It is said of Taxco, that the only streets that do not go up are those that are going down. And that is very true. With the exception of Benito Juarez, the main tourist street that winds along a ridge halfway up and halfway down one of the mountains the city is perched upon, the streets climb steeply up or down. And, even Benito Juarez heads significantly uphill as it reaches the zocolo in the center of town.

Originally designed for donkey carts, everywhere there are streets so steep that I wonder how the cars and taxis get up them. Sometimes they don’t and they have to back down, rev their engines, squeal their tires,and burn rubber before succeeding. (This is a common occurrence at my corner.)

Once, I was climbing up one of these roads, with a hand rail attached to the house wall to help pull myself up, when a taxi came down. In navigating the 90 degree turn, it locked its brakes and slid on the oil and rubber slicked and smoothed cobblestones, diagonally across the street right toward where I was standing. Suddenly, the wheels caught and the taxi veered away from me. (Whew! I thought I was a goner for a moment!)

You get used to walking up and down, sometimes on the cobble stone streets, and other times on cement ramps, and if you are fortunate (or not) a set of steps. Coming back into town the other day on our way to a lunch invitation in Los Jales (at the bottom of town), we had to negotiate this set of stairs.

Yeah I know, gave me vertigo, just looking at it. It is a loooooonnnnnnnng way down.