Breakfast at Margarita's was good and I packed up and hit the road. My plan was to visit Urique for the night and then bushwhack over to Batopilas the next day. As usual, my plan was long on imagination and short on reality.
Everything went well as far as El Divisadero. It was a pleasant road on a warm morning that paralleled the railroad tracks. I was hoping to see one of the trains but was disappointed. I would have checked the schedule if I had known how close they were.
At El Divisadero I paid my 20 peso fee and entered the Parque Ecoturistico Barrancas del Cobre. This is somewhat amusing as the Parque is composed only of a few viewing points into the canyons.
However, the view is worth every peso!! This is four photos stitched together and it doesn't begin to convey the immense size and scope of the grandeur before me.
I walked from point to point trying to take it all in. I couldn't. At the Grand Canyon there were defined edges, this is the south rim, that is the north rim, those are some pinnacles sticking up. Here it was just too big. No matter where I looked it just kept going, on and on. If my eyes focused on one thing they lost something else.
So I got back on my bike, more than a little humbled by the landscape, and headed for Bahuichivo. There were plenty of signs and a brand new road. An easy ride today, What could go wrong?
In the U.S. they pave the roadbed, then they put in the guard rails, then they paint the stripes, and finally they open the road. It seems in Mexico they do it all at once. The pavement just stopped. As you can see the guard rails are in place, and the stripes are only a hundred meters behind me. I cautiously moved forward thinking that the knobbie tires would take me through the construction site but there was nowhere to go. They hadn't dug out the route yet and there was only the hills and cliffs on the other side. Not that anyone cared. If I had given it a try I'm sure they would have cheered me on and laughed when I tumbled into the canyon below.
What seems to have happened is that there was a sign that diverted me over to a detour. This was up a pretty sketchy single lane road that had loaded dump trucks coming down. They would have considered the mighty Africa Twin no more than another bump in the road as their brakes squealed in protest all the way down the hill. In this confusion I seemed to have missed the road for Cerocahui which would have led me to Urique.
Now it was past noon and I had used up a lot of gas. I wasn't expecting to find more along the way so I decided head back towards Creel and then directly to Batopilas. I refilled my tank at the PeMex station where I turned off towards Cusarare. I was surprised to find Lago de Arareco (Lake Arareco) so close to Creel. There appeared to be cabanas for rent and it is something I will definitely investigate when I come back.
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| I named this Beauty Break Point |
More about that when I return next time ...
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