We were awakened at 6AM by the base jumpers taking off in their helicopter. The massive draft sort of re-invigorated the fire in the fireplace, and also blew some ashes all over the room, but we finally figured out how to get the little gas heater going.
Outside there was frost on the bikes.
But the view from the front porch helped make up for the chill.
Back to the main lodge for some breakfast. Tony claims, believe it or not, to be happy this morning.
At least the view beyond his happy face is pleasant. 
After breakfast we hiked up the road about half a mile to the Cascada de Basaseachi National Park.
There is an overlook very close to the parking lot, and while we were there, the base jumper’s helicopter came up out of the canyon. It made it clear just how big this canyon is.
The falls are 246 meters high, about 750 feet. We all wished there was an easy way to see the 1000 meter cliff that the base jumpers were using.
We hiked a ways down into the canyon to get a different view of the falls.
On the way back, we saw this to remind us that it is springtime:
We got back from the hike to the waterfall, packed and left Rancho San Lorenzo around 11 AM. There was plenty of time, so we decided to go check some side roads on the stretch between Basaseachic and San Juanito.
We stopped at an intersection to take a picture of Cajurichic where we were heading.
As we were getting ready to leave Gustavo saw a rider on an R12GS coming from Basaseachic. He seemed to be slowing to wave and Gustavo immediately figured out it was Noel, one of the guys we were planning to meet up with, coming from spending the night in Yecora. It took a minute of frantic waving for him to realize we knew him. Gustavo had exchanged e-mails with him before the trip, asking if he could join us in NCG or Basaseachic since he was riding to Creel from Tijuana, but he didn’t think he could leave early enough to meet us in either. We couldn’t have met like this even if we had planned it!
All four of us rode down to Cajurichic and we got a little separated. We stopped near a cathedral with a school across the street to regroup and a bunch of kids started coming over to look at the motorcycles.
Someone had mentioned on a Mexico trip report on AdvRider that they saved those stickers from LP, Vortex, Bridgestone, Bel-Ray, or whatever that come along with many of the Fine Accessories (tm) that motorcyclists tend to buy. These kids started out as curious but very shy. After I started handing out a few stickers, they got pretty excited.
I also found out that Cajurichic has the tallest topes of any place we went.:eek1 On the way into town, I hit my centerstand against each one of the 5 or so they had. And this is with the pre-load on the stock shock set all the way up. Sheesh! I think some improved suspension has to be on the shopping list in the future.
Roads in Mexico have all sort of hazards. You could be coming around a blind corner and find two trucks side-by-side like this:
It turned out that the truck on the right lost his air brakes, and was being recharged by the one on the left so he could proceed down the hill. Understandable, but not easy to negotiate when they are blocking the road.
We continued past the trucks and finally turned around after stopping to look at this view:
It was pretty warm (especially for us north-westerners), so we stopped in front of the cathedral in Cajurachic again to re-hydrate. A bunch of kids turned up looking for more stickers – warning to anyone who rides to Cajurichic, maybe you’d better bring a few!
On Mexico 23 (soon to be paved), right before we ran into Noel, I’d seen this cool lake with a house or church and a big white statue on the hill.
So while the others headed south-east, I went back north a mile or two to snap this picture. Unfortunately the statue didn’t come out that well, but it is still an interesting scene for the remote location.
Since the guys had a head start, I had a little fun making some time on the road. For several miles it seemed that the road had been fairly recently graded, but had developed pot-holes here and there. I managed to do some mild rear-wheel steering, luggage and all – whoo hoo! 
After a while, the road got rougher, then I had my first experience with real silt. It was a bit of a surprise, since an SUV had just passed through it going the other direction, so I couldn’t really see what I had gotten myself into. After that, when cars raised serious dust clouds, I knew to watch for silt.
Anyway, the silt wasn’t too bad. Certainly not as bad as some pics I’ve seen here. The wierdest part was that on the DL, the silt “wake” from the front wheel hits the toes of my boots.
The rough parts of the road made us all want to stop and take pictures (to take a break ). Here’s Noel taking a picture of Tony (who I couldn’t see).
At vantage points, it started looking like it might be a long day on this road, as it was just ridges and canyons, on and on.
Trust me, I have a lot more pics. The scenery was pretty amazing, but looking at pictures just isn’t the same. If you want to see it all, all the pics are in my Flickr Mexico Copper Canyon 2007 Album.
And the obligatory “burros in the road” shot:
There were a few construction crews on this road. We found out the road will be paved soon. After we got through several construction areas, (some of them a little tricky on the bike) we got to ride several miles on wide, smooth, ready-to-be-paved roads. Zoom!
Unlike the construction crews you typically drive by in the US, these guys were working hard pretty much any time you saw them. In fact, if you don’t stay out of the way, they might run you over. If US construction crews worked like that, maybe the roads around my house wouldn’t be in such poor condition. 
We returned to pavement in San Juanito, where we gassed up and visited the car wash.
From there it was a short and easy ride to Creel, where we checked into a nice and reasonable hotel and had some pizza for dinner.