Have you wanted to the tour ruins and markets in Mexico? The ASU Anthropology Department is offering you the perfect opportunity to do so. In our first ever Alumni Trip you can see museums and archaeological sites in central Mexico, be a part of a centuries-old custom of celebrating the Virgin of Guadalupe, shop in the colonial silver jewelry capital of the world Taxco, and see the monarch butterflies in their hibernation place with Professor Cheryl Claassen.

We will spend 12 days in sunny Mexico Dec. 3-14, 2009 and divide our time between Mexico City and environs (6 nights), Taxco, Guerrero (4 nights), and Malinalco, Morelos (1 night). We will also travel to Angangeo, Michoacan and Cuernavaca, Morelos as day trips. Accommodations will be double occupancy in hotels, 1st class buses, taxis, subway, and rented vans. It is not necessary to speak Spanish. Dr. Cheryl Claassen (PhD Harvard 1982), the trip leader, is an archaeologist who has led over 20 tour groups through cen-tral Mexico and taught in the Appalachian Anthropology Department for 25 years. Short lectures will be given throughout the trip. Total cost of the trip is $800 for all in-country hotel, admissions, transportation. (Trips just to see the butterflies from Atlanta usually cost $1500.) We need a minimum of 7 travelers paying a $200 down payment by September 1, 2009. This price does not include airfare to Mexico, travel insurance, or food while in Mexico. At least $150 will be acknowledged as a donation to the Appalachian State University Anthropology Department. The trip will be capped at 11 travelers. The $600 balance will be due October 29. Airfare is typically $340-$560 rt from Charlotte.

Dr. Claassen has traveled to Mexico 3 times so far in 2009 and can say that the media depictions of chaos and violence in Mexico are highly overemphasized and refer to border sections of the country we will not be near. For more information or to sign up for the trip, contact Dr. Cheryl Claassen, claassencp@appstate.edu or the anthropology department secretary Laura Anne Middlesteadt at 828-262-2295.