Because it is in a steep sided valley, expansion has taken place up the hillsides creating wonderful views of the city.
In order to make the city more vibrant, the owners have been allowed to paint the buildings in 'Colonial colours'!
The city parks stand out very clearly.
And as always churches outsize the rest of the buildings.
The traffic was becoming a problem, so they built a whole subterrainian street network. The tunnels create a completely different network of roads - quite remarkable and easy to get lost!
They have a bizarre museum in the city. By accident they discovered that people buried in the cemetery were 'Mummified'. It is a natural process. Because of the rock formation and the dripping of the water through the caskets the bodies were naturally mummified.
they have removed the best bodies and made a museum of them, it is bizarre!
and a little disturbing - they claim to be doing research!
Every year a Cervantes, Don Quijote Festival is held. The Don Quijote museum is fascinating, over 500 different painting, sculptures and murals have been assembled. I managed to take a photo of The Don Quijote chapel before I realised 'photos were not allowed! The murals are by Dali.
We climbed up to the Victoria mine, the oldest silver mine in the world. The 15th century smelting plant is still standing - but not used any more!
The buttresses were interesting - this one of an elephant makes you wonder how they knew about such things in those days!
The mine shaft is still the original, but the ore is taken out at the bottom of the shaft now.
The original owners built a church for the workers and I presume to thank God for their good fortune!.
It is one of the oldest, biggest and most decorative churches in the area.
The door is still the original.
The baroque stone carving exquisite.
Inside all was gold and silver.
The tiny figure of Christ was one of the best we had seen.
The city itself is a delight, a maze of twisting streets and tree filled plazas.
Places to sit and eat were abundant.
The brightly painted houses added real character to the city.
We wondered what these were.
We discovered they were huge sheets of pork scratchings!!!
The market of course was a riot of colour.
with some very whiskery masks!
The Cathedral was a major building!
The inside as impressive as ever.
The city has the oldest university in Central America, and is in fact older that Oxford and Cambridge!
The city is full of students, which makes it very lively.
The opera house has been refurbished, we were sad not to see a production.
The outside is especially magnificent at night.
We really enjoyed the three nights we stayed, especially the sitting in the parks watching the world go by, as we are beginning to feel a little travelled out!
