Wednesday Oct. 11, 2006
One of the most spectacular views while in Creel is the road to Batopilas, or so I was told. But I was also warned that it was a challenging ride for a loaded bike. A group of riders from the HU meeting were going down there for a night so I couldn't miss it.
I left my panniers with Kelly and Della and took only my tool kit, a few clothes in the trunk and my tankbag with water, GPS and cameras. The ride each way consisted of 70 kms of beautiful twisty asphalt highway (less than an hour) and 75 kms of narrow switchback single lane gravel road (4-1/2 hours going down and 3 coming back), with a drop in altitude of nearly 6,000 ft from Creel, which saw temperatures go up considerably. I travelled the entire gravel stretch in either first or second gear. Not only because it was so rough, but you never knew what was coming around the corner from the other side. It was an amazing site to see two trucks pass by each other - there was barely enough room for me to get past a truck in some places.
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At about 3/4 the way there, after 3-1/2 hours of hot and tiring riding, I crested a corner to an off-camber right hander where a grader had recently created piles of loose dirt behind the large rocks he couldn't move with his blade. I was magnetically drawn by this loose dirt into the left ditch where a groove was cut for water drainage beneath the vertical wall of rock extending upward. It was a slow speed fall that found the front wheel in the ditch and the rear end of the bike still up on the road. Damage was limited to a bent rear brake lever and right hand crash bar - both of which straightened fairly easily once back at Creel (the crash bars are actually better than before because I bent them both out an extra 1/2" so that I can easily remove the upper body panels).
After a couple of old plank bridges we finally arrived in the town of Batopilas. It took me about 1/2 an hour to grasp the fact that every vehicle and item in this town came down that road.
After a couple of old plank bridges which carried us from one canyon wall to another we finally arrived in the town of Batopilas. It took me the better part of an hour to grasp the fact that every vehicle and item in this town came down that road. It was an old, small, mining town that actually had electricity before any other town in the area. As we rode into main street the gravel surface we had been riding on for so long changed to several different variations of worn cobblestone. The street was narrow and steep in places as it weaved it's way through the homes and businesses. In one place a few children stood on the curb with their hands extended waiting for us to slap them with ours as we passed by, and then erupted into laughter mixed with joyful Spanish words.
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There was a surprising shortage of rooms in Batopilas that night and there was a fellow named Arturo who seemed to be the Concierge for the entire town. Everyone we met said talk to Arturo to find a room or restaurant. We waited for probably an hour while he and one of our riders from Mexico city (Gary) found us lodging. Next we learned it was customary to have a reservation for dinner, and even though the better restaurants appeared to be on the porch of somebody's home with empty tables, they would not allow us to just sit down and order - so we wandered around a while and eventually found a normal restaurant, but we made a reservation for breakfast! As we walked back from breakfast one of the little old doors on the street was open and we peered beyond to find a beautiful inner courtyard that I am told is common in Spain.
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After breakfast we continued to ride mainstreet out of town another 7 kms to see a 300 year old mission. The sunlight managed to place itself in the most appropriate ways in my pictures that day. The road was even worse than the previous day's, but at least it wasn't far. The ride back to Creel proved much easier and quicker - partly because I knew what to expect and partly because it was all uphill.
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