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Coahuila Desert Scenery - Driving West from Saltillo to Parras

Perhaps the most significant thing about our visit to Parras was the fact that for the first time we talked to someone who had first-hand knowledge of the vast Copper Canyon area that we hoped to visit (and did later in the year).

Children at Dinosaur Museum

En route to Parras, we made a small detour to visit the site of an archaeological dig where dinosaur bones were found. The dig was in a small village off the main road a ways and involved a short drive along a very dusty dirt road to the small museum that had been set up to display the dig's finds. It was a nice little museum. Not very extenisve but still rather neat to think that the exhibits were found close by. The care of the museum seemed to be in the hands of a group of children aged from 8 to about 16. There was no entrance fee posted, but we gave the kids 5 pesos which they intimated was too little, but Jan thinks they were pleased to get anything.

Posada Santa Isabel

Parras was a pretty little town.Its streets were narrow, paved, and almost all one way and lined with simple one or two story buildings, some of them colonial style with pleasant courtyards hidden behind high walls. We had consulted LPM and settled on the Posada Santa Isabel as our best bet for a hotel, but it took us an inordinately long time to find it because LPM did not incude a map of the town and getting directions in Spanish proved to be a very fallible process. But, third time lucky, we got there and happily found a parking lot and a very nice courtyard restaurant. At $40, not including breakfast, the room, which was not terribly nice was not cheap but there was a small pool so we took it. I should say that either we have become less gullible, or we have been visiting cheaper places, or maybe our improved Spanish makes the difference, but we found better and cheaper rooms on our second visit to Mexico August through October.

Fellow Tourist, Benny,from Switzerland

As we unpacked the car, we met another tourist. "Benny" was a Swiss retiree who had travelled extensively and like us was happy to find someone he could have a conversation with. We chatted some then interrupted the conversation so that we could finish our unpacking and take a swim before dark, but arrange to have dinner with him and continued the conversation there. Benny told us about his trip to Copper Canyon and gave us some tips on where to go and what to see. Unlike most other places we have travelled, we find we don't meet many other tourists. Perhaps it's because we need parking for the car and so don't stay in backpacker places.

The Casa Madero Winery

The next day we left the car at the hotel and walked out of town to the nearby winery to take a free tour. The name of the town, Parras, means grapes, and the full name, Parras de la Fuente (Grapes of the Spring) refers to the fact that grapes can be grown here because of the existence of fresh-water springs. LPM says that the winery was in existence before the town.

We enjoyed the tour although after the tour began with just the two of us we were a bit disappointed to be joined by a whole family of people. We had thought we would manage in Spanish better if we were alone with the guide, but then the family turned out to be bilingual, so in the end it worked out just fine.

The walk to and from the winery was rather boring in most respects as we had no other choice but to follow the highway, but we did find it interesting to observe the preferred local form of transport (after Ford pickups of course) which was of the four-legged kind. We loved this old man on his donkey, and wondered what the younger man was doing with his pair of horses.

Four-Legged, rather than Four-Wheel Drive