Profiling Tepehua – July 2025

Motorcycles, mariposas, and Mexico. These three things aligned in 2011 to bring Mike and Michele Bell to our Lakeside area, and since then they have arrived in the winters (like the butterflies) to ride, to enjoy, and give of their time and expertise to nonprofits like Tepehua and Rotary.

I recently caught up with Michele in the back room of Tepehua Treasures (where you kindly drop off your donations) to hear about their story, connections and experiences here at Lake Chapala.

Mike and Michele, from the Toronto area, are civil engineers by profession and avid motorcycle riders. In 2011, they flew to this area and joined in with the motorcycle tour group, Riders of the Sierra Madre (RSM), for a one-week tour to see the butterflies near Morelia. On this trip they fell in love with Mexico, its people, and the motorcycle experience they had. 

During the next four winters, they returned to the Lake Chapala area to enjoy an annual “flyaway bike tour” with RSM, where they continued to enjoy their riding experiences, and of course with each year, enhanced their love of Mexico, its people and culture.

In 2017, Mike had heart issues which caused the couple to RETHINK LIFE and they decided to take a 6 month break here. They became involved with RSM in small but important ways, such as assisting on the tours, taking clients out for rides to check their riding skills and to give tips on riding in Mexico, and taking photos during the trips to share with the visiting riders.

One day, while developing photos at the Kodak booth in Farmacia Guadalajara, they met Harvey Bernier (active Tepehua supporter) who struck up a conversation with this friendly couple about what he was seeing on the photo screen. They told him their story and they became fast friends. Harvey introduced them to Moonie King and the Tepehua Community Center which she had started around 2010, and they slowly but surely fell in line with helping Moonie with many of her Tepehua goals and projects. One of Michele’s first memories of helping Tepehua was making popcorn balls to hand out to the Tepehua children at Christmas time and taking photos to later give to families. 

This became their annual routine – six months in Canada, and six winter months in Mexico, riding and helping with RSM, and when not with them, would be doing what they could to help Moonie and Tepehua, and other non-profits in the area.

Along came COVID, halting their trips for a few years, but they returned to Lake Chapala in 2022 to rent a casita from their friend Harvey, and continued to learn more about the needs in the area where they could continue serving the needs of the people with their talents and helpful spirits.

With their engineering backgrounds, Mike and Michele also became involved in helping to tackle health problems associated with local water in surrounding villages. They connected with Rotary to participate in efforts to solve these problems.

But Tepehua always remained high on their list of priorities. They worked with Moonie before her death to create Tepehua brochures and to update marketing for the non-profit organization. This year Michele has been active in helping Sandra Zamora (Tepehua’s director) upgrade the shop, improve signage, and organize the sales area. If you’ve been in the shop lately, I’m sure you’ve noticed the improvements.

Future goals for Michele and Mike include getting some of the programs that Tepehua lost during COVID back up and running.

They are just two of the many amazing volunteers that come our way, perhaps just for the winter months or all year long. Mil gracias to our fantastic volunteers!