We stayed in Mazatlan for Carnaval, even though large cities coupled with the influx of a major horde of visitors isn’t our thing. In fact, we usually do everything in our power to stay far, far away from such crowds. Well, we are already here… we kept hearing how great the parade and fireworks are... we got tips on how to “view Carnaval in comfort”…hmmm, a once in a lifetime opportunity? Only 3 weeks away? This IS part of the reason people go cruising, right? To experience unique and fantastic things? Plus, we wanted to get a couple projects done on the boat and had found a great canvas guy and proficient stainless steel welder to do some work while we wait.

Book Early
Carnaval is a BIG deal here. Some say Mazatlan hosts the world’s 3rd largest Carnaval, after Rio and New Orleans. Held the week before Lent for the past 118 years, it’s also the oldest Carnaval in Mexico. This city of ½ a million doubles in size with visitors before and after the week-long fiesta. Don’t bother trying to get a hotel room last minute; El Cid was booked solid well in advance (rumor is at a pricey $300 a night…expensive, even for Mexico). Luckily, slip renters are not charged this Carnaval “premium”.

Puerto Viejo Restaurant Viewing Area
One major Carnaval event is a massive…and I mean MASSIVE… fireworks display, symbolizing the 1864 battle during which French forces tried to overtake the city. We had reservations at Puerto Viejo, a small, open-air restaurant across from the ocean at Olas Altas Beach near the Freeman Hotel. Our vantage point was spectacular. To give spatial context: the restaurant faces the main drag, directly across from us on the opposite side of the street is a musical stage set up on the boardwalk which we can see from our table. Right in back of that is the beach lined with a cadre of fireworks guys. Before the crowd shows up, we walk a bit and see the fireworks staged in the sand not 200 yards away from our restaurant and mere FEET away from beach-sitting spectators. SO not OSHA-approved. Oooh, this is going to be interesting!

Advance Payment…in Person
We arrive at 5pm to ensure a decent parking spot and that our reservation wasn’t “accidentally” usurped. (Stop by a week or two in advance to pay for reservations and choose a table.) For 350 pesos pp ($20), we are allowed to sit at Puerto Viejo all night along. We drank Pacificos and munched on everything shrimp: shrimp tacos, shrimp quesadillas and shrimp nachos while waiting for the crowd to gather in the street and the festivities to begin. Over 5 hours!

Chairs and Bathrooms Make Happy Campers
We learned real quick that the KEY to this reservation arrangement is the chairs and the use of a clean bathroom. Standing for 5 hours was not high on our to-do list; squeezing our butts into a 1-foot area on a hard, cement seawall and not moving the entire time lest someone steal our spot was another alternative. Quality of life people: sometimes it PAYS to PAY for chairs and relatively clean restrooms… with toilet paper and working faucets…instead of braving a leaking portapotty. Heading back to the car: “Hey guys, what’s all this watery, smelly runoff flooding the back streets… it hasn’t rained.”  “Don’t ask…and don’t step in it, either.”

Packed Like Sardines
Nothing happens in Mexico ‘til after dark. Luckily we had a live band, good people-watching, good company and good conversation as distractions, so our wait was highly enjoyable. Gradually the crowd gathered on the street in front of our restaurant. By 9pm people were swarming, buzzing about choosing their final spot, standing cheek to cheek waiting for the show. Not a great place if claustrophobia is an issue. We were previously warned to wear toed shoes, wallets in front pockets, no loose purses or backpacks for obvious reasons. With thousands upon thousands of people packed tightly into the street, butt to boob, feet are bound to get a little mashed; protruding pockets invite potential for picking.

Sitting at the restaurant at 10pm, we joked that all the gringos are looking at our watches thinking: “When is this going to start? Don’t ALL fireworks shows start at 9:15pm? It’s past my bedtime!” But at 10pm the locals are just getting started! Eating dinner at 10pm and staying up ‘til 4am for a fiesta is normal. So as we were leaving at midnight heading out of the area, we noted all the young’uns headed IN, dressed to the nines and ready for a night on the town. Whew! Past my bedtime!

The Battle Begins
Around 10:30pm, the Mock Naval Battle finally commences. Mazatlan wins both then and now as a more spectacular pyro-technic display we have not seen, not even at Disneyworld. Barges anchored just off shore act as the French invader man-o-war “Le Cordeliere” setting off cannons from the water; the beach “defensive positions” return fire from multiple locations along the Malecon; bright white spotlights point out to sea while colored laser lights wildly splay over the crowd; the entire ½ hour spectacle is timed to a soundtrack.

While we couldn’t see the bombs “attacking” the ship since the stage was in our way, we were right in the thick of the beach battle. I mean… IN it! Strict U.S. fire safety regulations would have totally prohibited the crowd’s proximity. Here, colorful stars are exploding right above our heads, fired upwards from the beach directly in front of us. Multiple streamers shoot out towards the water like massive blow torches symbolizing arching, fiery cannonballs. We are virtually surrounded in a 3D half-dome, enveloped by fireworks. The crowd doesn’t move… each one of us is a star-struck, wide-eyed, giggling little kid. Ooooh, ahhhh, whooaa…What an amazing experience!

For proper perspective, watch the 5 minute VIDEO I uploaded to YouTube. Best video so far, although the music is distorted since we were right next to the speakers. Plus, you get to see our nephew’s Flat Jack (Flat Stanley’s friend) watching the fireworks with us.

Beehive Exit
Exiting the jam-packed street was like playing Mexican train for real. Reminiscent of a busy beehive, parallel and opposing conga lines quickly form… everyone slowly shuffles along, holding onto the hoodie or collar or hair of the person in front of you, hoping not to lose sight of them in the masses. Do not trip - you risk getting trampled. Although this is a very controlled crowd so I have a feeling you’d get stepped on by only a few people before someone would halt the procession.

Actually, we were quite impressed by the placidness of the mob… other than a couple irritable people, no setting fire to cars, no gunshots, no drunken disorderliness, no pushy-crazies. This isn’t LA after a lost Lakers game. Maybe that all happens afterwards, I mean it’s still early. Turns out, I heard there was somewhere around 100 arrests/citations for the entire night… and half of them were for peeing in the street. Wait, so THAT’s what I’ve been stepping in? Another reason not to wear flip-flops tonight.
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The Burning of Bad Humor
Every year on this same night, Mazatlan Carnaval burns in effigy a symbol of “bad humor” to dispel all evil so the rest of Carnaval can be “free of bad feelings”. A large piñata representing an evil individual (as voted on by locals) is strung up and paraded down the street. Stuffed with fireworks and set ablaze among the crowd, this is a much-anticipated event during the evening of the Naval Battle. We saw the effigy parade but didn’t want to wrestle through the crowd to watch the torching.  For this year’s effigy…they chose the infamous Donald Trump.

Now, before you start snorting with laughter or grinning with glee (I know who you are:), thinking how terribly funny or cool that is…think about it. I’m not a Trump fan. Let’s get that straight. But even I felt a tad bit insulted. This is Mexico still, right? Corrupt Mexican political figures seem to dominate the effigy spotlight year after year; and I know there is NO shortage of evil/corrupt politicians to choose from here. So, you mean to tell me that in this ENTIRE gigantic country, there’s not a SINGLE person who represents MORE EVIL than Trump, a foreigner? Are you kidding me?

Let’s have some context and compare Trump to last year’s appropriately evil effigy: a mayor and his wife. This couple ordered their corrupt police force to arrest 43 protesting student teachers and to, essentially, “make them go away”. Those police promptly handed the students over to the local cartel - all 43 have since “disappeared”. Quite the vile act, right? Now THAT’s a good effigy. Movie-worthy, actually.

What about a certain recently-re-captured, most-wanted, drug lord responsible for murdering thousands? THAT guy wasn’t on the list? Seriously? Well, I suppose the effigy committee is worried about retribution… I mean, if El Chapo finds out they burned his likeness, he’s liable to get pretty ticked off and have them all “made to go away” from his jail cell. So no, let’s go with a foreign political nominee, we just can’t think of anyone else.

But what do I know. One year they burned a likeness of the losing local baseball team. As luck would have it, this very night in fact, the local Mazatlan Venados baseball team won the 2016 Caribbean World Series. So the Venados are fortunately safe from the torch… at least as long as Trump keeps talking...which looks like it could be awhile!

Some days…you just miss your friends back home. I’m not talking about your FaceBook friends. I’m talking about the kind with whom you can stay up all night talking. The kind with whom you can actually discuss the dreaded topics of politics or religion… and no one gets mad. The kind with whom you get along with so well you’d go on vacation together. Someone you’d help move using your own truck or assist with a boat project. People who call you to find out ‘what the heck is up’. The kind of friends who accept your failings, talk things out and forgive misunderstandings. The kind of friends you’d call family.

In the Marine Corps, you might get to know a person for 2 years and they get transferred. But one day, you run into them on another base, in another job…and pick right back up where you left off. But cruising breeds even more stunted relations. You know someone for a week or two and hang out a few times. Then they leave, or you do. Maybe you see them a year later; maybe you never see them again.

So many people…
You see, when you are travelling, you meet people. Lots of people. Sometimes you just want to stop meeting so many damn people. Even on days when you don’t feel like conversing, someone else will. It’s inevitable. This results in a lot of tenuous acquaintances, but real land-like relationships are rare. Let’s put this into perspective…

Howdily Doodily, Neighbor!
What do you typically do when someone moves in next door to your house? He’s out there transferring boxes and suitcases, you happen to be outside getting the mail…so you greet the neighbor, right? Well, at least where I come from… but you go out and make small talk about the neighborhood, the weather, where they moved from, etc. You feel them out, get an idea of personality, hopefully a sense of relief that this person isn’t, at worst, an ax murderer or at the least, a jerk. Do you immediately invite them to go out to dinner or drinks or into your home or to come with you to Walmart? No. Absolutely not. Weird, right? Yes. Definitely. Weird. Who DOES that?

Every Day a New Neighbor
Now, imagine if those new neighbors move out a week later - and a new person moves in the next day. Turnover… every week? Ugh. Then someone new moves in on the other side every 4 days, and another across the street every month, and another kitty-corner every 2 weeks. You’ve got someone different moving in around you every single day. How strange would that be? Pretty soon you just wouldn’t care to say hi anymore…am I right? It wouldn’t be worth it. They are just going to leave again anyway, and you already have your stalwart, longtime friends readily available. If this happened in your cul-de-sac, you’d ignore all of the newbies. But for cruisers, this is our reality. On a typical dock or any anchorage here in Mexico, (except in summer) new boats and new neighbors constantly arrive and disappear. Every day. Except we can’t afford to remain in our shells.

The Difference: Landlubbers Have Core Friendships
The difference is that you people back home already HAVE friends. You don’t need the hassle of acquainting yourself with a new neighbor every day. You have your core group of friends in town who you see more than most, the ones you meet for dinner or at the boat… then there’s co-workers to bullshit with every day, marina acquaintances, book club members, golfing buddies and of course, your family. All of them already KNOW you. These are people with whom you don’t have to start over…and over…and over…

Social Butterflies
Cruisers have NONE of that. At least new cruisers don’t. We have no core group, typically (unless you live at one marina); we move around too much, and those around us always move away. Gypsies. In order to have ANY friends, period, we soon become a lot more social than we ever were on land. Cruising forces you to talk to strangers.

Why? Because strangers are ALL you ever GET to talk to... like being a travelling salesman...or a truck driver. Better still, it’s like moving to a new state or starting a new job every week or every month. Recall your last move and how it felt to start over. When is the last time you tried to make a new friend because you had none? This is one downside to the cruising lifestyle. Some personalities relish the idea; others recoil. Eventually, you just accept this as the norm and make lemonade. Whether they realize it or not, cruisers continually strive to turn strangers into acquaintances and sometimes friends. We are just looking for engagement with others in the same boat (pun intended).

Want to Go to Dinner?
Under land circumstances, you wouldn’t ask that new neighbor to your home for dinner, having only just met them hours ago. But cruisers do. Not every day or even every week, but enough for it to be highly unusual to landlubbers. We’ve attended dock parties and gatherings; we’ve been invited aboard for drinks… even elaborate dinners; we’ve shared cabs back to the boat after buying groceries or attending an event; we’ve met others at beach taco shacks while having lunch and many others while walking the docks or kayaking an anchorage. All with perfect strangers. Why? You don’t even KNOW them! Like-mindedness and similar circumstances breeds faster rapport.

90% of these chance meetings are just another LinkedIn-type connection. But if you end up hanging out with a couple more than once, that is a cruiser friendship…whereas on land, to designate the word “friend” would be absurd at this stage. On the rare occasion you discover a couple you enjoy hanging out with and end up doing several things together because you happen to be in the same place for awhile, well…it’s a frickin’ miracle.

But they will inevitably leave. Or you will. And you must start over…meeting more people. Again. It’s an odd feeling. And it’s a little lonely. But it’s standard procedure.

Non-Existent Stranger Danger
One day, we entered a new anchorage and hailed the only other boat in our tiny cove. We invited them over for dinner, talked for hours…never saw them again. This has happened several times to us, more often for others depending on where your social spectrum falls… curmudgeonly or sparkly. (We are low to middlin’ on that scale.) On another occasion, I invited a boat for coffee and cake; I saw the wife briefly again at Marina Mazatlan, 4 months later. She was buying veges for their trip south the next day. “See you around the world!” she said happily, waving goodbye before heading out into the great Pacific to Tahiti and beyond. Fleeting friendships. I couldn’t even remember her boat name. But that’s typical.

The Cruising Network
Why bother even trying then? Well, everyone needs friends! You can’t have a very fulfilling life without them, even if they might go away in a few days or 3 weeks. You have to try, right? We can’t just talk to each other all day every day. Crikey, we’d be sick of each other!

Did we waste our time getting to know these guys? Even for just one evening? No. We enjoyed and learned from each one of our countless short-lived encounters. There is something authentic and real about meeting on a boat, drinking a beer or sharing a meal. In doing so they are opening up their home, offering a little piece of themselves. We appreciate that. You may never see them again, but then again, you just might… down the line… in another anchorage, or another town, even another country. Or maybe you’ll meet a friend of theirs, in which case you immediately have something in common and suddenly you’re “cruising friends” by default.

I Get By With a Little Help From My Friends
Cruisers are legendary helpers. And one day, this same amigo network might come to your rescue. Whether they buddy boat with you across a daunting ocean (thanks Humphreys), drive you to the hospital (thanks Mike), drive you to Mega for emergency mouse traps (thanks Rhonda), give you his leftover and impossible-to-obtain window material (thanks Orlando), or just awesome advice on everything boat and life in general (thanks Dave). It could be something as simple as giving you a chunk of their freshly caught tuna… or as personal as an invitation to Christmas or Thanksgiving dinner, distracting you from missing longtime friends and family back home.

Don’t Be a D…
You also want to be friendly with as many people as possible. Why? Because if you’re not, eventually it WILL get around. The cruising community is big, but not that big. “You know so and so?” “Oh, THAT guy? Let me tell you a story…He anchored right on top of us…what a….”

Lifetime Friendships
Becoming friends, really good friends, is a long process for us. We tend to get along with most everyone, but there are very, very few we’d even consider calling “besties”. In fact, I can count the number of really close friends on one hand. With all these passing interactions, does cruising allow you to form lifetime friendships? Of course. Does it happen every day? No. Not even close. Has it happened to us? Yes. Absolutely. There are several couples we know we can pick up with whenever we see them again, just like the Marine Corps; those we’d go out of our way to visit. People with whom we hope to have a lifelong friendship.

Besties? Well, it’s possible, but that takes time. But we’ve observed it in others - a genuine bond between those cruisers who either live in a marina or buddy boat for weeks or months at a time….similar to vacationing together… or living together. They travel together, strategizing daily voyage plans, anchor or dock next to each other, chat via VHF, dinghy to shore together, help each other with boat problems, go on excursions or to the store together, sometimes even eat meals together… everything. While we have no experience with that type of extended buddy-boating, it’s a very interesting dynamic to watch.

Today’s New Neighbor Might Be Tomorrows Friend
It is often difficult for land-dwellers to grasp the concept of such short-lived cruising friends. While Brian and I have each other, we DON’T have the support network of really close friends and family at our beck and call that you all have embedded in your lives back home. So cruisers must actively cast out their fishing poles to see what’s on the other end. Maybe you come up with a nice tuna that will feed your soul for a week or maybe you catch nothing. But you keep casting. It’s just different and sometimes a little lonely. BUT there will always be a new neighbor tomorrow! We have been very fortunate to have met some wonderful people during our travels. Even if we’ll never see them again, working to make those connections, however tenuous, was worth the effort.

Don’t try this at home…
Just north of Olas Altas beach along Mazatlan's oceanfront boardwalk, spectators gather to watch brave (or crazy) individuals jump off a 50ft high cliff into the ocean.

These “Clavadistas”, as they are called here in Mazatlan, are professional cliff-divers. Rumor has it the first diver did it on a bet back in the mid-1900’s. Since then, day in and day out… noon ‘til night… the clavadista’s job is to soar off a 50ft high platform in return for a few pesos donation. Doesn’t sound like a lot of fun to DO, but it IS fun to watch.

After a substantial enough crowd assembles, the diver climbs up onto his platform. Standing precariously at the cliff edge, we watch him warming up and checking ocean conditions. Each dive requires careful monitoring of the wave patterns, timing his entry perfectly into seas as low as 8ft deep! That’s ridiculously LOW. These high-fliers perform in all conditions…at low tide, between big crashing waves, in the rain…oh wait, I forgot…it never rains here. He even dives at night carrying a torch!

Suddenly, our clavadista plummets head-first into a quarry of rock-strewn waters! We got one decent shot of him falling into the depths of the Pacific Ocean. Whew! From that angle it looks as though he didn’t push far enough off the cliff face. But his tiny head quickly pops up to the surface far below, bobbing like a basketball amongst the waves crashing through the small gap in the rocks. Of course my GoPro seized up just as I was about to take a video. GoFigure!

Tired of the beach scene, we yearned for mountain views, so I booked a tour to the mile-high capital city of Durango, located in the adjacent state of…uh… Durango.

Pronatours
Pronatours offers a terrific, 12-hr guided tour of Durango via a 16-passenger Mercedes Sprinter van for $108pp. Victor, our guide, was amazing, keeping us entertained and well-informed throughout the day.

Due to the long drive, we had a 6:20am pickup time…waaay too early! Unfortunately, I mis-remembered the opening time of the coffee shop. No coffee or muffins for you! Luckily, our tour includes a “breakfast” box, or so I thought. A triple-decker ham & cheese sandwich is not exactly what I want to eat at 7am. Oh, the excitement when our van stopped at OXXO along the way - free coffee or mochas for everyone! Nice touch Pronatours. So very helpful of you to keep my better half on his daily meds - caffeine deprivation is not a pretty sight.

The Road to Durango
On a normal tour, the road you travel is just a means to the tourist destination. In this case, the newly completed Durango-Mazatlan Highway is PART of the tour. Actually, it is one of the main attractions.

The Devil’s Backbone
Beginning near Brownsville, TX, Highway 40 passes through Monterrey and climbs into the interior of Mexico. The last and most difficult portion to modernize was from the mountains of Durango to the beaches of Mazatlan. Prior to 2013, it took 6-8 hours to drive to Durango; day trips for Mazatlan vacationers were not an option. The Old Highway, built in the 1940’s, was a thin, 2-lane road through some of the most rugged geography in Mexico. Precariously perched along the dramatically shear Sierra Madre mountain range, this 180-mile hazardous trek full of switchbacks, rockslides, steep terrain, no shoulders or passing lanes was ominously named “The Devil’s Backbone”.

An Engineering Feat
Once the new 4-lane highway was completed in 2013, a modern transcontinental Highway 40 was finalized, opening commercial floodgates for both cities. Now, the journey takes a mere 2-3 hours, permitting our day-tripping venture to Durango. But of particular interest is the sheer engineering conundrum the “Devil’s Backbone” presented… and the steps required to conquered it. With no less than 115 bridges and 11 miles of tunnels (an incredible 63 separate tunnels in all), along the 140-mile route, I’m not surprised a $1.4 billion budget climbed to $2.2 billion. With a B.

Oodles of Tunnels
With an astounding 63 tunnels, I could barely snap a photo without being whisked into the darkness of YET another mountainside. The longest is an amazing 1.7 miles…so long they included side-exit passageways for pedestrians and emergency telephones in case of an interior collapse…a potential issue I’d rather not think about. Some tunnels utilize cool asphalt-embedded “runway lights” planted along the demarcation lines. As the sole source of illumination, they evoked the feeling of taxiing down a runway at night or driving in a live video game.

The Views
Fantastic! But I often wished we were driving ourselves so I could stop and breathe, taking in the spectacular scenery and crisp mountain air. Our drive took us from 70 degree desert-tropicalness into freezing temps where icicles cling to cement bulwarks and road-workers gather to warm around a steel barrel fire. The landscape reminded us of the Sierra Nevadas in California. Coniferous and oak forests tower tanned and green above a sea of grey, craggy rock, rising dramatically from the earth and tumbling into canyons so low I can’t see the river bottom. A grand waterfall plummets off a sheer cliff in the distance, somehow insignificant amid the infinite landscape.

Actual towns are virtually non-existent in this unforgiving territory; a few roadside stands and a couple dinky hamlets are all we see. So at night, just like traveling the coastline of the Sea of Cortez, a heavy blanket of darkness settles across these mountains… not a light to be seen out in the vast nothingness… other than the bright tunnel lights visible for miles across the winding canyon.

Guinness Book Bridge
The crown jewel of this highway project is the Baluarte Bridge. Spanning the Baluarte River, it marks the border between Sinaloa and Durango states. While the bridge is only 3600-ft long (about a 2/3 mile), it stands 1300-ft high off the river bottom. This puts Baluarte squarely in the Guinness Book of World Records for the Highest ‘Cable-Stayed’ Bridge in the world, and 2nd highest in the world overall. Not too shabby.

I uploaded a rather wretched YouTube VIDEO of our bridge crossing. Bouncing van + 8 seconds of photo-op stop = blech. But at least you’ll get a better idea of the view. Click HERE for some cool photos and stats of the bridge construction.

NOT as Smooth as a Pool Table
“This new road is a smooth as a pool table!” says our tour guide as he excitedly conveys the story of the highway. While I am positive it is world’s better than the old highway, we can personally attest to it NOT being pool-table smooth. AT ALL. In fact, being in the last row seats was the worst spot; so much so, we had to over-tighten our seatbelts to keep us from going airborne over the spine-crunching bumps. Every time I tried to take a photo of the landscape outside… Bounce! Click! Shit! Yet ANOTHER blurry photo.

Durango, Durango: the Mile High City
Situated over 6000ft high in elevation in a high-desert setting, Durango surprised the heck out of us; it was nothing like we expected. I anticipated another Mazatlan only bigger, with a lovely but very small old town section surrounded by thousands of non-zoned buildings and roads in various states of repair or complete disrepair. Typical Mexico, right?

Impressive Architecture
What we found was pretty incredible. Durango, founded in 1563 and now with a population of over 600,000, boasts a typical “centro” district encompassing a grand plaza with stately colonial buildings surrounding the impressive main cathedral. But those remarkable structures extended for as far as we could see! From palaces to museums to train stations, impressive Spanish/French building influences surprised us at every turn: lovely ornamental columns, intricately detailed cornices, majestic arched passageways, sky-lighted courtyards. I felt transported back in time to a preserved 1800’s Europe.
 
Our city tour consisted of a gondola ride for views of the expansive city, a walking tour of the central district including the gorgeous cathedral, entry into the Pancho Villa museum, a short stop at the central market and lunch in a colonial style restaurant. These places are best described with photos – see gallery.

Boom Town
During our walkabout, we noticed something else…Durango was booming. Mining and lumber are key industries here, not tourism. Unlike other Mexican towns where many businesses have gone under, nearly every shop we passed was open…and doing business …but not with the overwhelming Canadian and (to a lesser extent) American tourists. How do we know this? Well, we tend to stand out; I just can’t seem to tan enough to disappear. This was the first time we noted being openly stared at with placid interest by everyone we passed as a definite anomaly. What the heck are these tourists doing here? And why are they taking pictures of that McDonald’s? Crazy gringos.

Pancho Villa Museum
The highlight of the tour is billed as the Pancho Villa Museum. In reality, while the building was impressive, located in the former governor's palace, the tour was…meh. Our separate museum guide spoke English but ran his words together; plus, he was a low-talker (like me), speaking so softly and monotone that we only caught about 20%. Trying to comprehend our docent’s runaway English while ineptly deciphering Spanish-only text displays was near impossible in the short time span allowed. Eventually we all just shuffled along and didn’t learn much. But it DID inspire us to learn a bit more about this iconic figure when we got home. AND I got a once-in-a-lifetime shot of Brian as a Mexican Revolutionary Army dude. Priceless.

Francisco “Pancho” Villa, Villain or Hero
While our museum guide seemed to think of him as a Robin Hood archetype, I felt he was more of a rogue warrior character, seemingly only content when causing conflict. Pancho Villa’s first occupation as a bandit/bank robber segued into an illustrious military career. In 1910, Villa helped Francisco Madero to overthrow the current dictator, Porfirio Diaz, after a despicably-long reign of 34 years, beginning the Mexican Revolution.

A ruthless Villa thrived throughout the Revolution amid a confusing array of presidential power grabs, betrayals and assassinations… very “Game of Thrones”-esque.  As General of the North, he commanded a large army and won many battles, some of which were filmed by Hollywood, thus growing his celebrity and cementing his folk hero status. Villa’s backslide into villain territory was finalized after unscrupulously kidnapping and killing Americans in raids across the border to obtain weapons and supplies after the US withdrew material support to his army. Woodrow Wilson sent General Pershing after Villa in retaliation for the murders but failed to locate him.

Eventually, Pancho Villa surrendered and was allowed to retire in relative style, so long as he remained out of politics. But in 1923, a mere 3 years into retirement, he was gunned down, most likely to keep him from inciting further political turmoil. His body lies interred in Mexico City but someone else has his head. Literally, no one knows where his head is. One of many conspiracy theories…the infamous Skull and Bones Society of Yale possibly stores it in their secret collection. Creepy.

Publicity Hound
We asked our museum guide: Why did Villa get so much hype, as opposed to many other key players in the Mexican Revolution? Well, there’s the numerous troops he commanded and the countless battles he won, but Villa also kept photographers with him at all times. Pure narcissism? Or did he just really understand the value of P.R.? Probably both. Even back then, wars were won in the media. Perhaps he was “The Donald” of his day in terms of a publicity genius.

Back to the Tour…Why not rent a car?
For us, the toll fees alone weren’t worth it; a round trip costs about $100 - expensive for Mexico standard tolls. That doesn’t include the cost of the car rental, gas or hotel (we’d recommend staying overnight to avoid driving back in the dark). Plus, we just didn’t feel like driving, we felt relatively safer tagging along with a group of tourists and it’s nice to have a well-informed guide. At $220 for 2 people, including lunch, you just can’t beat that price for a no-hassle experience.

But if the main goal is to meander and marvel at the Baluarte Bridge and the mountain scenery, rent a car… especially if you want really good photos. The tour stops for, literally, a 1-minute photo op on the bridge in the middle of traffic. Unable to get out for safety reasons, I shot an 8 second video through the open door of the van, without even looking through the viewfinder, hoping I caught “something”.  The only bonus of the jump-seat position was that I was able to aim my GoPro through the back window and capture a video of traveling on the bridge. But again… impossibly bouncy.

Tour Grade?  A-
Overall, Durango was a great day-trip. We highly recommend Pronatours and in particular, Victor, as a guide. The only downsides: did I mention it was bouncy? (can’t be helped – don’t ride in the back if prone to car-sickness), short bridge photo-op stop (again, no scenic pull-outs so we understand the urgency to move along), and our low-talker museum guide (Pronatours should have Victor do the museum tour instead).

On the upside, we were surprised to discover a historical aspect of Mexico that seemed, until now quite frankly, rather underwhelming. In this unique city, rich in incredible architecture and fascinating history, the past now connects to the present by an engineering masterpiece. I predict many more Mazatlan tourists will be visiting Durango in the future!