Copper Cayon, Creel and Cusarare!Part One

[LexusAllTerrain]

Oh! what a beatifull place this is, the fresh air, the Tarumarahs, and the best vistas make for a great short trip.

I was planning in doing the Basaseachic water falls on the first weekend in July, we had some rain schedule for this weekend; the perfect time to do the water falls.

It was 6:00 a.m. when and I mention to my wife my plan to depart this weekend, we need to go to the bank, get a small amount of cash money, buy some drinks and pack! I needed to buy my mexican insurance and get my car permit,( I schedule 2 hours for all this!) It was a quick easy process on a very well organized set up, first it was to get our tourist permits for 180 days, next copies of vehicle registration, D.License, birth certificate and tourist permit, followed by the car permit just present your copies and Credit Card ( visa or master card only ) and we were presented with our car permit good for 180 days at a charge of 32.00 dollars! This would be a quick easy trip with my plans to go back to Batopilas-Urique-Temoris-Alamos in the near future;this would be warm-up or pre-run!

I downloaded a mexican map to avoid going thru Chihuahua, a short cut to Chuahutemoc! Getting a hwy off El Sueco thru the Sierra de Majaca; the hwy number has changed it was blank and I was unsure of my location, made a desicion to take the new number hwy and continue on, lucky for us it was the right hwy!

We passed by the Menonitas farm territory it was a great farm country were most of the homes look the same, gray and white roof in a rectangular shape ( am I in a different country wow! what a look ) We arrive in Chuahutemoc with some rain, fuel up and here we go this is were the fun should start.
There were some construction going as we left Chuahutemoc, which turned into a great 4 lane hwy no toll yet, which made for a fast easy drive to La Junta; at this point I made a desition to take the Creel hwy instead of the Baseaseachic hwy and here we are on our way to Creel. (talking about making a quick desition!) more coming soon!

Menonitas Homes
Menonitas homes again
Church
Cumbres the Majalpa
Majalpa again

Picture will get better!

 

[viter]

will be awaiting your future reports! I really wanna go to copper canyon too some time in the coming couple years, so I really appreciate you sharing your report!!!

 

[LexusAllTerrain]

Part 2

It is exactly 362 miles from El Paso to Creel, it took me 7 hours...

As soon as we departed Chuahutemoc, we started to notice the change in land, it was getting greener; after the 4 lane hwy we made a turn into La Junta a narrow 2 lane hwy, from here we notice the rain approching at a higher rate!

It was a beatifull ride, now we saw alot more pines, we drove for about 25 miles in straight roads, however as we aproach the small town of San Juan we notice more sharp turns coming their way, which slow our driving time, we were doing 65 miles per hour, and now we were down to about 25 mph!
Now we notice more animals on the side of the road, we saw some donkeys, cows and some horses eating very close to the road, now I know why i need a front bumper, we had a close encounter with some huge bulls crossing the narrow hwy on a sharp turn!

I was tired as we entered Creel, what a great place and it just happens that we arrive on a weekend of bicycle racing, people from all over were here at Creel to compete!
As we were looking for a place to stay, we passed by downtown Creel were we saw the railroad passing by the town;oh! what a delightfull sight this was!
We continue on looking for a small hotel, each and every hotel that i stoped, was supposed to be booked, and their excused was the bicycle races! ( I think it was they would notice my small kiddos-dogs ) I finally ask a clerk if we could spend the night in their parking lot for security purposes since they did not have a room, to which he recommended a small hotel in the main street, he called them and mention to me it was a new hotel and that they had a cancelletion, he ask me to ask for Susana and she would take care of us. We drove down to the main street found the hotel, and here we are ready for some dinner!
After we downloaded the kiddos into their room, we walked across the street to a place were they had some small cavins, a great place to eat, fairly inexpensive, we paid 10.00 for 2 plates, green enchiladas and chicken tacos, they were great!
We had a surprise, I saw a customer of mine working in this hotel in managment, It was very pleasent surprise to see him working here, to which he explained he had plan to spend the last 5 years in Creel ,he got this job, paid his bills and had the time to explore the area!
He also mention his contract was about to expire and he should be coming back to El Paso in about 5 months Wow! what a small world this is!

It was getting late by this time we made a decision to go back to the hotel, and get some rest, as we had a long day ahead of us...

 

[LexusAllTerrain]

I think Scott and Doron spend the night at this place when they took this route on their trip to the Copper Cayon Adventure!

here are some more pictures!

 

[efuentes]

Looks familiar

Gotta get back to Creel ....

 

[awalter]

Jose,

Nice report, awaiting more. Hope you make it to Basaseachi it is spectacular.

Al

 

[cruiser guy]

I'm still hoping to be able to go through the Copper Canyon. What was it like in the summer since everyone tells me that is NOT the ideal time? Did you traverse it all the way across or not?

Now that I've had my hip replacement I'm raring and ready to take on some hiking trails too!!

 

[LexusAllTerrain]

To me it was the perfect time, temperatures were in the 70's cloudy and some rain!

I did not transvers across because of the time frame i had, however it is an easy drive! Some rough terrain but not too difficult!

We had a blast!

 

[LexusAllTerrain]

My favorite picture in my trip.


This is at Valley of the Monks!

 

[Ursidae69]

Cool trip. :arabia:

 

[LexusAllTerrain]

It is 8:30 in the morning...

It was a great morning and we had a long day in front of us, it was cloudy and the temperature was a low 70'.
We had plan to explore in the area of Divisadero, a 20 to 30 minute drive from our hotel, I had seen a trail just off the overlook in Divisadero that would take you to bottom of the Cayon!
We took the narrow but scenic drive to Divisadero were we saw the best vista you could ever see in this area of the Sierra Madre! Upon arrivle to Divisadero we waited for the Train to pass, we had some of the best corn GORDITAS you could ever wish for, they were made with blue corn and they were delicious!
Here we are in in the Copper Cayon and I see an ex-employee with his family, talking about what a small world this is! We spend some time in the tourist area, and here we are finally ready to take a small trail. I wanted to find a CASTLE, I heard the Tarhumaras own this property, and I wanted to find this location, we are on this trail for about 13km when we came to another nice hotel called El Mirador, it was a great hotel had a great setting, great views and expensive rooms! we even found a Hummer waiting to take some tourist on a trail ride!

However i had a goal, I had to find this Castle that I was told about, so we continue on, we had some interaction with some of the locals, and ask them if they had heard of the Castle on top of the mountains!
We were given some directions and continue on in our search, after a couple of kilometers we found the CASTLE it was hard not to see, we proceeded to into the entrance; the road was some what difficult in parts, but we got to the hotel, this seems to be a very old and original if not the first hotel in this area of Divisadero, with great views of the valleys, and cayons, the surroundings were very nice, we encounter some people from France and got to practice our french! After we spend some time exploring the hotel and cavins made by rock, we continue on in search of the trail to Urique.

 

[LexusAllTerrain]

Here are more pictures!

 

[LexusAllTerrain]

...and some more!

 

[awalter]

Jose,

I guess you didn't get to stay at Hotel Mansion. I did over 10 years ago, there are some great hiking trails in the area. Nice write-up & pics.

Al

 

[LexusAllTerrain]

Jose,

I guess you didn't get to stay at Hotel Mansion. I did over 10 years ago, there are some great hiking trails in the area. Nice write-up & pics.

Al

Thank you Al, also do you know if you can buy gasoline in San Rafael or Bahuachivo?