Posted on lonelyplanet.com
25-Jun-2008 18:18
by: scubagiz

Posts: 5
Registered: 25/06/08

help needed for Aguascalientes and ancient sites

Hi everyone, it’s Gizem Bezirci from Turkey.
In october I’ll be in Aguascalientes for a symposium and I’ll plan to visit those wonderful aztek and mayan temples and sites but I couldn’t find enough information about getting there from aguascalientes. Me and one friend will stay in aguascalientes for 5 days and we will 5 more days to travel. We need some recommendations about the places worth to be seen and some information about travelling ways. We will be two women and I read somewhere that it is not safe to travel alone. Is it true??? We plan to rent a car and go those historic places. Is it gonna be safe do you have any idea??? Thanks for now:)

Posted
26-Jun-2008 03:31
by: exlovago

Posts: 24
Registered: 20/05/08

9
aguascalientes , zacatecas , la_quemada , uaa , architecture_schools , hostel

hey there…

well, here is the link to the Aguascalientes Tourism Board website….lots of helpful information
http://www.aguascalientes.gob.mx/idiomas/ingles/turismo/default.aspx

Just wondering, are you going to be there for a symposium at a University, maybe UAA, Tec de Monterrey, UVM…or any college, why not contact the School and ask them for some advice….

The Architecture School of the University of Aguascalientes (UAA) may be able to give you all the info about Aztecs and Mayan places and how to get there from Aguascalientes, architecture schools always have people researching the subject,
here is the link to the Design and Building Department of the UAA to contact them
http://www.uaa.mx/centros/ccdc/contacto.html
since schools like this send people over to other countries for lectures, symposiums and courses they are always happy to help people who go to their cities for that same reason

You may as well ask them if someone is going or is willing to be your guide, you never know, you can get a guide who knows about everything you are looking for to go with you for nothing…just because he or she likes the chance to help and share his or her knowledge

I went to some architecture schools to get info about the places i was visiting….they always helped me

There is a hostel in town….they may be able to give info too
http://www.hostelworld.com/hosteldetails.php/LukasHostel-Aguascalientes-24311

lukashostel@hotmail.com

Like someone said, yes Zacatecas is really close to Aguascalientes about an hour by car, and from there La Quemada archeological site is 40 minutes away they are worth a visit.

good luck and have fun

Natalie and I (Julia) are stopping by Aguascalientes on our way to Zacatecas, where we will spend ten weeks interning for a migrant workers’ rights organization. Natalie is a 3rd year law student in Seattle, and I am a 4th year undergraduate in Chicago. We were hoping to visit the botanical gardens, and the museo nacional de la muerte if we have time before heading out again. We would also like to travel around the area a bit, and are grateful that the owner lent us the magazine about Mexico’s Pueblos Magicos!

Museo Nacional de la Muerte in AGUASCALIENTES
museo , nacional , de , la , muerte , aguascalientes , guadalupe , manuel , manila , uaa , jose , posada

Museo Nacional de la Muerte in AGUASCALIENTES…

Just facing the Parian, on the side of the Templo de San Diego there is a new museum devoted to the Death, Museo Nacional de la Muerte in Aguascalientes… what to expect from it…well….i didnt expect anything and went inside….there are two buildings, the J. Jesus Gomez Portugal ( is an old monastery that was built before 1680 ) the Humberto Martinez de Leon Building was built in the last quarter on the XX century, if contemporary design …just the buildings and how they connect and integrate makes the visit worth every minute…the Museo Nacional de la Muerte is conformed by a collection of approximately 2000 works, the museum shows the death not like a natural process nor like a later aim, but like the interpretation and manifestation of a place in the course of its life

They have this website for the Museo Nacional de la Muerte in Aguascalientes
http://www.museonacionaldelamuerte.uaa.mx/index.html

this link takes you to see the events and more info of the Cultural Center

In the first room allusive pre-Columbian pieces to this period of this country are exhibited,

In the second room, giving a jump of almost five centuries, artisan pieces in all manifestations are appraised: masks, skulls, miniatures, toys, etc.

The third room exhibits articles of personal use (cups, canes, pipes, ballpoint pens, etc) miniatures in semiprecious stones, crafts in diverse materials asi like art colonial and contemporary sacrum as well as a small annexed room of articles related to pagan cults.

The following rooms are located in the modern building. three rooms, one by level, let us see the contributions of the contemporaries in plastic and graphic arts. From Manuel Manila and Jose Guadalupe Posada to Francisco Toledo. In 2 and 3 the engraving shows us all the possibilities; in the ground floor, the diversity of techniques show us that there is no limit for the artistic expressions. An enormous range of interpretations, techniques and movements present in this section that, by its colorful and great names, provides to the spectator as emotions and entertainment, which in the end, helps us to extend our horizon with respect to the meaning of the death for Mexican through the centuries, becoming in this way the iconographic figure of the way of thinking of this country

The patios makes you want to stay a while just relaxing, the first patio of the old building is an example of the architecture of the monasteries of the 1600, having a look of the church on the side…and then when you walk your way to the other building that is behind this one you get to a new patio that connect old and contemporary architecture…a place to have events… a place to chill out…its very worthwhile to make a visit to this museum …which is part of the Universidad Autonoma de Aguascalientes, it is the UAA cultural center

Since this is the UAA Cultural Center they have lots of events….from Conferences to movies, from theather plays to book presentations, from music events to temporary exhibitions, most of them at no cost and a few at very low cost open to the general public

Posted
03-Jun-2008 03:16
by: CascadeBob

Excellent post. Thanks for shring the info.
Si se puede

Posted
03-Jun-2008 11:40
by: RichTX1

It’s to die for!
Pero yo ya no soy yo.
Ni mi casa es ya mi casa.
(Garcia Lorca)

AGUASCALIENTES… the place is worth a visit

hello everyone…

well pretty much is about Aguascalientes, located between Zacatecas – San Luis Potosi – Guadalajara and Guanajuato… i was trying to see if there was anything else to do and see after the Feria de San Marcos……..and WOOOOW, i did find things to do that really makes it worth passing by and visiting….

There’s a website I was referred to and it really helped me out to have and idea of this place, cool thing they have it in a few languages

http://www.aguascalientes.gob.mx/idiomas/ingles/turismo/default.aspx

there are lots of things to visit within the city itself, such as the Old Neighbourhoods ( Guadalupe, San Marcos, El Encino and the Station Neighbourhoods) with museums, gardens, churches as well as places to have a good meal or drink ,,,,they do have a few buses doing tours of the city..that like always helps to have an idea of whats the city like…

and they have the Hot spring Baths….a few in the city some others a few minutes away…

i also went through this road that took us to some Exhaciendas and we ended up in a Town by the name of Real de Asientos…(one of those Pueblos Magicos)…it was a mining town…and has some cool stuff worth seeing…some tunnels underneath the main church…some paintings in the Pinacoteca…the oldest cemetery of the State….and the charming of this kind of towns….there’s still a mine on the area…this whole route takes about a day if you take your time to take the tours that they have organized and of course by stoping a few times on the roadside towns such as the exhaciendas or Tepezala..it was cool to know that it was located just a few km of the main Highway that connects Aguascalientes to Zacatecas…..

and the next day they took us to another route to a place by the name of San Jose de Gracia…there lays the Barrage Calles…seems like they renovated the area…there is the Isle of the Broken Christ…u can take a boat to it….and you can take a tour of the whole thing on them…they offer Jet ski, kayaks and …..a few minutes away there is the Communal Ground Ecoturistic Boca de Tunel where you can do mountain bike, hiking, rock climbing, swimming…and if you keep going into the mountain you will get trough the Sierra Fria

I was told that they have a few other routes in Aguascalientes like
Wonders of the Sierra Fria
Haciendas of the southeast ( there’s a place – EL OCOTE – where you can do Treeking, Camping and Rock Climbing )

Unfortunately I didn’t have enough time to see it all …but I will make sure that the next time I go to Aguascalientes I visit what was left to do…

I had a really good time there and I recommend that if you have the chance or you maybe pass through Aguascalientes …stop and visit