Monarch Butterflies, Mexico

Each day in central Mexico was special. Beautiful weather (each day sunny, in the high 60's, low 70's, nights clear in the 40's), the people just delightful: kind, courteous, gentle, and sweet. But the most remarkable day of all was the day we went to the butterflies.

The Monarch butterflies are truly remarkable as the only migrating insects. Although the indigenous locals knew of their winter presence, the rest of the world only discovered where the Monarchs went in the high valleys of central Mexico about 15 years ago when the National Geographic Magazine published a cover story about them and their winter habitat. Even more remarkable is that the life cycle of the Monarch is such that no single individual makes the round trip, but somehow the information is passed through the generations about the proper place to go. They come from all over the United States and Canada, and even cross the Gulf of Mexico to get there.

There are nine valleys in central Mexico, all at about 10,000 feet above sea level, where, depending on which source you read, between 300 and 500 million butterflies spend the winter. These valleys have an abundance of the Monarch’s favorite food—the milkweed. The generation that winters over lives between four and six months, as they spend the winter in relative lethargy, spending most of the time at rest in a sort of suspended animation. In contrast, the summertime generations live four to six weeks. Two of the nine valleys are open to tourists, and Joyce and I took the trip to visit one.

We arranged the all-day trip out of Morelia, a nice but otherwise nondescript medium sized city in central Mexico at about 6000 feet above sea level. Knowing that the trip up is difficult and on poor roads, we arranged for a four-wheel drive SUV and driver, as recommended in the guidebooks. On the appointed morning, Antonio showed up and met us in the lobby of our hotel. Antonio’s English was excellent, his vehicle was not. Antonio led us to a battered old Oldsmobile for the three-hour trip (in each direction) to the butterflies. The car sat surprisingly low to the ground, and three of the tires looked pretty good. The other one was bald. A car like the majority of cars on Mexican roads. The odometer had stopped working at 280,000 km. We went. Antonio was proud of the fact that he had the brakes replaced every month, and the shock absorbers every year. We found out why.

Mexico has a practical way of making vehicles slow down at schools, villages, and dangerous intersections. Instead of lowered speed limit signs, which are easily ignored, the Mexicans put speed bumps where they want you to go slowly. They call them "sleeping policemen." It really works. The State of Michoacan, where the butterflies are, has an especially exuberant use of them. These are often not just minor humps in the road, but brobdignagian mounds of asphalt. All vehicles come to a complete stop and then crawl over the larger of these speed bumps. Originally, when new, the speed bumps were painted in brilliant yellow stripes, to be obvious. The Mexican government, however, clearly has higher priorities in spending than keeping up the paint maintenance on speed bumps, so the color is faded on most. There are roadside signs warning of the speed bumps as you approach most of them, but then not at all of them. Our guide drives these roads a few times a week, so he knows them well, but not perfectly. Because the car had completely ineffective springs, and worn shocks, Antonio couldn’t make it over some of the speed bumps going straight, but rather, at the larger ones, came to a stop, angled the car 45 degrees towards the oncoming traffic, and went over the bump one wheel at a time, thus protecting the underside of the car and the minimally effective exhaust system. That’s how he did the ones he knew about. We had occasional surprises that launched the car into the air, with a resulting crash as we landed on the other side. I worried about the bald tire, but it held up.

The first two and a half hours are on winding mountain roads, over one range at 10,000 feet, into a valley, and then the final half hour on a dirt road up to the parking area. We found out why the brakes needed replacing every month—Antonio had no idea how to drive mountain roads. Going down, he rode the brake the whole way, never using lower gears to slow the car. The brakes got so hot you could smell them. But that was easier than going up. There was very little traffic on these roads, but what there was consisted mostly of enormous trucks and busses. These diesel vehicles belch out incredible volumes of acrid, black particulate exhaust, and go slowly up the hills. The road, of course, has a solid yellow line, the meaning of which varies depending on the number of cars behind the truck or bus and the level of frustration and machismo of the driver. The Mexican way is for the car just behind the truck to ride the bumper until the driver feels it is the right time, and then to pass as quickly as possible. This means sucking into your lungs all of the black particulate acrid exhaust until the right moment to pass comes. If it doesn’t come soon enough, then the two-lane road becomes a temporary three-lane road and the yellow line is what you drive on. Most of the drivers coming the other way understand this and move over as far as possible to allow passing on the uphill side. Most of them.

Finally we arrived at a small village where we paid a toll to continue up to the butterfly reserve. The locals offered a parking place and four-wheel drive pickups to take us the rest of the way, for a fee, but Antonio said it was unnecessary. Up we went. The road deteriorated badly. In some places it was paved with stones, in others it was dirt and steeply uphill. We had to ford one small stream, and the local boys hung out there to watch the fun as cars tried to figure out the best way across. They tried to be helpful directing Antonio over the rocks in the streambed, but one would point right, the other left, and Antonio did what he thought best. We made it.

The parking area is at just over 9000 feet above sea level, and the remainder of the way is a climb of 1000 feet elevation in about a mile up to the butterfly valley. This is so steep that most of the trail is made of steps built into the mountainside. Climbing slowly, with many stops for breath, we wondered if we would ever see anything. And then, as we got close to the top of the valley, there they were.

Words cannot do it justice. Initially there were a couple of flying Monarchs, and then we began to see what looked very much like piles of autumn leaves along the trail, except that they were piles of butterflies. Eight, ten, even twelve inches deep piles of quiet butterflies. The ones on top were occasionally flapping their wings slowly, but most were so lethargic that they just lay there. You could pick them up and put them on you as ornaments. They didn’t care. As we got higher we began to see giant clusters of butterflies hanging from the trees. Again, few were flying. It was about noon, the temperature felt like about 50 F., and it was somewhat cloudy. Then the clouds parted, and some sunshine fell on the trees and piles of butterflies. After about five minutes of warming, they began to awake and fly, and many took off into the air. As long as the sun was out, the butterflies flew, and then, as the sun faded behind the clouds, the activity stopped and they went to rest again. Over and over we saw the same pattern of activity and rest as the sun came and went.

At the top of the trail was a large open field, above the valley where most of the butterflies were grouped. There was a small stream in the field, and some of the butterflies were gathered in the sunlight at the stream. It was lovely.

After some time, it was back down the trail, and then lunch at an open-air restaurant at the base of the trail. After lunch, and a bit of shopping at the vendor’s stalls, we headed back to Morelia, a repeat of the trip coming. We were so exhausted, however, that it seemed much less exciting. We arrived back as the sun was setting, and sat with a cold cerveza and reflected on a remarkable day.