Mexico - A Leap Of Faith At Las Pozas

Hello there!

After a short break and consolidating my first edition of my Travel Diaries, which included my travel posts to 14 different countries, here's kickstarting my second edition of Travel Diaries! For those who are keen to read my the first edition, you can find them here.

I am actually quite excited to start this new country and new series of posts, because it's something that I wanted to do for quite some time, but I needed some time to tidy up my photos and organise my storytelling and places. And this new country is Mexico!

Back in 2009, I had the opportunity to go for a summer exchange programme to spend 7 weeks studying in an university in Queretaro, a small city in Mexico and that was one of my more memorable parts of my life! Going halfway across the globe from Asia, I didn't know much about Mexico so I went there with my eyes wide open, and ready to embrace the different cultures and experiences.

A few months before the actual trip, if you are old enough to recall, there was the H1N1 virus which was quite prevalent in the world, including Mexico, and the trip was almost cancelled. Eventually, the programme was postponed, and the situation got better and travel restrictions were lifted. Even so, many participants of the programme decided not to go ahead for personal reasons. Because this trip was such a rare opportunity, I made the decision to go ahead.

So let the adventures begin!

Here's the series of Mexico posts so far:
Mexico - Flying Halfway Across The Globe
Mexico - A Journey Beneath The Vineyard
Mexico - Where Peña de Bernal Comes Alive

We continue our summer exchange in Mexico! I realised I haven't shared where I studied, so it's Tecnologico de Monterrey university, at the Queretaro campus. One of the highlights of this summer exchange was that the university actually organised weekend trips for students who were interested to explore different places in Mexico! Of course, we still had to pay for the trips, accommodation, food, etc, but after flying all the way to Mexico, this was definitely an easy way to sight see Mexico without having to plan the logistics myself. So I signed up for it! In fact, I think nearly all the international students went for it!

One of the first trips was to San Luis Potosi! I remembered it was quite some distance because we were travelling from one state to another, and we were greeted by this gigantic structure, called the Las Pozas. It hasn't opened yet so visitors were queueing to wait.

On first look, it just looked unique and beautiful, and I didn't think too much about going in to exploring, but soon I realised how scary it was!!! Why? Read on and you will know haha!

This was the famous "Stairway To Heaven", which was one of the high points on this structure. Did you notice something unusual?

More parts of the structure as we made our way. Because it has been built for so many years, it has blended so well into the forest and plants were growing on it already.

We were done with the easy part at ground level, it's time to head up to the upper floor. At that moment it struck me!

Did you notice that there are NO RAILINGS on both sides of the stairs???

I remembered some of us asked the guide if anyone actually fell off the stairs.. And it's all the down. Anyway, we just had to be very careful and keep some distance between each other. Because the structure was so old, I think there was a limit of how many people could be on each section, so we had to wait at times.

And yes, I made my way up! Safely! On higher ground now.

This was another highlight of this place. Even though it looked like concrete flower structure, did you notice this was the only thing that had colours? The rest of the structure was monotonous.

If you remembered, one of the earlier photos showed this "Stairway to Heaven" view from below. But when we actually reached, I freaked out a little. This was so high and there was nothing for our hands to hold on to! Some of us, including myself, were on all fours because it just so scary to walk from one side to the other side! There's no way to retreat because the visitors were moving in one direction from A to B.

Reattaching the earlier photo to show how high it was...

Even though it was very scary at the very top, I still carefully took some top view photos! Very high right?

Thankfully, everyone made it down safe and sound. But it was definitely a leap of faith, and being very careful. But that was definitely a very interesting visit, and that's why these trips and exchanges were so memorable for me, even till this day!

And that's all I have today! Have you been to San Luis Potosi or Mexico? Let me know in the comments below!

Finally, thanks for reading my post in the community under World Map Pin!