Mexican Independence day and snake enounters

Strange day in morning everything went wrong but we ended up having a brilliant day.

Wasted 2 hours waiting for our new friend Ramon who we had meet in a bar and had promised to take us out in his truck, the `´famous´´ coffee house only a Nescafe, another one closed as we approached, we couldn't find a way into the Canyon, they cleared away the tables as we were about to sit down with our meal and when I say cleared away they took the put them on a truck. Stuck in Creel we took a taxi out of town so as to walk back the 6 miles and got lost

But it was at this point when we were trying to get a lift to the Valley of the Monks that we were picked up by a Mexican couple. The rocks were wonderful, the couple were great company, he had brilliant voice and they gave us beer. Walking around the rocks I startled a snake that did a sort of hiss and mini rattle and fled one way while I, making a scared girly noise went the other. I was told later that it probably was a deadly Coral Snake. The next day a massive Rattle Snake crossed our path

In the evening the Independence Day celebrations started with fireworks, fire crackers, speeches and shouts of Viva Mexico. Back to the bar at 11pm and the singing and music went on until 3am when we were all kicked out. We even managed to drink them out of Margareta

There is a 15 minute walk down a dark dirt road to our hotel dodging packs of dogs and strange people appearing out of the darkness. We did this for 3 nights and each time the dogs got bolder. Eventually one of them went right up to Marilyn´s legs - I always kept her between me and the dogs!. The picture is of one of the dogs having a well earned rest during the day