Part 2 The Trip down the Canyon

The next morning coffee wasn’t ready until 7:30am so you know Dave and I had to wait a long time, since we get up so early. Breakfast was ready for everyone at 8am, we had scrambled eggs w/ham, fresh fruit, toast, and tortillas, it was unbelievable. After that we got back into the vans and started site seeing again. We went to the “Lost Cathedral of Satevo”, to find the place was amazing, now we know why it is lost, and really should stay that way, just kidding. To get there we had to do more dirt roads, holes, ups and downs, and then if another car came by, forget about it. After that we went and visited the Tarahumara (Indians) Family , this was a mother with 7 girls and 8 boys. The 13 year old that played the harmonica had 2 kids already, and her 14 year old sister, who lived next door, had 4 kids. Their husbands where 14 and 15 years old, can you imagine. That’s the way these Indians live down there and they are happy, during the winter months they live in “kind of houses” but in the summer, when it gets to 115 degrees they move into the caves that surround them. The mother and 13 yr old took turns dancing for us, which to me was horrible, it was like watching animals in a zoo. All these babies standing around watching their mom and grandma performing for the crowd I just didn’t like. But I must say when they were done they were more than happy to except the peso’s from us. When we left the place we all decided to chip in and have Cesar, our guide, stop at a store before he brought the next group down and bring them beans and corn, they needed food more than money. We ended up giving Cesar 1,350 peso’s, so he was able to buy a lot for them. Then we headed back to the hotel for lunch, god help us if we should miss a meal, thank goodness this was all included in the cost that we had already paid to our caravan company. After lunch we got back in the vans and did more driving around and stopped at the “Old Mining Shepherd’s Hacienda”. It’s just a shell of a Hacienda now but it was something in those days, with all the mining of gold and silver they did. We did get a chance to walk around the town of Batopilas, we visited a girls private school, and brought them some candy and school supplies. Then Dave found a street vendor that made, by hand, leather sandals that lace up the legs, the bottoms are made of tires then leather on top of that, so that was the new grandbabies 1st present. Unisex present since we don’t know the sex yet.
Then it was back to the hotel for a “Welcome to Batopilas” margarita party, then Cesar surprised us with organic tequila and wanted to teach us how to do shooters. What does he think we are armatures, well one of the girls in the group had a surprise for him, and boy did Linda surprise him. She taught him how to do a body slam, and he was not willing at first, but we cheered him on and he did it. I didn’t know what it was but sure found out. Linda wet her neck, then put salt on it and then put a lime between her teeth, Cesar was suppose to lick her neck, drink the tequila, then get the lime from here teeth, that’s the short version of the body slam and boy he was a trooper and did it. We all were laughing so hard and Bob and I were trying to take pictures, I got about 3 hopefully Bob was able to get better ones. After the drinking Cesar brought out a Mariachi Band and they sang for us, Cesar then sang and then Larry, Linda’s husband, you know the body slam lady, sang for us, what a wonderful voice he has. Cesar and the band were very good too. After dinner, which by the way was goat, I thought it was chicken in a gravy and was very good, we all went back to our rooms again, very tired. The Mariachi Band was still outside, drinking more organic tequila, and singing songs so a few of us went out to listen to them. We were having fun listening to them then Linda and Larry came out on their balcony, so Cesar had the Mariachi Band sing to them. Since Linda did the body slam with Cesar and Larry sang with Cesar it seemed the right thing to do. After the singing was done everyone headed back to their rooms, what a great night.