On the trail of Pancho Villa

Ay Chihuahua!

Have you ever heard this time-honored phrase of amazement uttered by some dumbstruck or exasperated Mexican? Whatever its origins, it is perhaps never more appropriately used than by those visitors who come to appreciate the state’s wide diversity of tourist merits. Once familiar with them, they too can rightly exclaim, “Ay Chihuahua!”.

(Amigo Trails Travel author note: the origen of this statement ‘Ay Chihuahua’, comes most likely from the complete phrase ‘Ay Chihuahua, cuanto Apache’. The phrase probably originated in the 18th century when there were so many Apaches in Chihuahua and the hostility of the natives and the environment would have made it very difficult to live in Chihuahua State. The phrase was shortened and left ‘Ay Chihuahua’ but the expression of desperation still applies).

While any local schoolkid in Mexico can tell you that the state is the nation’s largest (245,000 km2, about half the area of Spain and accounting for over one-eighth of the national territory) and that its capital city bears the same name, very few know how big the state once was or how small a Chihuahua dog is supposed to be.

While many tourists have explored the state’s world-famous Copper Canyon region (deeper and narrower than the Grand Canyon), far fewer have retraced the swanky steps of Pancho Villa who crossed and criss-crossed the state in search of blood and glory. And, while everyone in Mexico (and the U.S.) has heard of Pancho Villa, not so many know that his real name was “Dorotheo Arango”. With a name like that, no wonder he took on a pseudonym!

Very few travellers are interested in spending more time than absolutely necessary traversing or exploring desert landscapes, and Chihuahua (= “dry, sandy place”) has the unenviable reputation of being mostly desert and not much else. Indeed, the Chihuahuan desert is North America’s largest.

But deserts can be very interesting. Not only does the Chihuahuan desert harbour a multitude of unusual plants and animals, many found nowhere else on earth, it also includes the mysterious Bolsón de Mapimí or “Zone of Silence”, a region straddling the state borders of Chihuahua, Durango and Coahuila. This Zone of Silence, best known for its lack of reception of radio waves, was chosen, partly on account of its paucity of human inhabitants, as the site of one of the world’s first Biosphere Reserves.

Even today the state of Chihuahua is underpopulated. Most of its residents live in one of two big cities: Chihuahua and Ciudad Juarez. As for thousands, probably millions of years, water remains a severely limited resource throughout the state. This may have deterred but did not prevent pre-Columbian people from establishing substantial and surprisingly sophisticated settlements.

Let’s explore some of Chihuahua’s less well known tourist sights, on a rapid traverse of the state from north to south. To see all the places described would require at least a week. To choose one or more and include them on your next drive south requires only an additional day or two. It is of course a prerequisite for all the places mentioned that you are prepared to forgo the dubious merits of expensive high-speed toll roads for more varied, more scenic but equally safe two-lane black-tops.

(The above story is an excerpt from article by tony burton. For the rest of the story, please follow this link. )