Jesus de las Conchas

“There are no foreign lands. It is the traveler only who is foreign.” 

― Robert Louis Stevenson, The Silverado Squatters

We have arrived in the gritty, loud, non touristic city of Veracruz, right on the Gulf of Mexico. It's a major port town here, with large container ships in the harbor.  But amongst the hard working stevedores and oil businessmen, is a town you can really enjoy, at least for a day or two.

We arrived at 11pm and after checking into our hotel and went straight to the zocalo for dinner. There just happened to be a HUGE soccer game between the hated Mexico City team and the local Veracruz team, Los Tiburones (the Sharks). The Tiburones won 4-0, so there was a lot of celebrating!  There were hundreds of people in the square (zocalo) drinking copious amounts of cervezas. There were also 8 or more bands playing various kinds of music; Cuban jazz, Mariachis, Norteño and the local Son Jarocho. At most points they just kind of all blended together, but sometimes you could actually hear a song, mostly from the loud Mariachis. Next to our table, a young woman was singing along to the sad Mexican songs of love lost. She seemed to be crying and laughing at the same time. 

We both ordered a gorgeous fresh crab soup in a spicy red broth. You knew it was fresh by the little bits of crab shell in the soup. This was washed down with cold Negra Modelos. Yum!

This morning we had breakfast at the Cafe de la Porroquia, a 200 year old institution in this town. Very professional waiters are constantly flowing around this large cafe, their job is to keep up your "lechero" full. The lechero is the milky coffee that is served here. They put some espresso in your glass, then the waiter comes and pours hot milk into the glass, raising his milk kettle up so the milk flows down from on high and creates the froth. 

We ordered our breakfast, Amy had eggs and refried beans and I had huevos Oaxaxenos, and then the music started. A group of five musicians and two dancers played the local Son Jarocho music. It was fantastic!

The rest of today has been spent walking around town, going to the Augustin Lara museum, dedicated to the great composer and musician who was from here and finally to the very local Playa del Villa, the city's beach where all the locals come down to cavort in the sea. We had a nice lunch of octopus and conch, mine in an ajiillo sauce and Amy's in tamarind and chipotle. And as is always best when you eat fresh fish, our toes were in the sand. This place is about as far from Cancun as you can get. No lobster skinned tourists (except for us) here, all local folks cavorting in the shallow water. Hawkers hawk everything from shave ice to jewelry to cheap watches. What an amazing place to people watch!

There are a lot of kitchy souvenirs you can buy here, but possibly nothing as kitchy as Jesus de las Conchas, Jesus of the Shells. Well, it's Easter and I guess anything goes.