Recuerdos: El Chepe (Parte Tres)

More from our trip on the Chepe train. Even three years later, looking at the photos on a screen, I am captivated by the views. I really really hope to go back here.

February 17, 2020

This is one of the times I wish I had a better camera and some decent photography skills, because sunset at 8,000 feet over the Barranca del Cobre is one of the more beautiful things I've seen in my lifetime. However, I am a sea level kind of person. I was born at sea level and I live at sea level, and doing anything at 8,000 feet is hard on my lungs.

I was trying to read a book from our patio but these views were so stunning that I kept getting distracted, so I just stared. The pictures are all from our hotel, except the one where you can see the little orange building—that was our hotel. It is clearly pretty inaccessible—not the kind of place you stay and go out to shop during the day or clubbing at night. They serve meals there and otherwise, there's nowhere to eat. It was about $200 US a night for two people, all meals included. It didn't have a shuttle from the train station so after we got off the train and waited a little bit, I just found a man who had a tour company logo on his pickup and asked if we could pay him to drive us to the hotel, and he agreed.

If you look down into the very bottom of the valleys, it is where many of the Tarahumara people live. They call themselves the Rarámuri and are one of the largest groups of indigenous people in North America today. The women are famous for running long distances in sandals and in fact, we saw women running up from the valley to sell baskets to tourists.

We saw very few Tarahumara/Rarámuri men anywhere. The women have very distinctive outfits, shown in the mural here. Lots of tourists were taking pictures of the women selling baskets but I was uncomfortable with that, especially when the pictures included the children. Other people's children should not be tourist attractions or human zoos. The girls don't tend to go to school, but make baskets with the women and sell them.

Even though I know that Mexico is a very large country with many different climates, I—like most Americans—usually assume that any given place is either going to be a desert or a beach. This is the high Sierras. It was cold at night and not too warm during the day (of course is February but plenty of places in Mexico are quite warm in February).

This really was one of the most stunning places I've ever been.