My San Miguel B&B es Mi Casa

A Jaime Jimenez Lupercio painting I'm considering. So Mexican!

Entrance to El Jardin de Don Quijote B&B, 
and Don Quijote in the garden, below

I've stayed at some great hostels and B&B's in my travels, like the funky Lavender Circus in Budapest and Egyptian Nights in Cairo.  But El Jardin de Don Quijote is one of the prettiest.  It's the home of Maria and Javier Soccoro Barrera, with rooms built around the Spanish-style main house and the copiously flowering courtyard garden watched over by Don Quijote himself.   It's $25 a night, including breakfast.  It's a few blocks from the main street going into and out of town, Ancho de San Antonio, and near the famous Instituto, now an art and language school.  It's a 10-minute walk to the central square, the Jardin, and in walking distance to shops and restaurants;  tailors, shoe repair, watch repair and laundry; the wonderful Juarez Park and other little parks and green spaces; the Biblioteca and the Artisans' Mercado;  several small hotels like Posada de Aldea, where you can have a fantastic Sunday brunch, and a new luxurious hotel, the Rosewood (overly sumptuous and expensive, for the very wealthy, mostly Mexicans, I'm told).

My rooms at B&B & SMA scenes. A David Leonardo at Hecho en Mexico right.

David Leonardo at Hecho en Mexico

Since being back in San Miguel, I remember why my apartment in Sylvania, Ohio, looks the way it does: It's my Mexican casita, mi casa.  After two years in Ukraine, all my stuff in storage, and three years away from Mexico, I had forgotten.  But my apartment is full of Mexican arts and crafts, paintings and decorations. It has tiled, painted and tin mirrors; art on the walls by David Leonardo, Roz Farbush, Vermillion and other well-known artists--still painting, still exhibiting, still featured at galleries, the library, restaurants like Hecho en Mexico.   Mi casa is brightly painted.  It's definitely more of a Mexican apartment than a Ukrainian pysansky Easter egg.  It has a Mexican feeling and spirit.  My Ukrainian friend Tamila said it when she was in Ohio visiting from Cherkasy, Ukraine over New Year's:  so much color and light, so bright and Spanish!

So I'm back in San Miguel, in a lovely B&B, in a Mexican frame of mind.  And I've seen another painting that I think would look great in my living room.  It's by Jaime Jimenez Lupercio (first photo above), a highly acclaimed artists from Mexico City, a new artist for me but not for afficianados and collectors around the world.   I've said no more art. I've got enough.  My walls are full.  But can I resist this piece?

So, when I'm in my San Miguel B&B I feel at home, and when I'm at home in Sylvania, well, I feel like I'm in San Miguel. Mi Casa es tu Casa es Case de San Miguel es mi casa.