Ruth and the sunset at the island of Dhiffushi, Maldives.
Where are Kevin and Ruth now? Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.

Where are Kevin and Ruth going next? Kuwait City, Kuwait on March 31st.

Saturday, January 10, 2015

Guachochi to Creel - Wow!

We had heard that yesterday's drive was going to be scenic. They weren't kidding! What a spectacular drive! It was only 150 kms (93 miles), but it took us four hours and fifteen minutes. We rarely got over 60 km/h (35 mph) because the road was so curvy. We think it's more curvy than the Devil's Backbone highway we did at the beginning of the month. And, that does include a lunch stop and a couple of rest stops.

But again...what a drive!

We went for a walk around the place we had camped at the night before. It's a really nice spot.

Kevin, at the cabanas place where we stayed near Guachochi.

Ruth, at another viewpoint at the cabanas place.

The road out was a little muddy.

We had quite a bit of rain overnight. And some hail! And, it wasn't very warm, with the temperature no higher than 10C (50F) all day, and around freezing at night. We left at around 10:15am and the road out was still pretty wet.

Very little traffic the whole way.

Scenery.

Threatening skies. We did in fact get a little more rain, but nothing bad.

Let the curves begin!

Sherman, enjoying the view.

Just gotta take it slow and enjoy the views!

Many people say they don't enjoy driving on mountain roads, but I love it. The only thing I don't like is when people are rushed and they're right on your tail. I don't care though, I simply drive slowly. Sherman's front brakes heat up pretty quickly, so on the steep downhill sections, and I drop the transmission into first gear and I hardly have to touch the brakes. Of course this also means I'm going between 15 and 25 mph.

Fortunately, there was hardly any traffic on the road!

Gorgeous scenery.

Wow.

At last there are guard rails...in most places.

A few hairpin turns.

Lunch stop at the bottom. Can you see Sherman? (You can click on any photo to enlarge it.)

See the bus? That's our road up ahead.

No guardrail here!

Dark clouds, but no rain at this point.

Like I said, not much traffic.

There was about 80 kms (50 miles) of this. 

There's our road down below.


Okay. Seen enough? We have lots more...but that's enough!

As we got closer to Creel, the land flattened out a bit and there's an actual lake. Could be anywhere in Canada!

The sign for the Hotel Villa Mexicana.

We pulled in to the Hotel Villa Mexicana. This lodge actually used to be a KOA campground, complete with full hookups and even those little KOA camping cabins. Now, with very few RV'ers ever coming this way the campground is not in very good shape, although the lodge and other facilities are very nice. And, they have a great wi-fi connection!

For RVs, they charge by the person at 100 pesos ($8.20 CDN) per night for full hookups. That's if you can find a site where the full hookups still actually work. The water lines all appear to be non functional, probably as a result of the freezing temperatures here they have all been broken. We'll show you some pics of the place in tomorrows post.

We didn't want electricity so they gave us a price of 120 pesos ($9.84 CDN) per night for the two of us. Included in that, they gave us a key to one of the camping cabins so that we could have a hot shower!

The sun is shining today (yay!) so we're off to explore the town.



25 comments:

  1. Wow! That road looks like the road between Flagstaff, AZ to Sedona, AZ. I always though Mexico was mostly flat, arid, cacti ridden place until you hit the tropic future south. I'm really surprised of mountains and beautiful camp grounds and wide open spaces. Makes me wonder why do people from Mexico want to enter and live illegally in the US? They have a beautiful country....

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    1. We have done that drive before, except that we went from Sedona to Flagstaff and yes that was a beautiful drive as well.

      To be totally honest only a small percent of Mexico is flat, it is mostly mountainous but when most tourists come to visit they head for the beach.

      Most Mexicans that come up to the States, come up to work because of the money and the jobs are better than at home. Most though only come to save up money so that they can go back to Mexico and build themselves a home for their families. They know they have a beautiful country!

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  2. Reminds me of "Oh My God" Road which used to be a stagecoach road outside of Denver in the mountains = except think one lane dirt road with parts of it that have fallen away (put that in on Youtube and you will see what I mean - scariest drive of my life)

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    1. Sounds like the a couple of drives we did here in Mexico the year we brought the Little Blue Car down and went on some roads that we knew we couldn't do with Sherman. Yep, a little scary!

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  3. I sure enjoyed your photos today. Beautiful. Thanks for bringing us along!

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    1. We are glad that you enjoyed them and thank you for taking the time to comment, we love to here from our readers.

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  4. Why are you catching the Copper Canyon train in Divisadero and not Creel?

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    1. Because we want to do some hiking in the canyon and this is a good stop off point for that. Plus the best scenery from the train is between El Fuerte and Divisadero.

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  5. Replies
    1. You would love it, it reminded us of British Columbia at times.

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  6. Looks like a fantastic drive... (but I'm glad we took the train)

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    1. They both will offer different views of the canyon. We are happy to be able to do both. Looking forward to seeing what the train has to offer in the way of scenery. :-)

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  7. Fantastic pics! Too bad about the campground, it was still hopping when we were there in 2008.

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    1. It's a shame really because they could make it so much better.

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  8. Replies
    1. Thank you, we can't wait to see more of the canyon!

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  9. What an awesome journey thanks for the view's!

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    1. It was a gorgeous drive, it was actually nice that it was twisty, winding because it meant that we had to travel slowly which gave us more time to see the spectacular views.

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  10. Such pretty photos! Recently found your blog, really enjoy the photos.

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    1. Thank you Missouri Gal and thank you for taking the time to comment. We should have some more fantastic scenery over the little while as we explore the canyon more.

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  11. If you have a hankering for birria, there is a neat little cafe alongside the tracks near the train station.

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    1. Kathe K, I wish you would start a blog or restart your "Life's Adventures"! You are not as sedentary as you might have us believe. ;)

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    2. Thanks Kathe, we had seen that yesterday and I would like to have gone but Kevin and seen another restaurant that he thought looked better. Maybe we will give it a try when we return here in a few days after coming back from Divisadero because we do love birria.

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  12. Are you going down to Batopilas ; if so I recommend an air condition Van. We stayed at the KOA 5 years ago and it was in rough shape then. Enjoy

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    1. No, I don't believe we will be heading to Batopilas this trip and even if we were, we wouldn't be needing air conditioning at this time of year. We woke up this morning at it was -4C (25F) outside with only a high of 13C (55F). Having said that I see that it is much, much warmer down there so maybe it might be necessary.

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