Chapter 29
P ancho kept his word, and the group found him loitering outside the Church of our Lady of Guadalupe, where Maureen had lit her candles for Piotr and Carole precisely one hour later.
‘I am parked around the corner; follow me,’ he instructed with a glint of gold tooth before setting off briskly. The party of five Irish tourists and one Australian struggled to keep up thanks to the humidity, making it feel like they were wading through water. At last, though, they reached the mini-van after being led down a network of dark, narrow lanes.
It was a rumpty old thing with dents in the side and arid soil embedded in the paintwork; Maureen noticed as Davey announced, ‘I’m in the front because I’m the biggest.’ He clambered in while Pancho, after a few attempts, managed to slide the passenger door across and usher them all inside. Once comfortably seated, he slammed the door. Maureen turned back to Carole; they exchanged glances over what they’d let themselves in for.
‘Cash up front,’ Pancho said, hopping behind the van wheel and twisting around to give them all a glimpse of that gold tooth again.
‘Cash is king, eh Pancho?’ Donal chortled, digging around his pocket for his wallet.
‘I’ve got this,’ Niall said to Carole.
‘That’s very generous of you, Niall. Cheers pal.’ John leaned forward in his seat and patted his bandmate on the shoulder.
‘Not you, you eejit: Carole.’
American dollars exchanged hands, and Maureen kept her thoughts on John needing to switch his choice of deodorant up to extra strength to cope with the Mexican humidity to herself.
Pancho turned the key and the van rumbled to life, sending a blast of frigid air into the stuffy back.
‘That’s a blessed relief,’ Maureen said, wafting her top and enjoying the air con.
The van nosed away from the kerb, and Pancho easily navigated the narrow lanes until they emerged onto a busy main road. That’s when a peculiar phenomenon was noticed. It was Donal who pointed it out.
‘Why are there so many pea-green Volkswagen Beetles on the road, Pancho?’ He asked the question on everyone’s lips because every second vehicle was a V-dub zipping along. It was a sight that felt like a mass hallucination.
‘They’re taxis, my friends,’ Pancho spoke up. ‘They are cheap to run, and it is easy to take the front seat out to make room in the back for passengers.’
That made sense, Maureen thought, glad she wasn’t seeing things. ‘I’ve some trivia for you, Pancho. The first Volkswagen Beetle to be assembled outside of Germany was in Dublin.’
Pancho laughed. ‘You have taught me something.’
Maureen puffed up, pleased, and they all ignored the sudden backfiring of the mini-van.
It didn’t take long to leave the urban buildings behind, and soon they were teaching Pancho something else: the song, ‘It’s a Long Way to Tipperary’. The van bumped along roads with fields filled with spiky teal plants on either side as they sang their hearts out.
‘This is what we farm,’ Pancho interrupted the song. ‘The agave plant is used to make the tequila.’
‘Who’d have thought, Mo?’ Donal said, gazing out the window as Pancho turned the steering wheel left, and they began bouncing down a long dirt drive where a low-slung series of buildings forming the L?pez ranch was visible ahead. He pulled up outside an open area closer to the barn buildings than the red-tiled roof house and, as Pancho wrenched the handbrake up, a man emerged through the clouds of dust. Maureen half-expected to see Clint Eastwood standing there, eyes twitching, hand at the ready by his gun like in his Spaghetti Western days. She was also beginning to feel panicked by Pancho’s third failed attempt to open the passenger door. At last, however, he wrenched it open, and she all but fell out behind Donal to stand blinking in the vast open space.
A bar area with shade cover and a row of stools lined up in front of it waited for them and, next to that, a barn in which barrels were housed. They were rolled on each other, stacked high, and filling the cavernous space was a vat and other complicated brewing machinery. She thought the distillery was a mix of old and new, taking in the enormous brick oven and stone wheel from what seemed like the Dark Ages. Their host was talking, and she focused her attention on him.
‘Welcome to Lopéz Farm. I am Enriqué, Pancho’s older and wiser brother.’
Pancho pulled a comical face, making them laugh.
‘He could be Pancho’s twin,’ she whispered to Donal. ‘Right down to the gold tooth.’
‘Only he’s a good head taller,’ Donal whispered back, shaking Enriqué’s hand.
Maureen was glad she’d brought a big bottle of water with her. Rather than head straight to the bar, Enriqué was swift to get their tour underway by leading them across to the nearby fields of agave plants they’d seen from the van. She was also glad of her hat as she took a long swig before passing the bottle to Donal and reminding him of the importance of keeping hydrated. Her thoughts turned fleetingly toward the elusive Mayan Princess drink bottle. Not wanting to ruin an enjoyable day, she tuned into what turned out to be the fascinating process of harvesting the agave plant to make tequila.
Enriqué informed them as they clustered around him that it took six to ten years for the agave to mature, before the farmers sliced the spiked leaves away with a tool called a coa to reveal the pineapple-like core. ‘Authentic tequila must be made with 51 percent or more of the agave sugar. Ours here at L?pez Farm is premium. We use one hundred percent. Impressed nods went around the group, and the word ‘premium’ was tossed about. Enriqué gestured for them to follow him over to the shade of the barn and, more than happy to escape the harsh glare of an unforgiving sun, they did so. Here, they were shown how the core, or pina, was chopped into pieces and baked in the brick oven, which Maureen had noticed earlier. Heads tilted to one side as he explained the process left them with fermentable sugars.
‘How on earth did people figure out these things in the first place?’ Carole whispered to Maureen.
‘It should be the eighth holy mystery, alright, Carole.’ She was pleased her friend had shaken off her fug and was absorbed in what they were being shown.
‘Here’s one I prepared earlier,’ Enriqué announced with the aplomb of a television chef, making them laugh.
He was a good host and teacher, Maureen thought as he demonstrated how the big stone wheel called a tahona was used to crush the baked pina to release aguamiel. ‘In English, this means honey water.’
‘Nectar of the Gods, eh Enriqué?’ John chortled, and Maureen caught Carole rolling her eyes and smiled.
The complicated fermentation process and distillation followed, and all of these things had gone over Maureen's head. She was glad when Enriqué led them to the bar where Pancho had lined up shot glasses. The lads were gagging for a sample. Carole confided to Maureen that she’d once had a rather wild night in her student days on the tequila and had suffered terribly the next day, so she would be going easy on the sampling.
‘I’m with you,’ Maureen replied, plonking on her stool, her feet automatically tapping to the music emanating from the American jukebox set up in the corner of the bar.
Pancho clapped his hands, rubbing them together. ‘This afternoon, we will be sampling L?pez Farm’s finest tequila.’ He gestured to the bottles with their colourful labels on the laden shelf behind him. ‘We have a selection of Blanco, which means it is un-aged tequila; Reposado, which has aged in the barrels for two months to a year; Anejo, which matures for a minimum of one to three years; and finally, Extra Anejo. This is my personal favourite, as good things take time. This must remain in the barrel for three years, during which time it takes on the oaky flavour of the timber. We’ll start with the Blanco.’ He fetched a bottle, opened it, and sloshed the clear liquid into the shot glasses, but when he reached Maureen’s, he saw she’d placed her hand over the glass.
‘I don’t have a strong constitution for the hard stuff, Pancho, so just a wee one for me.’
‘Maureen, it’s a shot glass; you can’t get any smaller.’ John peered around Davey.
Maureen eyed Carole’s full glass. ‘We’ll see how we go then.’ She took her hand away and, once Pancho had recapped the bottle and put it back on the shelf, she raised it.
‘I think you will enjoy the freshness and crisp flavour. In Mexico, we say Pa' arriba , which means lifting your glass.’ Those that hadn’t done so did so. ‘ Pa' abajo , lower your glass.’
‘You’re a big tease, so you are, Pancho,’ Maureen giggled. It was definitely not a chortle.
Pancho laughed, ‘ Pa' centro , point your glass to the group. Now, Pa' dentro ! We drink.’
Things got a little hazy for Maureen after her second taste test of the agreeable Reposado. One minute, she was sampling the liquor that no longer burned on the way down at the bar. The next, she demanded that Pancho put the Champs classic “Tequila” song on the jukebox. As the party song blared, she kicked her legs to the left and right, attempting to get a conga party line dancing around the dusty yard. There was a vague snapshot of bumping back down that long dirt driveway, followed by a big blank. Then she was back on the ship and standing under a cold shower, swearing she would never touch tequila again. ‘It’s touched by the divil, the tequila, so it is, Donal,’ she declared.
Later that night…
It wasn’t easy performing with a banging head, Maureen thought. She'd sobered up in the hours since boarding the ship, showering and having something to eat while muttering about wishing she'd hydrated more. A Mayan Princess drink bottle would have served as a reminder to sip from it. Nevertheless, she prided herself on being a professional and her smile was plastered on her dial as she banged her tambourine. She just wished Donal wouldn’t sing quite so loudly.