Tampico Tour Tuesday

TUESDAY
Our tour guide picked us up at noon. We toured Madero first, which is a town where oil refineries rule. This is the place of the first refineries in Mexico and remains so today. Politically the town is run by the "oilers and oil unions". There is evidence of some poverty and maybe mismanagement, such as the almost total lack of garbage and trash removal, but all of the people seem healthy and happy.
There is a lively fishing industry and many excellent seafood restaurants. The ports are deep water and there are three within 15 miles of one another indicating the busy export and importiom of oil and oil products and other things such as manganese. Madero has grown and expanded blurring the division between it and the older city of Tampico. There is also an adjoining town on the south side of Tampico. There are large buildings, some centers etc built by the oilers. Of course the oil refineries have many jobs for the population. This is a tourist zone so there are many activities besides the endless beautiful beach and blue sky. There are, for instance, large fishing tournaments for Tarpin and other large fish. Many people, including our guide, Juan, belong to clubs. Juan very kindly took us to two such clubs. They are very family oriented and have many athletic facilities.

Tampico is an old city which has lost some of it's glory in recent years. The "Mafia" is not so prevalent now but then the Police are everywhere so you do feel secure. By the rime we got to Tampico we were getting tired indicating that we were not entirely recuperated however, Juan had a very interesting tour for us of a free day care and preschool. It is paid by the government and free to working mothers for children from 6 weeks to 4 years. The government has very strict rules and regulations regarding security,education and even nutrition. Simulated emergency drills are required EVERY week! Egress and exits are monitored by fingerprint computer and video cameras. Okay, this may not be as interesting to you as it was to me since I was once a preschool teacher. There were about 250 children in this and I think he said 75 workers - not sure about that number.

Tampico is proud of their antiquity and claim to be the first place of the ancient civilization I am unable to recall the stories so will attempt to put in a link to the information. Also, Tampico had the first Coca Cola bottling facility.

Juan returned two very tired but very satisfied clients to the Club Maeva at about 5pm. We had such a delicious snack with Juan that dinner was superfluous. We ate a late snack and went to the sack.
Wow, that is enough.