitar, accordion, drum, contrabajo) braced in the aisle serenaded us with a perfunctory three ballads and then passed the hat. The water, mud-brown and choppy, chilled us with spray as the boat slapped over the waves. On the bench facing me, a well-dressed couple in their later 40s kissed passionately for the entire 45-minute boat ride, oblivious to the sloshing water, the egrets flapping lankily by, and the stand-up bass positioned inches from their knees. We came across them between food stalls on the island and they were still at it.
Our final evening in Pátzcuaro we visited the Basilica and the graceful former convent (now artisan shops) lyrically known as the House of the 11 Patios (most surprising 16th-century feature: a small hexagonal soaking bath tucked behind a stone window shaped like a star). I bought some hot yams from a street vendor and ate them from a plastic bag, and eventually we made our way home to our charming, chilly wood cabin and to bed.
