Mexico's Copper Canyon: Creel by bus, bike, and horse

---

we strapped on our backpacks and hiked across the border into Juarez. We exchanged our money and stuffed it into our boots, then Kevin negotiated a price for a cab ride to the bus station. This was Sunday, June 18, 2006.
Sunday- by bus
We got to the station just in time to jump on a bus to Chihuahua, grabbing a ham and cheese torta and some chips and water at the station for our ride. Five hours later, we arrived and had to wait for around an hour to jump on a bus to Creel, on the outskirts of the Canyon, so we did some people watching in the station.
The bus ride to Creel was supposed to take four hours, putting us in Creel around 10 p.m., but it took six or so hours instead, stopping in every little town along the way, getting us in past midnight. They don't call out the stops, so we were pretty much guessing whether we were at our stop every stop for the last few hours of the trip. We didn't have reservations and I was gearing up to spend the first night on a bench in the plaza, but a man from one of the hotels met the bus and gave us a room. We were almost out of water and walked down the main street of Creel looking for a store that was open and serving water. We didn't know our way around and it was dark, so we didn't go far, and we didn't find water. We used what water we had left sparingly to brush our teeth.
Monday- by bike
The next morning we got up lazily. We checked out the famous Margarita's hostile that I'd read about in the Lonely Planet, where Kevin had stayed five years ago when he'd visited. I wasn't very concerned with checking out the amenities; I liked the idea of a hostile where you eat together and meet people, so we checked out of our hotel and into Margarita's. Then I realized the bed was less comfortable and our suite did not have a tv (later we also discovered that there was little hot water and at times, no water at all in our private bath). It cost 350p (pesos) a night and included breakfast and dinner. The first hotel we stayed at cost 300p a night and did not include any meals.
After we got checked in, we headed out to breakfast. I think it was around 11 a.m., maybe noon. The restaurants were almost, if not completely, empty. Apparently, they don't eat lunch till around 2-3 or dinner till around 8, at least in Creel. We found a nice looking place and had some pretty good food, but aweful instant coffee.
After breakfast we went to the store where the man in the book I'd gotten, Backpacking in Copper Canyon or something like that (written in 1994), said we could get the best maps of the area. Their maps were really nothing to speak of, but they did rent mopeds and bikes and provide guided tours. Kevin and I decided to rent mountain bikes for half a day, paid our money, and got on our helmets and bikes just as it started to rain. We waited for a few minutes then decided to go- it wasn't raining hard. It took a while to get my feel for the bike- it'd been a while. We rode down the highway till we got to the turnoff to go to San Ignacio, we paid our toll, and rode up to the church. School was in session, so we could hear lots of children in the area, but didn't see very many people. We continued down the road and decided to take the turn off to the Valley of the Monks as a detour to the Lake.
The path was roped off and we waited to see if someone would come to take our toll and let us through, but the only man walking nearby walked right passed us. We went around the baricade and stopped to take a picture at the entrance to the valley. Just then, a cute little girl walked towards us carrying wares to sell. We didn't have any small bills. The rosary was 20p and the smallest I had was a 50, or some singles or fives. Kevin had a 20 that he'd managed to tear in half (that never happens), and she took it and walked back to her mother, who then walked over to us, her other children in toe, to tell us in no uncertain terms, although not in words we understood as they were Tarahumara and did not speak much Spanish and no English, that a ripped 20 was unacceptable. I decided to buy something else, raising the cost to 40p and figured I would just throw in the extra 10p, but the mother insisted that I take three items for the 50p, so I got a bracelet and a keychain as well. I gestured that I'd like to take a picture of them with Kevin and they posed somewhat timidly. The children were speachless when I showed them their picture. We decided not to go into the Valley, and headed back to the main road to go to the Lake.
We rode by another school and down a pretty flat road, then up a long steep hill, and finally began descending down rocky switchbacks. I learned to put most my weight on my feet and lift my butt off the seat as I was going over the rocky areas, but not soon enough to avoid bruising. After a while and luckily before we went too far down, Kevin decided that we were not on the path to the lake. We looked at the map again and decided we'd missed a turn somewhere. We headed back up. We came upon a mother and daughter herding their goats, cattle, and pigs. the little girl ran over to ask for some pesos. Kevin asked for directions to the lake and gave her a peso in return. We walked our bikes by at a safe distance from the goats to avoid causing them to scatter and rode back to the turn off we had missed earlier as it looked like nothing more than a footpath leading to a gate. Once passed the gate, we found the trial branching off every few feet and were a bit annoyed that the map we had been given was of no use in navigating our way. We decided on a scientific approach of taking the right fork every time- it would not head toward the lake, but it might lead us back to the main road. Instead, it led us to a larger road that Kevin was certain would lead to the lake so we turned left and though i admit i harbored a little doubt, it did. We came at the lake from on top of a cliff and got a nice view, though the picture did not turn out very well. We rode down some switchbacks till we came up right beside the lake. It had begun to rain lightly again and we were concerned about getting the bikes back on time, so we took a few pictures and headed back, taking one more wrong turn before we found the main road. We were not as far from town as we'd supposed, so we returned our bikes a bit early.
On our way back to Margarita's we saw a sign just on the other side advertising horseback tours of the canyon. We inquired within and made reservations for a 9am tour to the waterfall and some Tarahumara caves. Then we got cleaned up and went to dinner where we met a man from Georgia and told him about our adventure. (I think he did the bike tour to the lake the next day).
Tuesday- by horse
Norman, our tourguide, dropped his wife and daughter off at their store a little past 9 a.m., introduced himself to us, and drove us over to his house to pick out our horses. I chose poorly. I got the most stubborn, rebellious horse. He didn't want to keep up with the other horses, sometimes he would completely stop and refuse to go anywhere, and then he would begin trotting whenever the horse in front of him began to trot. Norman and Kevin were ahead of me and didn't seem to understand why I kept lagging behind, telling me to kick the poor horse harder, though I felt I must've already given him several bruises. It was not a good beginning to the day. It got better. Norman asked if we'd like to gallop. So I galloped for the first time in my life. Much better than most horse rides I'd been on where the most you get to do is trot. The first time, I nearly flew over the horse's head. The second time, it was a rush, but I didn't feel so out of control. The third time, I meant only to trot and the horse took off on my unexpectedly into a gallop so I was a little afraid as I tried to get a better grip on the reins, but it was still thrilling and I couldn't blame the horse for taking off. We rode through some valleys and out onto a peninsula with canyon stretching out all around us. When Norman figured out I liked to take pictures, he suggested I crawl out onto a rock that looked nearly detached from the cliff wall. I thought he was kidding, but he said there was a way and then he showed me. Kevin stayed on the cliff with the camera and got a picture of me hanging onto a tree at the end of this nearly freestanding rock. Then Norman climbed onto a shelf below to get a picture of me jumping across the casm between the cliff and the rock. It was thrilling. Kevin called me a chiva (a mountain goat). We rode the horses around to another cliff wall to look down onto the waterfalls. As we had gotten there at the first rainfall of the season, the waterfall was but a trickle with several swimming holes on the way down. We rode the horses around to the other side of the canyon and down very steep hills (my horse stopped at one point and I was terrified I'd die on the way down when I finally got him going again.) Then we tied them up to climb the rest the way down to the cave on our own. Norman pointed out cliff paintings along the hike and we sat and had lunch from inside a n apparently abandoned Tarahumara cave. The scenery was beautiful. We hiked back up and headed home.
We purchased a bus ticket to Batopilas, which lies at the bottom of the Canyon, for the next morning then went to dinner at Margaritas. We informed one of the ladies that we would not be staying another night and talked to her about our plans. Another guest overheard us and introduced herself, Adreana. She had worked in Batopilas five years ago as a tour guide and told us who to look for and where to stay when we got there. She said she was trying to decide if and when to go herself to say hello to her friends, since she was so close.

---

Photos

San Ignacio
The cross outside the church at San Ignacio

Terahumara Herders
For a peso the girl pointed us to the right path.

Norman
Kickin' back on a branch- on the edge of a long drop.

One giant leap
Daredevil lindy- not really.

Beautiful Margarita's
The courtyard outside our room.

The Lake
We finally made it to the lake.

Going out on a Limb
It was Norman's idea. Really. And the "Chiva" nickname was born.

Three horses, two dogs, and a fine day
Our horses waited patiently while we explored the rim of the canyon.

Beautiful Margarita's
The courtyard stairway- or modern art.

Beautiful Margarita\
A view from the sidewalk- many renovations over the past years.