Features

Mexico - Janitzio

by Mike Levy

There are strange islands and there is Janitzio. This oddest of odd (but beautiful) places is in the middle of Lake Patzcuaro in the state of Michoacoan. You can easily pick up a boat from the lakeside pier and then chug out to an astonishing sight.

First, you have to negotiate the “butterfly fishermen” – so-called not because of any special adaptations of their suntanned bodies but the shape of the nets they use to catch the locally trumpeted white fish. Though they will try to sell you souvenirs, your attention will be fixed on Janitzio and its very strange vista. The island is in fact a small conical mountain sticking out from the lake. Wound around the island in twisting helter-skelter fashion, is the main street, which climbs to the bizarre monument on top.

You have to contend with unending souvenir shops and cafes but the prevailing mood is friendly and unpushy in that relaxed Mexican manner (sadly gone from Cancun). It’s a steep climb to your strange destination but there are plenty of good balcony cafes that will refresh you with a cold drink and tortilla. After about a 30-minute climb, you get to the base of the what you have seen from miles away: the 40-metre statue of Jose Morelos, a hero of Mexico’s independence from Spain.

The chunky statue was erected in the 1930s and has something of Mexican expressionism in it. You can climb up inside (as you used to do with the Statue of Liberty before liberties were taken) and get an astonishing view of the surrounding hills. Being Mexico, you are never too far from a mural, and this statue is no exception. As you get your breath up on the staircase, have a look at those painted by famous Mexican muralists which depict the heroic life of our hero.

When you are done with Morelos, head back to Morelia – surely one of the most peaceful and contented of Mexican cities – spotlessly clean and dominated by a cathedral that seems to be totally out of proportion to the small city in which it resides: but then this is a land of strange things.