Again, she got a group together. This
will be a real adventure trip, I thought.
With a 3,000-foot elevation drop on
sharp switchback bends and tropical
vegetation waiting at the end of the
road (which goes no further), Batopilas
is a small, sleepy town with a rich his-
tory. A single street beside the river
leads the visitor to the plaza, where the
installed, such as a zip line which cross-
es the town and river in two stages. I
am deeply moved that somebody
recently arranged to have one of the
new benches in the plaza inscribed
with “Jim Glendinning y sus amigos.”
The Riverside Lodge, where we
stay, is a block-long, two-story hacien-
da, formerly the home of a wealthy
El C hepe train crossing the bridge at Temoris. Mexico file photo.
walked 15 minutes to the Rio Grande,
took a wooden rowboat to the
Mexican side, and I bought breakfast
for George and David at Dos Amigos
Café. No immigration controls, no
Customs inspection. Then we flew
back to Alpine.
What a surprise! A whole new coun-
try on my doorstep! Next, I did more
research on the border region and
wrote a book, Unofficial Border Crossings
from Big Bend to Mexico, which featured
Boquillas, Paso Lajitas and San Carlos.
Needing some more pages to achieve
book length, I took the El Chepe train
across the Sierra Madre, and added
“& Copper Canyon” to the title. With
each discovery of a place to eat, to
sleep or something to do, I got more
excited. And, while I had already trav-
eled extensively around the world,
there were aspects of Mexico I particu-
larly liked: the music, the color, the
sense of family and manners. Lovely
people.
It was the late Kelly Fenstermaker
of Fort Davis who in 2001 said:
“You’ve written a book about Copper
Canyon, why don’t you organize a
tour?” I replied, “If you get 10 people,
I’ll arrange a trip.” With a little more
research, I booked the hotels, train
tickets and guides, and the next year a
group of 10 local residents and myself
spent six days on a tour to Chihuahua,
Creel and El Fuerte, a tour that still
runs today.
I am the only person locally running
Copper Canyon tours and am fortu-
nate not to have had any real problems
over the years. Part of this is because
the people I get on my trips are from
West Texas and can accept the some-
times-unavoidable minor changes dur-
ing a tour without throwing a fit. I had
one accident on a tour – a retired lady
from Oklahoma– who slipped on her
way to the waterfall near Sierra Lodge,
fell and broke her ankle. The hike to
the waterfall is 3.5 miles round trip
from Sierra Lodge, where we stay.
Most people have no problem with the
distance and complete the hike safely.
Sierra Lodge, 18 miles from Creel,
where we spend the second night on
the Copper Canyon tour, is off the
beaten track and has been described as
a “luxury log cabin.” No large tour
groups there. The rooms have
kerosene lamps, log burning stoves,
thick fluffy towels and bathrobes and
flannel bed sheets. At 7,000 feet, that’s
just what you need. The folks running
it serve margaritas before dinner and
Maria the cook makes meals to
remember.
An interesting change has hap-
pened to me over the years. An invet-
erate solo traveler, I increasingly see
the advantage in joining a small group
on a tour and sharing the experience
within the group of food, sights or
meeting people. The most pleasure I
get from running these trips is seeing
the delight in other people’s faces, and
hearing their comments when they
observe something unexpected, new
and pleasant in Mexico.
Once the Copper Canyon train trip
had become familiar, I looked for
another destination. The redoubtable
Kelly Fenstermaker had read about
Batopilas, at the bottom of one of the
canyons. I researched it, booked it.
C atedral de San Francisco , Chihuahua. Photo by Jim Glendinning.
principal buildings stand: the 19th cen-
tury church, the Presidencia (city hall), a
new Museum of Mining and the
extraordinary Riverside Lodge hotel.
Batopilas has recently been named
a Magic Town by the Mexican
Government. Various improvements
have been undertaken (e.g. to the
plaza) and new visitor attractions
merchant who owned the store during
Batopilas’s heyday in the late 1800s,
when the silver mine was in full pro-
duction.
Called “wonderfully weird” by
continued on page 27
Cenizo
Second Quarter 2017
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