Tag Archives: bus travel

Bucket List Destination: COPPER CANYON, Mexico

In the northwestern state of Chihuahua, Copper Canyon is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The combined length of the ravines makes Mexico’s Copper Canyon a whopping four times larger than the Grand Canyon in the United States. In some places, it’s even deeper than the Grand Canyon, with a depth of over 1 mile (1.6 km) The Tarahumara people, or Rarámuri as they’re known in their own language, call the Copper Canyon home. They are a group of indigenous people who have protected their culture and way of life by retreating deep within the Copper Canyon system some 400 years ago when the Spanish arrived in the north. They are so remote and so secretive that there are no accurate estimates as to their population size. The El Chepe Train transports people into the canyon on a railway track that stretches from the city of Chihuahua to Los Mochis on the Pacific coast and consists of 37 bridges and 86 tunnels. ~visitcoppercanyon.com

A visit to Copper Canyon, Mexico, via the El Chepe Train has been on my sister’s Bucket List for 35 years. It’s about time… Below are four videos that document our adventures as we cross the border into Mexico to tackle the Mission NOT Impossible…Copper Canyon, Mexico.

Caminho Portuguese: The Bonus Round #1~Back to Portugal

Tuesday, August 21, 2018

We bid farewell to Albergue Seminario Menor, Santiago, Spain and hike to the bus station to catch a bus back to Porto, Portugual. It’s kind of interesting to speed past towns and the path that took us fourteen days to walk.

Upon arrival in Porto we fire up Google Maps and proceed to locate Oporto Brothers Hostel. Intersections do pose to be a challenge when there are at least six or eight streets fanning out from the center, but with the help of locals, police and Google Maps we find our way to the correct neighborhood. Things begin to appear more run-down in this section of town… don’t think I’d want to wander too far in the dark around here. Google Maps says we have arrived, but we see nothing as to signage for our hostel. What to do? Start knocking on doors, I guess, until someone helps us. Yep, that works… we find the hostel name on a tiny hand written slip of paper taped to the doorbell.

Great accommodations at Oporto Brothers Hostel and serve our purposes well.

Tomorrow we’ll put one foot in front of the other and walk to the Porto cathedral to start our coastal section of Camino Portuguese. This may be a backwards approach to the camino, but it works for us. Make your own path, hike your own hike.