Pueblos Mancomunados Trek - Day Two - Benito Juarez to Cuijimoloyas

So we'd packed all our stuff up and with a spring in our step, headed off to the tourist info office, where the nice chap who spoke english was going to advise us where the trail we were going to be following for the day started. He was suitably chirpy, and seemed totally confident of our ability to not only carry the packs we'd got strapped on, but also to find our way.

His directions for our 4.1 mile walk consisted of 'Go through the forest. Head down to the river, and up the other side. Head for a big rock. Then, you'll see the village up the hill and you're there. There are signposts every 200 yards or so'. It all sounded so easy.

So much so, that instead of taking us up to the start of the trail himself, he grabbed a passing villager, a rather sultry dusty chap in his mid twenties in baseball cap and well worn Frannypants (old tracky bottoms) and let us be on our way.

It didn't take very long for us to realise that the altitude, combined with the weight we were carrying and our total lack of fitness was going to be a problem. Barely 10 minutes in and we were making excuses to our 'guide' about taking photos so we could have a breather. Here´s a couple of the results. You can see the landscape is pretty rugged.


The village of Benito Juarez.


So on we continued on the dusty track with our 'guide', before he eventually waved in the vague direction of small path heading in to the forest. Again our total lack of Spanish probably didn't help, but he definitely said the name of the village we were headed to, and it wasn't like we had any real choice but to follow his direction, so he buggered off to wherever he was heading and left us to it.

Within 5 minutes of entering the forest the path split, and having seen no signs at all we decided to head downwards as that seemed like the general direction. Eventually we came to stream, which I assured myself must have been the river mentioned earlier by our helpful host. The path, however, got smaller and smaller, until it came out onto a small deforested area. There was no real sign of the path continuing, but it had been an extremely steep decent, and we didn't fancy backtracking, so we went with what looked like the most likely option.

By this point, the weight of our packs was a real problem, we just had far too much stuff, and as I coaxed Clair on through what we eventually decided was probably a coyote path things were looking pretty bleak. Finally the path was gone altogether and we were on a near vertical slope hopelessly lost in the forest.

Here´s a piccy of the 'path'.


We took our packs off and I scampered off to try and find a route. Unbelievably, I stumbled across the actual path we supposed to be on! Multiple signposts and everything. We had to climb over vast fallen pines and dense thickets to get there, but eventually we were actually on the path.

Unfortunately, it had taken us nearly 2 hours to get there. We were absolutley knackered, and the first signpost said we were only 1km from where we were supposed to have started. Bugger! Also, beautiful as the scenery was it was one severely steep climb and descent followed by another.

An example:


Zoomed in a bit closer, I was sure I could make out a village there somewhere.


I was wrong it turned out. We were still miles away. Here's me with a slightly strained expression on my face.


And me trying to encourage a seriously flagging poor Clairy by stomping on ahead. It was downhill so I could just about do that at this point.


Anyway, we lost the trail about 5 more times, and the 4.1 mile walk must have ended up closer to 8 or 9 miles with the backtracking and totally wrong paths we took, but eventually we found a track, and a wrinkly old farmer who found our appearance extremely comical, informed us it did lead to Cuajimoloyas. It was in no way the route we supposed to be taking, it wound on forever, but finally, we saw the sight we were looking for.

The big rock with an aerial on top that indicated we were at Cuajimiloyos.


So we left at 10:30 and arrived at 5:30, and our guidebook had informed us it was a 3 hour walk. So we at last doubled it, pretty impressive I reckon. In the end, we learned a valuable lesson about what we could realistically carry, and also that their signage was rubbish. It was still a stunningly beautiful walk, it just nearly killed us.

Once there we asked for a place to camp and the tourist information graciously lent us the use of Allejandro, another cheerful guide, to take us to our camp spot (a very exposed field with 4 bulls tied to spindley little sticks, a mere 20 minute walk from the village, but that was nearly too much for us) and make us a fire. By this point it was getting dark, we were seriously pooped and a freezing cold wind had picked up. I attempted to knock up some tuna pasta while Clair put every single item of clothing on and zipped herself into her sleeping bag.

After wolfing down our grub (he happily had some too) our guide departed leaving us with a small fire which now seemed perilously close to our tent. Especially as the wind direction was now blowing the embers directly towards it.

Eventually we admitted defeat. I stomped it out (only slightly singeing my walking boots) and we bedded down. The wind got stronger and stronger, and I awoke in the night to the sound of our rubbish being snaffled by something. Whatever it was spent quite some time huffing and puffing beside us. It was genuinely quite freaky, particularly as the lonely planet cheerfully lists that the area contains all 7 of Mexico's wildcats plus many other large predators. In the end we decided it was almost certainly a coyote, and would have been more scared of us had we confronted it.

All in all it was a pretty full on first day's trekking.