One Hundred & One Beautiful Small Towns in Mexico

by Guillermo García Oropeza, Cristobal Garcia Sanchez

One Hundred & One Beautiful Small Towns in Mexico broadens the successful One Hundred & One Towns series with a tour through the virgin coastal hamlets, sun-kissed terra-cotta villages, and lush green hilltop towns that abound in Mexico. This is the armchair traveler?s escape and the serious tourist?s companion, featuring exceptional photography referencing a rich cultural background steeped in ancient Mayan folklore and religious tradition. This book ventures through the countryside providing in-depth histories of the smaller, less trodden towns that speckle Mexico?s varied terrain, and introduces readers to the sights, sounds, and scents that are all a part of Mexico?s powerful allure. Towns are organized by region and are accompanied by information on local delicacies, nightlife, and must-see hot spots. A complete appendix with addresses and phone numbers of recommended hotels, villas, bed-and-breakfasts, restaurants, and more can be found at the back of the book, as well as a sugge

Genres: Travel, Coffee Table Books, Photography

280 pages, Hardcover

First published March 25, 2008

Reviews

[David]

101 small wonders!

I came across this book on my public library web site looking for something else. The name intrigued me and being a Rizzoli coffee table book, I thought the photos would be grande!

It was a pleasant surprise on both accounts. One, I rarely look at coffee table books but really enjoyed flipping through gazing at the photos. Two, having been to Mexico a few times, I immediately spotted places I have been to, but more importantly, saw places I want to go see next.

The book covers Mexico from top to bottom, west to east and has a great map to discover the new places. The name is a little misleading since it includes Coyoacán, a suburb in Mexico City, plus Puerto Vallarta and Play del Carmen, hardly small towns. However there are numerous places that according to the photos, are very small places but look intriguing.

Now to be fair, my political correctness comes out. Many of the historical Spanish settlements are built on the backs of the indigenous peoples. The book does address this and also does cover many archeological places such as Teotihuacán, Monte Albán, Palenque, Chitzen Itzá and Tulumas well.

It discusses the historical, religious and cultural aspects of each place. It’s not a thorough history but one gets a very touristy snap shot of Mexico. Hey it is a coffee table book!

In the end it was an enjoyable flip through and the photos were fabulous. Maybe 3.75.

[Ellen]

The best part of the books in this series is reading the little histories inside, looking at the pictures and then going deeper and researching the interesting places on your own. I don't know whether or not this series is intending to attract people to these towns or just imparting knowledge about smaller places that might not be as well known, but some of the towns have almost no attractions while others are classic travel destinations. No matter what you're looking for, you can be guaranteed to learn about the places they've chosen (many of which are Pueblos Mágicos, towns that are considered to have something special to offer tourists and, in return, are given extra funds for development and preservation) and delve deeper into the history and culture of a fantastic country!

[T]

Great coffee table book.