Chihuahua Pacifico ( Copper Canyon Rail)

A few memorable stops along our way, first was San Carlos - on the water, but too built up for us. Several marinas, lots of fancy homes & restaurants. Close by was the city of Guaymas, more interesting with old buildings, a malecon, a market & a town square. Strange sight on the hiway - a half ton truck, 2 guys holding a ladder, one guy up on the ladder fiddling with the power lines & one fellow flagging traffic - only in Mexico!

We headed into the hills to Alamos, a colonial silver mining town, founded in the 1680's with cobblestone streets, interior courtyards & many arches. It is one of many of Mexico's Pueblos Magicos (magical town). We were lucky to watch a festival with performances by several children's groups, the little cowboys were so cute! In case everyone thinks that we only eat tacos we did enjoy a very fancy meal in a lovely old hotel with some new friends. We took in a tour of the town, lots of history & Robin actually bought a souvenir, a unusual horsehair belt.

We are enjoying the hiways, 4 lane, mainly lacking shoulders & rough patches, but an improvement over last winter. Agricultural area, cattle, lots of corn crops, tomatoes. Hard to get used to all the manual labor, large fields being sprayed with back-pack sprayers!

Another Pueblos Magicos, El Fuerte, the station to board the Copper Canyon Rail, this one founded in 1564. We were the only RV in the motel & RV park, but a safe place to leave the motorhome for the 3 days of our trip.

The Chihuahua Pacifico Railroad is quite spectacular - 39 bridges, 86 tunnels (longest 5981 ft.), it took us from cactus to pine forests, over large rivers & into deep canyons. There are 7 main canyons, the area is 4 times larger than the Grand canyon & is deeper. Our portion took us 8 hours, our destination being Creel in the state of Chihuahua. The cost for First Class, we splurged, was $150 round trip per person, well worth it. We had comfy reclining seats but we spent most of the trip outside on the platforms between the cars with our heads sticking out over the half door. You could touch some tree branches & you were quick to pull your head back in before tunnels! The diesel exhaust & dust left us pretty grubby but the scenery was unbelievable. There weren't many people in First Class, most of the Mexicans rode in the Economy cars. The remote canyons are home to the Tarahumara Indians, also known as Raramuri or" those who run fast". They live a simple life, many still live in caves or small houses, they walk most everywhere, kids may walk 4 hours to school where they stay for the week.  We were lucky to been shown into a cave home on one of the tours we took. The women wear very colorful skirts & blouses, often carrying babies on their backs. The traditional footwear, worn by many, is tire tread soles with strips of leather for straps. The men dress in regular clothes, jeans. At one train stop the women rushed to all the train doors, holding up beautiful, colorful handmade woven baskets for ridiculously low prices. They are also present at all stops on any tours, no matter how remote. One girl walks 2 hours to get to a canyon overlook, if it gets too late she sleeps in a cave.

The main stop on the train to gaze into the canyons is at Divisadero, also the sight of a gondola tramway & ziplines. Almost as interesting were the food stalls where they cook over fires in 45 gallon drums, preparing delicious gorditas.

We stayed 2 nights in a pretty, colorful hotel in Creel that included 2 tasty Mexican meals per day. We definitely needed the heater, there was frost & ice outside in the morning. We went on two tours, the highlight being the Tarahumara cave home where 10 people live. Also visited was Arareko Lake, quite similar to Jasper area, Cusarare waterfall, quite spectacular - but we had to drive thru 4 creeks to get there, mainly on a "goat trail",  a 300 year old mission church & several strange rock formations. I bought a pretty, but useful pine needle woven basket, plus several colorful baskets which hopefully we will find a use for.

outside view of cave home

inside the cave, 10 inhabitants!

The second tour took us to several canyon overlooks & back to Divisadero where we took the gondola tram - 2750 meters long, no towers. Great views into 3 canyons & down into the valleys where there are Tarahumara villages (no roads, just paths). Beside the tram is a zipline, 2600 meters long, you apparently reach speeds of 130 km/hr. Quite glad that we had no time to try this out! The admission price was reduced if you bought & then donated a toy, quite similar to Santa's Anonymous.
The return train trip was much quicker, mostly downhill, Creel being at approx. 8000 ft elevation. At one point the train makes a 180 degree turn inside a tunnel. The ride & the experience were most worth it, another item off the "bucket list".

We have traveled further south, now being 80 km north of Mazatlan, on a beach, sorting & deleting some of the hundreds of pictures taken in the last week and trying to catch up on some overdue emails. Hard to believe it's almost Christmas - Feliz Navidad!

Life on the beach in Kino Bay, Mexico

This life of ours is truly grand - the choice to walk left down the beach or right, which type of seafood for supper, which birds to watch!

We entered Mexico on Nov. 21, took care of Immigration matters - Migracion visas, $25 each, vehicle import permits, $68 each plus a deposit on Visa. The hiway was magnificent, 4 lanes with shoulders, as good as back home. A far cry from last year. There are tolls, we have paid $28 so far, but worth every centavo! Our second night we arrived at Islandia RV in Kino Bay & would be happy to spend our entire winter here, if not for more exploring to be done. The folks who call this home for the winter, & a few fulltimers are very welcoming & friendly. We got in on a happy hour the first night & a Sunday lunch complete with DJ, music & dancing our second day. We are parked facing the ocean with a view of pelicans, gulls, shrimp boats, fishing pangas & of course lots of dogs. We have a French couple in the park  who bake bread & baguettes every week for sale, Mexicans who come thru the park selling fruit & veggies, some with seafood & someone with tamales almost every day (just finished beef & sweet corn ones for lunch). A short walk down the beach gets us to several places to eat & the "fish guy" with coolers full of shrimp, crab, fish & occ. lobster (all for less than $7 per pound.)

We spend our days bike riding, kayaking, walking the beach, bird watching. We kayaked out to the island twice to see the sea lions, blue-footed boobies, pelicans, cormorants & more. We got a bit too close to the sea lion colony & when their barking increased in volume & they all splashed into the water & proceeded to swim our way we headed for home, very quickly! Another kayak trip took us into an estuary, more birds - herons, egrets, etc & good areas for clamming. We brought back a good tub full, clam chowder soup for supper today.

We were happy to be included in the US Thanksgiving pot luck, so much good food, good company & a sunset to watch.

We did a day trip to Hermosillo, about 1 hour away, a city of almost a million people. Found the Mexican atlas we needed, Robin got a $5 haircut (shortest I have ever seen it!), got my picture on a cookie display with a Santa & were surprised by the fresh Christmas trees for sale (just like at home).

We have sorted thru our rock collection & left a bunch behind, we have decorated our area with sea shells & of course collected some to take home. The variety of shells here is the best we have seen.

We had a lovely visit with Chuck & Linda, good friends from Penticton who decided to head into Mexico this year for a visit with other friends.
Robin was put to work doing some carpentry for a neighbor to accommodate a new fridge. A bunch of us went out for fresh seafood, a place where you take your own alcohol because they don't sell it, someone even brought their own lime squeezer!
They do bingo here weekly in the oceanside clubhouse - Robin came along reluctantly, we paid $20  to play 2 cards each, 10 games plus a blackout. Go figure, he won one game & I won two - we took some good natured ribbing "Canadians go home" (everyone here is American) but we took home $62.
We watch the local fishermen & their kids, usually quite entertaining.

We had a nice rain one night, here in the RV park everything is sand so it all soaked in. We were surprised when we drove around town 2 days later to see the lakes on the streets & huge mud bogs on the dirt streets. Glad we will never see what a big rain can do!

Robin had a hermit crab "zoo" for a day, all sizes & shapes!

We went out for supper last night, overlooking the bay, watched the sunset. On the way back we came upon a Christmas parade, several floats with kids dressed up & they were throwing candy to the large crowd. Same as back home - police car to start & fire truck to end the parade, sirens blaring. As we sat outside back at the RV we heard one of the common loud speaker trucks. They drive around town advertising all sorts of things, most of which we can't understand. This one drove into the park, advertising something small, hot, delivered to your door - we stopped him & found out it was fresh, hot churros, complete with hot oil fryer in the back of his truck! Of course we bought a bag & stuffed ourselves.

This morning we watched dolphins out in the bay, soon its time for another beach walk. It will be difficult to leave this little piece of "heaven", but we will move on on Monday. More places to see, adventures to have.
We think often of our family & friends back home, hoping the winter is going well.