From El Fuerte and the nineteenth century we traveled a short distance to a godforsaken little train station to ride the last passenger train in Mexico: the Chihuahua al Pacifico, or “Che-Pe.” Passenger trains were once legion in Mexico, but they gradually gave way (as in the States) to freight carriers. AMLO, Mexico’s Presidente, has inaugurated the construction of a controversial tourist train in the Yucatan, but who knows if that will ever come to fruition. In the meantime, ChePe is the only game in town. This particular train still moves a few passengers from the coast to the mountains, and locals joke that Che-Pe stands for “always late.” Mostly, this train takes tourists up into the towns of the Sierra Madre, where they can view the Barrancas del Cobre or Copper Canyon.
The train tracks run across some scrub and high sierra desert landscapes before entering into a series of climbs along canyons cut into the mountains by the various tributaries of the Rio Fuerte. Each landscape, tunnel, trestle, and cut is more spectacular than the last. Makes one glad we no longer worry about film but simply shoot the pixels and worry about the good ones later!
heading up the canyon 
looking down out of the train
This being a Mexican train, you can open the windows and hang out. Of course, if you do, you’ll see the various mudslides, overnight arroyos, track and railroad ties lying beside the railway, and of course tunnel walls which whizz by about a meter from your window. Throughout the day, we rose from sea level to eight thousand feet, crossing forty bridges and passing through over eighty tunnels, before arriving in the eighteenth century, more specifically the mission town of Cerocahui.
I leaned out once for a pic 
ok, ok, twice
Cerocahui is even smaller and more rustic than El Fuerte. This town was originally just the site of a cemetery for the Raramuri peoples, when the Jesuits came around and built a mission to evangelize them in the seventeenth century. When Spain expelled the Jesuits in 1767, and the town had to wait on a Franciscan priest to arrive in the 1940s! We’ll revisit the Raramuri in another post.
Our hotel, very cozy 
vineyards 
the mission church
This day we traveled up a scary mining road to a scenic outlook over the Urique valley, one of the canyons forming the Copper Canyon.
These Photos are amazing! What adventures! I live the train shots, the mountain and valley views, and the little store built in a cave on the side of the road. Thanks for taking us on the journey. Most I’ve been able to travel in a long while!