Mexico City

Last month, my buddy Michael Demeng, called me up and invited me to go to Mexico
City with him. He was heading there primarily to visit Isla de las Munecas, or Island of the Dolls. He is collecting research for his 2nd book, and knew that an Island of Dolls would be my kind of thing. I hemmed and hawed, making up excuses as to why I
couldn't go, so he sent me a few photos of the place he found on the Internet, and within moments of receiving the photos, I called him back and said "I'm going!"
What ensued was a remarkable adventure to this very strange place...

Isla de las Munecas is a small island situated a few hours outside of Mexico city, in the canal lands of Xochimilco. This area, known as the Floating Gardens is a series of canals that stretch for over 80 km. To navigate these canals, you take a type of Mexican gondola, a trajinera, with a Mexican gondelier, who uses a simple pole to navigate the canals. Mexican families and tourists alike come here to get out of the chaos of the city, to enjoy a lazy day of drifting up and down the canals. Mariachi
bands float up and down the canals on these trajineras, serenading people.

We boarded our floating barge on a weekday morning with no one about. We cruised down the canals, I loved looking at all these boats and watching life along the banks.


They gave me a beautiful corsage type thing when we took off, of course I wouldn't
wear it, but it did make for a cool photo.
More boats...
Mariachi band on the way to work.
Boat maintenance.

Stay tuned, we will be arriving at Isla de las Munecas shortly...