Creel is a dusty, sleepy little place.
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The town`s epicentre are the railroad tracks that bring in CHEPE train twice daily, at a minimum. Quiet hotels, a few hostels, bars and restaurants, adventure companies and laundromats occupy the rest of the space in `downtown` Creel.
Tour guides, hotel owners, school kids and Tarahumara Indiginea make up most of the local population you`ll see on the streets. The Tarahumara seem to exist separately from the remainder of he population here; you will often see them selling fine artisanery, such as their colourful crafts and quilts, and they rarely smile.
The town`s saving grace is that it`s surrounded by some of the most beautiful and remote mountainous land in all of México. Apart from the CHEPE train (that was originally used to transport gold), there isn`t really any easy way in, or through this landscape. Creel, however, provides an easy and well situated base for day, and multi-day hikes through the many Canyons.
Most people opt for a tour, and don`t bother renting a car – the terrain is tricky and can be dangerous to navigate even for the most experienced off-road drivers! It is common to arrive in Creel, and plan your trip there. A lot of the tour companies are quite informal, though organized, and many visitors rely on finding other members to fill a group (and thus diminish the price per person) once at their hotel or hostel in Creel. For this reason, the town`s hostels are very popular (communal dinners are provided at most), as is Casa Margarita, a socially-oriented hotel with a bustling main courtyard (the hostel of the same name however, is incredibly unorganised, unhelpful, and slow to assist with any enquiries). If you have a group and time to wander around a bit (and either don`t mind carrying your bag, or leave it somewhere) a little walk around the streets, especially on the North side of the railway tracks, could land you a cheaper and cleaner accommodation… especially if you haggle for your price. Hotel owners here are generally quite friendly, and most can organise a good tour. The prices will be agreeable as well, especially if you have a group (of at least three) already.
Alternatively to booking your trips through your hotel or hostel, Los 3 Amigos offers the best, most knowledgable tours for equally fair prices.
Though I would have loved to do a two or three day tour into the bottom of one of the canyons, I only had a few days, and opted for variety instead. Two or three day tours also end to be more expensive as well, as they often include nicer accommodation in lodges in the basin. A nice older lady was kind enough to tell me that this was absolutely the highlight of her trip, and that I “really missed out“. I told her, “Thanks“. (Anyone sense my sarcasm?)
Panties and I opted for a relaxed day long tour where we hit the major mountain peaks and look out points. Great for pictures… though it was not terribly exciting being driven from point to point. We wished we could have done more hiking around. But we did get to see all the best views, the infamous `penis rock` and meet loads of Tarahumari locals and check out their crafts.
The other trip we opted for was less of a tour and more of a `drive`: we arranged with a man at our hostel to drive us to and from what we thought were `natural hot springs`. He dropped us at the main road and we were to walk all the way down to the springs, and then hike our way back up. We were happy to include the hiking we missed in our last tour, with HOT SPRINGS and relaxation. We were pumped!
We walked for about an hour down into the canyon – and the views were incredible – but when we got down to the springs we saw that they were not natural at all! Nor were they very hot…
It was more like rerouted water into what were clearly manmade pools, with a trickle of a waterfall running into it. But one was kind of warm – warm enough to keep us from shivering anyway – so we decided to enjoy what we could get and go to the hot tub at the gym in the Best Western later on (they only charge you $100 pesos or so to use the facilities).
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There was one really good bar in town with live music that everybody recommended. It`s packed with tourists and locals alike. It`s on a corner, on the main street, Mateos; and though I`ve forgotten the name, you`ll hear about it, no question, if you do find yourself in Creel. If you don`t, it will likely be the only one with any real action, so just listen up!
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Though we did wish for more time, we were happy to get to Las Barrancas when we did. For now, it is a pretty obscure destination on the overall tourist trail – for México travel or simply hiking and outdoor tripping in general. The US of A has lef us to believe the Grand Canyon is the be all, end all of North American canyon trekking, but in fact Cooper Canyon is wider, and deeper… and harder to traverse.
For now, it`s mostly a cozy older crowd (mostly Canadians actually) retired or on the verge of, milling around Cooper Canyon. Being so close to Canada and the US, and relatively affordable, we figured Cooper will blow up in the next decade or so as an adventure destination, especially with the CHEPE train being as nice and fast as it is. This would change not only Creel, but also Los Mochis and Chihuahua (at the Northern end of the CHEPE rail line) entirely… not to mention the local populations, most of all the Tarahumari Indians who already seem to be sick of selling their work to the curious tourists snapping their pictures.
But, I must say… the Canadian Rockies are way better…
