The following photos come from Jardín Borda, a sprawling private gardens in the center of town, built in the 18th century. It has been many things and belonged to a handful of people, the most famous of which was Emperor Maximilian. Made invisible to non-elite Cuernavaca by its overflowing outer walls, it is thick with trees, pools, manicured flowers, hidden conversation benches, and even a stone ampitheatre. | |
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| You enter the gardens from the top of a hill, and work your way down. Along the way are many modest pools with stone pillars decorating them inside. The pools were an integral part of a water system that utilized gravity to feed the entire gardens. At the bottom of this promenade of pools is a larger, fancifully trimmed pool, seen here from the absolute bottom looking back up. |  |
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The same pool as the above photo, with one of the many potted geraniums in the foreground. |
| At one end of the gardens is a long rectangular, man-made pond that plays home to dozens of the web-footed sort. Quite content to sun-bathe on their tiny islands, or catch some shade around the outside, they could care less about human presence. Food is all that will get their attention. So I thought, "Cool, I can get up really close to take a close-up of this duck's head." |  |
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Initially, I didn't even see these two camouflaged scavengers chilling outside the kitchen. But they knew I was there. Cats always do. When I finally noticed them from the bench I had been sitting on for two minutes, they were just staring away, clearly non-chalant about another gringo about to take their picture. (FYI, when traveling, it is a requisite to take photos of all wildlife.) |