I first heard about the area from an anthropology professor who had studied Indian tribes in Mexico in the 1960’s.  His focus was on the remote tribe of the Tarahumara who remained hidden away in the mountains and canyons, basically untouched by modern civilization – still living much the same as they lived when the first Spaniards arrived in the 1500’s.  I dreamed of visiting these fascinating people and learning first hand about their way of life.  Never did I think that that dream would become reality, let alone a significant part of my life.

In the 1980’s I visited Creel, in the heartland of the Sierra Tarahumara.  Fiesta Tours was just getting started, and I was exploring the area as a possible destination.  The mountains were indeed beautiful, the canyons unbelievable, and the Tarahumara who came into town to trade their baskets and weavings were the same people I had learned about in college.  I was charmed and set about designing a tour which would incorporate my passion.    

On one of my first tours, over the Easter Season, the train was oversold.  Semana Santa in Mexico is a great time for Mexican people to visit their relatives, and the train at that time was the easiest east-west crossing over the Sierra Madre Occidental. The rumor was going around town that the train would not stop in Creel as it was overloaded.  I remember, in a fit of panic, jumping on the train locomotive as it slowed down in Creel clearly not intending to stop. I insisted to the engineer that he stop to let on my group of 16 people.  He stopped, though he didn’t want to, and we pushed on to the train with our reserved tickets in hand.  Eventually they even found seats for us – though not the ones originally assigned.  I learned very quickly to avoid travel on the train over the Easter season!   It was the beginning of a great many adventures in the Copper Canyon.

Over the years, we made many good friends, and came to know some of the Tarahumara families quite well.  In the nineties, many of the people were hit hard by a prolonged drought and unable to grow sufficient corn.  Corn is the staff of life for the Tarahumara – they manage to cook it in many different ways, dry it, store it, drink it, offer it to their gods, and pray for next year’s crop to be productive.  In the Tarahumara creation story, they are made from corn, and put on the earth running – so it is an essential part of their being.   

We made numerous hiking/camping treks into the canyons in those years,  and were the first to hire the Tarahumara out of Cusarare, close to Creel, as our outfitters. They brought in their burros and pack saddles, loaded our gear onto their animals, and disappeared into the mountains!  Our guide took us by mountain trails to our next camp where we met up the burros and muleteers with our tents and food.  We made dinner for everyone, and fed the Tarahumara New York Strip steaks, baked potatoes, roasted vegetables, and tortillas and salsa.  Later we discovered they had gone off into the pines and were drinking their pinole – a gruel made from toasted ground corn.  Even though they were stuffed with our full meal – they still needed their corn to get them through the day! It was always a cultural experience.

We soon discovered that the Tarahumara do not like to enter water that is in the earth – neither lakes, rivers, streams, any body of water.  The water is next to the underworld where evil spirits live.  Our route crossed the Urique River which cuts through the actual Copper Canyon.  When the hikers caught up to the Tarahumara at the river, they had unloaded all the gear, and would not cross the river.  The gold miners had set up a pulley system with a basket that crossed the river, and the idea was to load a basketful of gear at a time to get pulled across. That would have taken hours.  My husband Marshall took a 100 foot length of rope and forded the river. He tied the rope to a tree on either side, and started walking across the river with a load of gear on his shoulders.  Eventually, the Tarahumara began to cross with the aid of the rope, and even crossed the river with a few burros loaded with our “stuff”.  Marshall became the hero.  It was a simple gesture, but it earned a great deal of respect.

Our Tarahumara cook and I had started to set up dinner at camp so we could get the tortillas started cooking before dark.  We were looking through the scattered gear to find matches, maseca (ground corn meal for tortillas) and a basin to mix the dough in.  The cook was getting a little frantic and I was trying to figure out why she was so upset…….finally I realized she did not speak Spanish and we were not communicating!  She only spoke Tarahumara, and until that moment there had always been a Tarahumara guide or muleteer around in the background to translate!  After I realized that, we were able to figure it out with gestures and smiles.

When we returned to our village of departure at the end of the trek, our main guide, Reyes, introduced us to his wife and kids.  There were newborn babies in their little cabin, and we realized they were in need of milk and food supplies because of the dry year.  In town, we purchased powdered milk, a huge sack of beans, and a case of corn meal which we brought to the family.  Every time we visited after that, we always brought food for them. Some they kept, and a lot they distributed.  There is always someone who could use it in the canyons.

About two years later, we found out that they had named one of the babies after Marshall – his name was Marcial.  And we were asked to become the godparents of Marcial and his sister Pilar Catalina at their christening. We were honored.  And we have been close friends since that day.

We are not Catholic, none the less, we were accepted by the local priest as responsible for the children.  As we sat outside on the church steps during mass, we tried to talk things over with our compadres about the kids.  It turned out, they were not really practicing Catholics either.  They responded to questions in ways they thought we wanted to hear.  They enjoy a wonderful blend of their own private beliefs with Catholicism and manage to work within two worlds and seem to get along.  Fortunately for us, there were about 30 other children to be baptized that morning, and many people helped us with information about what we were supposed to do next.  Magically some candles appeared for the candle lighting ceremony, and even though we got it wrong, it was a solemn ceremony that united us all in friendship.

We have watched the kids grow up to become young adults, and it has been a great experience. We have wrestled with the question of how much a part to play in their lives – just how much exposure to our culture is good and when does it cross that thin line and become a detriment.  Is our notion of education or a “good life”  appropriate?  Ultimately we’ve pretty much left them to grow up Tarahumara.  We’ve been pulled by the idea that if we invited them into our home in the states, they would be exposed to a part of the world that could tear them apart from their Tarahumara culture.  We would have had a hard time bringing them to Arizona, as their parents had no proof of income, no electric bills, no water bills, no regular income or expenditures to present to the US Consulate to prove they would return to Mexico.  The kids did not even have a birth certificate to allow them to get a passport…..however, they did have a baptism certificate!  And a proof of childhood vaccinations!  Priorities are different.  

We have since learned that many Tarahumara have been exposed to the outside world. Some have gone to school in Mexico City, or Chihuahua City, or gone to the United States.  Some return to their homeland and choose to remain ensconced in their culture. Others return to help educate other Tarahumara in the local schools. Some become attorneys and help defend the rights of their people.  A few have become doctors and travel about in the mountains on various health programs helping their own.  Some are gone and stay away forever.

We are enriched by our relationship with our little family in Cusarare and have learned a lot about the culture by working with them. It is always great fun to introduce our small tour groups to the family, and the kids always work as our tour guides taking us into the canyons to see the waterfall, or over to the mission church. 

The Tarahumara have resisted for 400 years the encroachment of a “civilization” foreign to their way of life.   We see their resistance fading however in the onslaught of modern technology and education. It is hard to maintain their way of life in the face of cars, electricity, television, and computers. The closer the families are to the big towns such as Creel, the more “modernized” their way of life becomes.  Some of the families in the remote canyons, those who still live in caves or small wood cabins, maintain their traditions.  As in most cultures today, you will see those who opt for change and joining the modern systems.  And you see traditionalists who find it very important to cling to their grandparents ways of thought and strive to maintain the ancient way of life.   We see benefits to both.  The Tarahumara have traditionally lived in small “ranchitos” of 5 to 11 families scattered throughout a mountain area.  This remoteness has kept them from being exposed to the outside world more than they might otherwise have been.  They get together with each other to help prepare their fields, plant the corn, and harvest it.  Otherwise, they very seldom get together as a group. 

We’ll be going back to visit the Copper Canyon for one of the best times to visit the area that we have found for the celebrations of the Virgin of Guadalupe on December 12.  Guadalupe is the patron saint of all people of Mexico, particularly Indians and the poor. It is one of the few times of the year that the Tarahumara gather from miles around into a small town such as Cusarare, where there is a mission church.  We’ll visit the church at night on the 11^th to watch the ritualistic dances performed inside the church, and out in the church yard in ancient rites that pay homage to Guadalupe as well as Tarahumara gods. The following day we’ll return to the village where  mostly women these days will be dancing as matachines in colorful costumes with long streamers flying from beautiful headdresses.

The towns of Copper Canyon have changed over the years.  We see more hotels, paved streets and roads, more electricity, more cars.  There are huge tour groups coming through that do not stop to see some of the small treasures we so enjoy.  Over the summer, a tram is being built in Divisadero that will take people from the canyon rim down to the Urique River at the bottom of the canyon.  Helicopter rides are available to fly over the canyons. 

Cathy and Marshall Giesy are owners of Fiesta Tours International, doing small group tours into Latin America and the regional Southwest.  They are celebrating 25 years of doing business in the Santa Cruz Valley this year.