News : Dr. Mangold and son Hugh in Mexico on medical mission trip

Dr. Mangold, Hugh and the entire family at last year's Party In Pink 5K

Dr. Maggie Mangold and her 10 year old son Hugh have joined with a group from Iowa City traveling to Mazatlan, Mexico, to conduct medical exams and dispense medicines to those in need. The group leaders are Katie Iverson, PA-C of Iowa City and her husband, Dr. William Iverson. The group is joined by several students and others.

Sorry, no photos from the trip yet but here’s a write-up of activities as of Sunday, April 3rd by Hugh.

Today we got up at 3:30 to go to the airport in Des Moines. We went to Phoenix then we had a three hour layover. We got to meet everyone-- there was Katie, Bill and their son Lucas, Katie's parents Joe and Linda, the PA students Pat and Eric and a high school girl named Andy. When we got to Mexico I thought we were going to land in a forest because the airport came out of nowhere!

Once we got through immigration we took a van ride to our hotel Royal Villas. After we got done unloading we went to a grocery store called “Mega.” There was a ramp/escalator that the cart was magnetically connected to, which I thought was pretty smart! We bought water because we don't want to get traveler’s diarrhea, we got some mangos, chips and salsa and some cookies.

Once we got back to the hotel we helped everyone get their food to their room. Then we all went off to do our own thing.

Mom and I went down to the beach and walked all the way down, then back to get some money, then all the way back down again to go eat. The menu was all in Spanish so we had to kind of guess what we were ordering! Our bill was $354, which in American dollars is $20.97.

I learned that one American dollar equals 17 pesos. Pesos are all different colors and are shorter than American dollars.

After we ate we went to the pool, then came back to watch the sunset and FaceTime our family in Iowa.

So I think Mexico is very interesting, in a good way.

Hugh Mangold