Puebla, Puebla

All week mi padre has been telling me I couldn’t leave. He’d come up with at least two new reasons every day. It was cute. On Thursday I was getting ready to leave, and I had planned on taking a taxi to the bus station. When I came downstairs with all of my stuff, mis padres were standing by the door holding the keys so they could drive me. They’re amazing.
I rode the bus to Puebla, Puebla, which took 4 hours.
A snow-capped mountain near Puebla:

Puebla is where the battle of 5 de Mayo occurred. Katharine and I met up there. We bought our tickets for the next day and were on our way to our hostel, Hostel Santo Domingo. It was a nice place with a big room. It also had wireless internet and free continental breakfast, so it was all around lovely.
It was already 8pm, but we walked around el centro and saw Santo Domingo church, which has an absolutely amazing chapel inside.
Chapel inside Santo Domingo:

We also saw the cathedral and the zócalo (main plaza). The zócalo has a really pretty fountain.

Cathedral:

We found some food and returned to the hostel.
This is when I had the best shower I’ve ever had in my entire life. The water was nice and hot and there was so much water pressure it was unbelievable. I was tempted to stay in Puebla for the rest of vacation just to be able to shower there every day.


Friday we ate the continental breakfast that was included in the price of the hostel, which was cereal, toast, juice, and coffee. We walked back to Santo Domingo. There’s a part of the church that looks like a crown.

We returned to the zócalo too, which is even prettier in the daytime.

The building across from the zócalo:

There’s this really weird thing that Katharine named the snow forest. I think his is the closest I'll get to being cold during vacations.

Heres a picture of the cathedral with a $500 peso bill, which has a picture of the cathedral on it.

We walked to the Palafoxiana Library, but it wasn’t open yet.
As we continued walking, there was a parade. Yes, that is Bert from Sesame Street in the train. (you can click the picture to make it bigger).

We found the Church of la Compañía, which is where “la China Poblana” used to be buried. She was a girl from India who was captured by Portuguese pirates and sold into slavery in Puebla, where the family ended up adopting her because of her simplicity and spirituality. She spent her the rest of her days religiously, mixing her native beliefs with Catholicism. She’s pretty important to the people in Puebla, I guess. I read all of this in a travel book.
Here's the church:

We entered the cathedral, which was gorgeous.
The outside:

The inside:

Then we returned to the library. It was the first public library in America, it was founded in 1646, and it has 42,556 books.
You can't take pictures, so here's a picture of the postcard that they gave us:

We returned to the hostel to pack up and take a taxi back to the terminal, as our bus to Oaxaca left at 12.
Facebook album: Puebla
Next up: Oaxaca!