March 30th

Woke up and felt OK with my ribs still bound – the support from the bandage had given me quite a good night's sleep. I was first to have breakfast, then Jurgen and Corinne and finally Jane from Ireland.   She is a bit quiet and I hope she will be good company. Jurgen is becoming more amusing as he relaxes and has quite a good sense of humour. We have all decided to go to Tula this afternoon to see the two pyramids from the Toltec era with the Atlanteans on the top and the temple of Quezalcoatl.

 

 I found out that Da Vinci had lost a shoe as well yesterday so I was back with Palomo who had been re-shod . 

 We went off in two separate groups for our riding this morning, my German friends with a guide of their own and me, Jane, the Irish lady, the BA pilots Sean and Caroline who is a very pretty young Scots girl about 27years old and two very gay Canadians. We split as usual into a group for cantering and a group for walking and eventually everyone met up at a bar for a beer and then carried on together. We were again in Fresno where I had been a few times before and went off towards the pretty waterfalls just outside the village.

There waiting for us was Katrin and Vale with a picnic table all laid out with wine, tablecloth, table decorations etc. Before we all dismounted we were given a Tequila shot which had to be downed in one, then off we got and we were served lunch.I really don't know how they manage to produce such wonderful food and transport it to the riverside and then make it all look so immaculate. Wonderful!

  We spent a very pleasant hour there and then the four of us going to Tula returned to the ranch – with a couple of good gallops included, changed our clothes and piled into the car for the ride to Tula.



The Tula site was bigger than I expected with a museum attached. We all went in there and I was amazed how intricate the stone carvings were of the gods, the Jaguars and altars etc, compared with the very basic earthenware pottery of the same era. It made me think that either the dating was wrong or, I think that it had been done by a different race of people, there was such a marked difference.

  

 

 

It was quite a walk to the pyramid area and there was also a ball game court which had been excavated. I am not sure what kind of ball game was played but it was no doubt something bloodthirsty, probably lacrosse with human hearts instead of a ball!! The pyramids themselves were quite large, one in a state of disrepair and the other appeared to be complete. 


 There was a steep staircase up to the top of this one which took me some time to climb and there on the top were these huge carved Toltec figures. 


 




 Quite eerie, all staring the same way down the valley. I don’t know their purpose or who they are supposed to represent but very fascinating indeed. 

 

There was also a site being excavated which was a temple to Quetzacoatl who, legend has it, emerged from the sea (probably from a boat!) clad in a coat of feathers. It is also recorded in some books that he was tall and had blonde hair and blue eyes which of course would enhance his deification as he would have stood out amongst the smaller more suntanned locals.


 
 
 We lost Jane somewhere along the way as she had decided to wander off on her own without saying anything. Brenda was getting really worried as we had all been out looking for her and not found her. Eventually she appeared sauntering along, quite unaware of the problem she had caused.

The town of Tula itself was nothing as special as the pyramids so we had a wander around the market and went into an amazing cake shop. The wedding cakes were totally out of this world. They must have a lot of wedding guests, they were enormous and so ornate.

 Because of Jane's walkabout we were late returning for dinner and had quite a lot of us around the table this evening -8 in all. Our gay Canadian friends left about 8.30 – one of them was a restaurant critic for the Toronto Times. hope he gave Uschi a great review.

 The rest of us stayed a bit longer but it had been a very full day in the heat and I eventually retired to write my diary. We are all riding in the morning so another chance to catch up with everyone.