La Barca

La Barca is a city in Jalisco's Ciénega region and the seat of the municipality of the same name, at 1,530 metres on the bank of the Lerma River, which here forms the border with Michoacán. It had 38,780 people at the 2020 census and forms a single urban area with Briseñas de Matamoros and Paso de Hidalgo on the Michoacán side.

The name tells the story. Once Guadalajara settled in the Atemajac valley, its people needed a safe road to Michoacán and Mexico City, and the big obstacle was crossing the Lerma. The Real Audiencia ordered a ferry boat (barca) placed on the river at a spot the mule drivers called Chicnahuatenco, "on the shore of the nine waters"; it could carry up to fourteen people plus goods and animals. Huts sprang up to lodge travellers on the "road of the boats", and on 4 May 1553, Saint Monica's day, Simón Jorge de Verapaz formally founded the town with indigenous families from Jamay, Ocotlán, Poncitlán, Tototlán and other nearby towns. It became the seat of an alcaldía mayor and was granted city status on 27 March 1824. In November 1810 Miguel Hidalgo, beaten by Calleja, lodged here in a house on the Portal Morelos.

The best-known house is La Moreña, beside the main plaza, built in the 19th century for the wealthy conservative landowner Francisco Velarde, nicknamed "el Burro de Oro" (the Golden Donkey) and shot by republican forces in Zamora in 1867. It is now a museum and cultural centre, famous for Gerardo Suárez's murals along the patio corridors: scenes of 19th-century Mexican life such as an outing to Xochimilco, jarabe dancers, a jaripeo, milking time and a tianguis, based on lithographs by Casimiro Castro. Facing the plaza is the parish church of Santa Mónica, built by the Augustinians between 1780 and 1797, with a pink stone front, statues of Saints Peter, Paul, Monica and Augustine, and a dome tiled in 1937. The chapel of San Nicolás de Tolentino is older still, from 1660-67, and the town hall occupies the former council houses of the late 17th century.

At the table La Barca is known for charred goat birria (birria tatemada), caldo michi fish soup, cream, cheeses and cecina, tamarind and milk sweets and, above all, as the home of the cazuela voladora, a drink of citrus juice, cola and cane spirit served over ice in a clay bowl. Near Portezuelo hill lies the Las Calles archaeological site, mortarless stone remains some 2,000 to 2,500 years old. Every 4 May the founding is re-enacted with a historical parade on horseback and dancing, and on Sundays the municipal band plays a serenade in the Plaza de Armas bandstand.