A Night in Mascota: A Horror Story with Good Food

I sat at the table on the terrace at Travis and Allen's and dialed the number of Mesón de Santa Elena. My plan was to stop in Mascota, Jalisco, on my way back to San Pancho from Ajijic, and spend the night at this charming inn I'd seen on a previous day trip, and had heard wonderful things about since.

"Lo siento, señorita, pero el hotel está lleno el noche del 12," apologized the sweet voiced reservationist. Full up. Semana Pasqua, the week following Easter, was apparently a popular one in sleepy Mascota.

Fooey. On to Plan B. Did I have a plan B? Not so much, really. Cruise the internet, find another Mascota hotel was the best I could do. I came across one. A rudimentary website, but looked pretty. No online reviews whatsoever in English. One nice one in Spanish. How bad could it be? It had a restaurant and bar downstairs and internet access and king size beds.

I called the two Mascota phone numbers listed on the website. Nothing happened. So I called their "Guadalajara reservation line" and a woman answered. Quite personable, delighted to help. Was pretty sure there was a room available but could she get back to me? Sure. She did. I reserved. I had no idea I should've had other kinds of reservations.

I left Ajijic Thursday late morning, as the drive was not punishing as far as Mascota. Travis and I checked the map. My plan was to take a slightly different route back, still connecting to the highway that passes through Mascota and then on past San Sebastián and on to Puerto Vallarta.

I drove west along the lakeside to Jocotepec and climbed aboard the new bypass and the highway to which it leads, one of the weirdest stretches of road I've yet driven in Mexico. It is perpetually under construction and has seen no discernible improvement since I drove in on it last fall.

I followed road signs, which have quite a sense of humor here in Mexico. Not like the old Burma Shave signs, which were meant to be funny. More like the cosmic joke type of humor, meaning you usually don't know where you are, where you've been, or where you're headed.

But I managed, with only one tiny detour that turned out to be kind of fun. Then I stumbled onto the two-lane road I sought, connecting highway 80 (which goes on to Barra de Navidad) and highway 70 (the one to Mascota), which was littered liberally with sugar cane, drifts of debris piling up on the shoulders. It was pocked with ragged potholes torn by the tall and absurdly overloaded cane trucks, so was slow going. Fortunately, it was short.

In around four hours, I pulled up in front of my Mascota hotel, Mesón del Refugio, "Inn of Refuge" or "Shelter Inn", perhaps. It wasn't too prepossessing from streetside, but Mascota is an understated town in the classic style: stark and modest facades behind which lie the flowered and fountained courtyards of beautiful old homes.

Inside, the hotel was inviting enough, with a second story veranda encircling the lower courtyard and a wide staircase leading up the the second floor rooms. I found a young woman in the office inside the main door who knew just who I was and happily received my 500 pesos, which she put in her pocket.

I came to believe that evening that the owners of this hotel are in Dubai or Mittagong, that the hotel is actually closed, and that a flock of indifferent teenagers has moved in and is pretending to operate it.

The room was okay, not that different from others I've stayed in in other towns. Spacious with a flat hard bed, a wardrobe with four plastic hangers, a bathroom with a surprisingly large glass walled shower. One towel. One hand towel. One roll of toilet paper. Two tiny bars of Rosa Venus soap. That was it for the amenities, but I carry my own. And a plus -- a tiny terrace overlooking the street.

I checked in with Allen, letting him know I'd made it safely, and opened my computer. Nada, even when I used the internet access code I'd received from the teen downstairs. Nada on the veranda outside the room. Nada downstairs by the office. The teen was nowhere to be found.

I took my car around back to the grass lawn that is the free parking. Pretty back there. Photogenic, even.

I schlepped my bag up the back steps, where I met another teen, this one listlessly making beds in one of the rooms, who I had to call because the key they'd given me would not open the door they'd given me. She was perplexed. The thing is, this wasn't one of those ATM-card type keys that you take down to the desk and have re-programmed: this was an immense two-pound iron skeleton key. Turned out the hardware which the key is meant to turn in order to open the loose latch holding the double door shut had slipped down into a cavity in the door. I fished it out with my pocket knife, found the giant hole for the giant key, turned it, and put my bag inside. 

"What time does the restaurant open?" I asked. She looked at me in some mystification. "There's no restaurant here," she responded. What is that downstairs? I wondered, first to myself and then aloud. "Oh, there's no restaurant any more," she said. "But there's coffee and tea and a microwave available in the kitchen near the bar." Thank heaven for small favors, I thought. I asked for a restaurant recommendation, and she directed me to a restaurant whose signs I'd passed on my way into town. I locked my door (ha!) and left to explore late afternoon Mascota.

Mascota is a farm and ranch town, the center of a broad agricultural valley that has been inhabited since well before 800 B.C. This is the approximate date of burial sites excavated by Dr. Joseph Mountjoy of the University of North Carolina Greensboro, who I had the pleasure to meet in 2005 at one of the excavation sites in the hills just outside Mascota...but that's another story.

So anyway, I was hungry. I found the recommended Restaurant Navidad on Calle Profesor Juan Diaz, a block off the plaza.

The ambience is about a step up from a particularly nice school lunchroom.

But I was greeted immediately and cordially and presented with a long and fascinating menu. I ordered a beer. It was icy cold, accompanied by a gratis plate of one of Mexico's great little munchies, sliced cucumbers and jicama with lime juice and chile powder. There was also a bowl of the best peanuts I ever ate, plump and fresh, lightly roasted with a bit of coarse salt, fragrant with the red chile in the bottom of the bowl.

I noshed as I perused the menu. It wasn't easy to choose. This is not your typical Mexican restaurant and it most certainly is not fusion. Patitas de Cerdo -- Pork Hoof. Chingadera -- Nachos with Meat ("American Style"). Gringa Botanera -- Quesadilla on a Flour Tortilla with Cheese and Sliced Carne Asada.

Finally, I was torn between Milanesa de Cerdo and Costilla Dorada. Milanesa is usually a chicken preparation in which the chicken is pounded, breaded, and fried, and can be very good (or very bad), but I hadn't seen it before with pork. Costillas are ribs. I asked Oscar Nuñez, my waiter, for his advice. 

We eat a lot of pork here, he told me. It's about all we eat, he laughed. The milanesa is delicious, but the costillas are pork short ribs done country style and you should try them.

So I did.

"¡Es mucho!" I exclaimed when he brought it. But I ate the whole thing.

The ribs were simmered to fall-off-the-bone in a divine spicy salsa. The frijoles, which I always taste but seldom eat, as they are often bland and runny, were rich and thick and flavorful. The price of this platter? Fifty-eight pesos, well under five dollars.

And when I pushed it away, stuffed and happy, I ate a few more peanuts just for the memory, while I read the menu some more.

The back page of liquors was astonishing: Raicilla Tequila Cerro -- Moonshine (that's really what it said). Remy Martin, Hennessey, and Courvoisier at 95 pesos (around eight dollars). J & B at 73 pesos and Chivas Regal at 98. Believe me, one seldom sees this assortment of libations in a country town in Mexico. I didn't have any, but still.

I bid adios to Oscar, who invited me for breakfast at 7 o'clock, and walked off a tiny bit of my dinner.

"Peace is the respect for the rights of others." Benito Juarez

This is a monument to a local Catholic priest who was killed during the Cristeros wars of the 1920's and made a saint in the year 2000.

As I read this, I heard a rather loud but not unpleasant church bell, very nearby. It turned out it was right over my head.

See that rope on the left? Here's what it was attached to:

I wandered back toward the hotel, camera in hand.

I read for a while in bed: Mexico, Biography of Power by Enrique Krauze. Then I read for a while longer, as my window opened directly over a huge inflated play structure in the street swarming with loud chubby kids on vacation from Guadalajara, whose parents saw no reason to put them away before midnight. Then I read some more, as the few guests in the hotel partied until 2 a.m.

There was no internet in the hotel while I was there. There was no hot water that night. There was no hot water the next morning, either, as I attempted to shower away the bleariness from lack of sleep. You really don't want to know the state of the laundry room into which I blundered in search of an adult human. I will not, in case you've recently eaten, describe the condition of the kitchen or the microwave at the guests' disposal, which I didn't even want to use to boil water for the tea bags I'd brought along. The guests' coffee maker in the ex-restaurant had spiders in it. I can't bear to tell you the rest.

After a two-second cold shower, I packed up and carried my bags down to the car. I stopped in the office to see whether the girl from last night still had any portion of my 500 pesos left in her pocket. I was considering mugging her for it. She wasn't there. A gangly teenage boy, both perplexed AND mystified that there'd been no internet nor hot water, didn't know where the girl was and waved vaguely in the direction of the street. 

I left. The drive back was curvy and country and glorious in the early morning light.

Mascota is lovely. Go, if you can. I'll go back for sure. You already know where I'm eating next time. There's an awfully lot on that menu I didn't have room to try...and those ribs are worth a second meal.

Of course you know where I'm not staying. I suggest we both wait until there's a room available somewhere besides the Mesón del Refugio. Shelter House, indeed.

 

Comments

[Tom Leach]

I stayed there 3 yrs ago.. Room 12 is the only good one. It has a rooftop patio on the west side of the hotel. it had on site owners then. I enjoyed your story.

[Candice]

Yeah, Costillas Doradas. You've got a good eye for food, Travis. And you know just where they are. And how to get there. Either on the way here or on the way back. They're worth it. Just sayin'...

[Travis]

Damn. I want those ribs. I came back to your blog just to look at them. Costillas Dorada, eh?

[Gretchen Goodliffe]

Great side adventure... of which there are apparently endless ones in Beautiful Mexico. I would love to hear the real story about the Lost Boys (and girls) running the hotel in Mascota. I would bet that there is a GREAT story hidden inside every little town in Mexico... of the horror and fairytale kind. One wonders where fate will find you next!!!

[Jeanne]

Small world - I graduated from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro!

Very pretty town - and the food looked wonderful! Sorry about the hotel! Now you know where definitely NOT to stay again!

[Char]

another adventure...life is never dull is it...thanks for taking us along! xo