Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Good News?

I have been working on the posts for this blog and will have the rest of the chapters to the 2007 car trip up soon.

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 54

The train ride back to Los Mochis.





Thursday, August 19, 2010

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 53

The last stop we made on the tour was possibly the most breathtaking. In more ways than one!

There were several look out points, protected by broken down post and rail fences. The smart ones among us stayed behind these fences. Of course, there are always tourists who just have to get up to that edge. Fools, all of them.

At any rate, the views into the canyons were awe inspiring.






If you click on the below picture to enlarge it, you can clearly see the pathways below that are used by the local Indians for getting from one canyon to another. These people do a lot of walking!








Here's a shot of one of the out looks that is protected by the aforementioned fences.



And zooming out on it, we can see why!




This was our tour guide for the morning. He walked out to this rock to show us how it wobbles back and forth when you stand on it. And he had on slippery cowboy boots. I gave this invite a pass, for sure!




The rock you see that is two in front of the figure, is the one our guide was standing on and rocking back and forth. See why I declined!




Zooming out gives you an even better view. Scary stuff.




True to his word, we left this place and ended our tour with 20 minutes to spare before the train arrived in Diversadero to whisk us back down to sea level at Los Mochis.
All in all, a very good trip to the Copper Canyon. I would like to go again in the Fall. We were there for the dry season. I would like to see it with the rivers and waterfalls running and all of the foliage green. I bet it is even more stupendous then.

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 52

The morning of Saturday, June 2, found us up and about quite early. We packed our bags and headed downstairs for the included breakfast at our hotel. We were to catch the train back to Los Mochis today. Reversing the route that carried us upward just a few days before. We were slightly loathe to leave the area after only so few days. We felt like there was much more to see in this unique corner of Mexico.

While we checking out, the hotel clerk asked us if we would be interested in a private tour of the area by car. He assured us that the tour only lasted 3 hours and we would then arrive in Diversadero in time to catch the train there. We figured, why not? A chance to see more and 3 hours less of a train ride. Win, win!

Our Spanish speaking only guide picked us up in front of the hotel and off we went. He was very knowledgeable about the area and filled us in as we went along. He was able to point out every different variety of tree and bird that we saw. I asked him what animals were indigenous to the area. Wolves, coyotes, birds of prey, snakes, lizards, that sort of thing. It looked like bear country to me also so I asked him specifically about bear. He laughed. He said that there used to be a lot of bear in the mountains but that the Indians ate them all up long ago!

He took us to several canyons that are not on the regular tour routes.






The views were all spectacular.




















Along the way, we saw some other piles of rocks that had been named by the locals. Any guesses as to what they called this formation?



They also had a particularly descriptive name for this V shaped opening in the rocks.


All in all, we stopped and visited three different canyons but saw many, many more.



One of the canyons had such a spectacular point of interest, that it deserves its' own post. The picture above is a hint at it.
We were very glad that we took the time to take this extra, last minute tour. It left us with a good feeling and we felt that we had truly gotten to see what the Copper Canyon is all about.

Thursday, August 12, 2010

Summer 2007 Car Trip - 50

Lake Arareko is a pristine little thing. It sits on ejido land (communal property) that is home to about 400 families of Tarahumara natives. This area is full of caves, waterfalls, deep canyons, rock formations and about 200 square meters of forested land. It is all breathtakingly beautiful.

We were set loose to just walk in the forest and around the edges of the lake. It so reminded me of where I used to live by Taylors Falls in Minnesota. Pine trees, rock formations and clear water.

Enjoy the view with me.