Many have asked about the little train serving Mata Ortiz and
some of the more distant settlements. We're glad to have the following
account from Sandi Casillas, a resident artist in Casas Grandes.
-Editors
THE
LITTLE TRAIN that goes up into the mountains is now called Aventura
Sobre Rieles and has been painted various colors: uva (grape),
limón (green), fresa (strawberry), and plátano (banana).
The trailer for tourists is very comfortable, but yesterday when
I took the trip, they left it off at Mata Ortiz where all the
tourists stopped. I continued up into the mountains with the locals
in the fresa colored car and a plain old cargo trailer following.
The driver, Elías Magallanes, mounted two planks on some
buckets of unknown content in the trailer, and people who did
not fit in the fresa car rode in the trailer on that makeshift
bench along with the cargo. We stayed quite a while in Mata Ortiz,
since they had to turn the extra train car and trailer around
to have it ready to return to Nuevo Casas Grandes with a train
that was coming down from the mountains. And in any event, we
couldn’t continue until that train passed us. So I visited
with Guillermina Quezada, who gave me some homemade bread she
had baked that morning early. It was kind of like bolillo, but
a little sweet. It was a good addition to the lunch I had prepared
to take with me.
After Mata Ortiz, we followed the Rio Palanganas up into the mountains
through
rolling hills with scrub oak. We passed through the semi-deserted
villages of Santa Rosa and Rucio, leaving cargo as we went. Someone
got off at Rucio, where the railroad worker homes have been stripped
of their roofs and windows. The shells of the rooms, painted like
the colors of the train cars (fresa, uva,etc.), brought to mind
Easter eggs cracked open. The driver of the train, Elías,
tipped his hat and made the sign of the cross as we passed the
town's chapel with its open door.
The canyon narrowed after that. The walls now were high and of
various colors of rock, and the little river beside us was clear
and fast running. It being the weekend, groups of people were
picnicking or camping under the great sycamore and cottonwood
trees. We came upon a group of men standing on the edge of the
track, looking into the canyon at a pickup in the river. Elías
slowed enough to see if anyone was hurt and told the men we would
be returning the same day (usually the train doesn't return until
the next day).
Our next stop was at Cuevitas to leave off a large family who
had come to visit their mother and grandmother, a sturdy little
white-haired lady who lived in the strangest little adobe and
rock house right by the tracks and close to the river. A large,
old cottonwood branch was supported from the dead trunk to the
roof of the little house to hold a rope and a swing made of a
piece of tire. I could imagine that the family would have a wonderful
time with grandma. The area was well named—Cuevitas—since
the cliffs were riddled with large caves, many with rock walls
in their entrances. I was told that the Tarahumara Indians sometimes
used them, but that they were really homes of the "old ones."
About an hour later we were well up into the mountains. We had
passed an impressive old ranch that Elías told me was called
Palanganas and was owned by the Navar family. All along the way
had been little ranches irrigated by small ditches exiting the
river. Now we were beyond the scrub oak. The piñon and
juniper were dotted with pine and cedar, but it was not yet a
real pine forest. We let off a young girl at one of the ranches,
and Elías sent greetings with her to her family. At Aguaje,
we let off another family at quite a nice house uphill from the
tracks. This area was peppered with houses and ranches, but Elías
told me they were mostly deserted; people had moved to the city
after the railroad had quit running to La Junta. It was hard now
to make a living, and our little train, which normally runs twice
a week, was their only lifeline to civilization. The government
is expected to subsidize a sotol manufacturing plant soon in Bella
Vista, the next town down the line, to provide employment there.
Sotol is a sort of white lightning made from a mountain variety
of the agave plant.
I was now the last passenger on the train and was supposed to
go all the way to Cumbres Pass, where one of General Pershing’s
planes is said to have crashed when pursuing Pancho Villa, thus
becoming the first American plane lost in a military action. But
Elías said it would take two or three more hours to Cumbres,
and he didn’t seem to really want to do it. Since I was
the boss, it would be okay if I said we needn’t go. So I
opted to do that part of the trip next time. A few curves later,
we stopped and added two dripping wet girls who had been swimming
in the river and wanted a ride. They decided that I looked like
their grandmother. Elias informed them that yes, we were going
to Bella Vista, but that maybe they would rather go home, since
he had just delivered their mother and family from Nuevo Casas
Grandes at their house.
Arriving at Bella Vista, we found that it, too, was mostly deserted.
We looked it over a bit, and then backed up to Aguaje and Carmela's
house. While Elías and Carmela’s husband turned the
train around for our journey back, she invited me in to have a
cup of coffee and eat my lunch. Everyone agreed that I looked
like the deceased grandma, and they showed me her picture. She
had been either a Morman or a Mennonite lady with
very little resemblance, but I agreed to be their new grandma.
As everyone was asking what she had brought from town, Carmela
complained about the problem of keeping food fresh. “But
you have a refrigerator,” I said. She laughed and said she
kept dishes in it, since they had no electricity. They did have
a generator, but because it was expensive, they only used it occasionally.
While we were there, more family arrived and said they had learned
that the mother of Rosa, a neighbor, was ill in Nuevo Casas Grandes,
and that Rosa was to go to town as soon as possible. We picked
up Rosa, after giving her a little time to prepare for her journey,
and began our trip home.
All along the way, Elías stopped and gave messages to people,
telling someone he had left two sacks of grain for them in Bella
Vista and that next trip he would bring the what-ever to their
cousin, and so on. A little boy who stayed at Cuevitas with his
grandma had left his backpack on the train, and we stopped and
left it for him. A bit after that we found a white pickup Elías
had been watching for. From the truck, we got jackets for Beto
and picked up Rosa and Beto's little boy, who had been picnicking
with family.
When we came to the place where the pickup was in the river, the
young man whose disaster it was was waiting by the track. He had
broken the axle but in the meantime had removed it and now had
in his hand. He asked for a ride to town for himself and his family—four
children and wife—and also for advice, which we gave in
plenitude.
All long the way, we had to stop for calves and colts on the track;
strangers who come to picnic on holidays leave gates open, I was
told. Elías, a careful driver, kindly herded the assorted
animals out of the way with the help of Beto and the damaged-truck
man. As we passed the chapel, Elías again tipped his hat
and crossed himself. On reaching Nuevo Casas Grandes, I completed
the thread of good deeds by giving Rosa and Beto and son a ride
to the sick mother's house—thus bringing completion to my
aventura sobre rieles. –Sandi Casillas omasandi@paquinet.com.mx