Liz Cirelli: The Copper Canyon

We spent just over a week on the paradisical shores of Tulum beach, resting, basking in the sunshine and having fun doing absolutely nothing. “Embracing the void” is how we liked to phrase it. Over the course of the week, our few remaining friends from the pilgrimage left to return home. On the eve of their departure we did one final ceremony with Don Manuel – this time with plant medicine. The medicine was very strong and the ceremony was intense. During medicine ceremonies it's often common to purge – and purge is exactly what I did. A lot. At one point it literally felt like I was purging a small demon – the feeling was so intense. After intensity of the medicine had calmed for everyone in the group we all began singing the shamanic songs that had by now grown to be so familiar. I joined in. I felt amazing, so at peace, so free. Don Manuel invited us to sing any songs we wanted, and I started singing one of my favourite songs, Summertime. After I had finished Don Manuel started chanting “another, another”. His words filled my heart with confidence and gratitude and, with a smile on my face, I began to sing “You've Got The Love” again. I love this new voice I've found. I can't wait to get home and record it! The ceremony lasted all night and as dawn began breaking, some of us ventured out onto the beach to greet the rising sun. The group shared a fruit breakfast together and then the ceremony was closed. Despite having had a very minimal amount of sleep, I felt so alive, so shiney. Plant medicine ceremonies are gruelling, but so worth all the hard work!

Our remaining last few days in Tulum were spent with Don Manuel and his angelic wife Annetta. It really was such a pleasure to have a little space and time to sit and talk with them alone. Lucy and I really have grown to love them – spending the past month with them really has been such a humbling honour. So many lessons learnt, so much growth done. I think I've grown more in a month with them than I did in 6 months in India. It really has been one of the most epic months of my life. I feel like a brand new person – as though I'm finally free of all the things that have been holding me back for so long. This is the beginning of the next episode of my life. And that sentence contains so many different meanings for me. Over the course of our travels, Lucy and I have made peace with the fact that we are no longer young girls. In fact we've more than made peace with it...we've totally embraced the powerful goddess that is womanhood, happy to bid farewell to our 'spring chicken' days and step into our empowered maturity. For sure, we'll always be fun-loving cheeky mavericks who are always up for a good time, but our attitudes to life have changed. We can both feel our power growing daily, and our plans for the future are huge! They weren't lying when they said that your 30's rock.

Aside from the tremendous amount of healing that Don Manuel has facilitated, it has also been fascinating listening to his talks. After one ceremony he explained to us that the Mayans have often been portrayed as a violent race, performing human sacrifice and living a dark existence. But this is totally untrue. The Mayans were a peaceful, highly intelligent race, who did not partake in such practices. Rather, it was the Aztecs who, despite warnings from their elders, regularly made human and animal sacrifices. Their elders predicted that if they did not cease such disrespect for life, dark times would befall them. Then the Spanish arrived. The Aztecs defeated Cortez not once, but three times. The only reason he was not killed was because the elders forbade it. They told him to go home, but he had no home to go to, so he stayed...and then more Europeans arrived, bringing with them the plague, and wiped out the Aztec people. The Mayans, with their mastery of mathematics and astrology, had predicted all of this with perfect accuracy, and had abandoned their cities to take refuge in the mountains long before the Aztecs – or the plague – could reach them. They don't teach that in history classes do they? One of the living Mayan elders has the entire history of the Americas documented and kept safe, ready to be released when the time is right. This is just one of the fascinating pieces of history we have been told over the course of the past month. Other talks have covered the history of Christianity and how the religion became corrupted after the death of Christ. Don Manuel truly is a fountain of forgotten (or hidden) knowledge.

Lucy and I waved goodbye to beautiful beachy Tulum to step on a plane to northwestern Mexico – to Chihuahua. At an elevation of around 1,440 meters, we were expecting it to be fresher up in Chihuahua than it had been down on the beach, but, as we stepped off the plane in our flip-flops, the chill in the air took our breath away. It was freezing. I'm talking proper January cold. We made a dash for the toilets to put our layers on...thank goodness for my leg-warmers! I wrapped my pashmina around myself and some very lovely helpful people ushered us quickly into a taxi. We giggled in the back of the taxi at how shockingly cold it was, and how ineptly we were dressed – the driver said it was the coldest it's ever been here. The following day we made a beeline for the shops to obtain much-needed layers. And what do we find? A plethora of utterly amazing shops at bargain prices (I'm talking a fraction of the price of Primark). Yes, we went on a bit of a shopping spree. Lucy bought 30 pieces of clothing for £130. That's how cheap it is. I didn't go quite as mad, but certainly indulged a little. If you ever come to Mexico, go to Chihuahua for some shopping!

Luckily for our luggage allowances we only spent 2 nights in Chihuahua. We were itching to get ourselves to Creel to behold the mighty Copper Canyon. The landscape here is like a scene fresh from a Western movie. The land is dusty and golden coloured, and is scattered with huge speckled boulders. Dramatic snowy mountains rise up from the horizon. The air is fresh, dry and cold. We took a trip to the Valle de las Ranas y los Hongos (Valley of the Frogs & Mushrooms) – named after its bewildering natural rock formations that look like...giant frogs and mushrooms. We then drove on to the Valle de los Monjes (Valley of the Monks) to behold the spectacular enormous vertical rock formations that on the one hand could look like monks standing to attention...or erect penises...depending on the inclination of your mind. Whether penises or monks, these rocks really were something. Our guide led us behind some of the huge rocks, through a route that allowed us to scale to the very top of them. The view from the top of these rocks was utterly splendid. We could see above the other vertical rocks that surrounded us – and beyond us in the distance rose the snowy, rocky mountains. The only thing you could here up there was the wind (interspersed with little Isis having a mini-tantrum over the fact that she wasn't allowed to walk to the edge of the rocks to fulfil her desire for thrill-seeking. She really is a fearless force of nature).

We then drove on to see the Cusarare waterfalls. The sun was now setting and by the time we approached the falls, dusk was beginning to paint the landscape with its cool purple and blue-tinged hues. In this light, the waterfall looked positively mystical. Parts of it had been frozen in motion and the running river at the foot of the falls was frozen and snow-covered. The rocks from the river bed rose up out of the snow, their dark grey colour even more accentuated by the pure white of the snow. It felt like we were walking into the Ice Queen's palace. It was totally enchanting. I've never seen a waterfall that's been frozen in action. I'll never forget how beautiful it was. Walking back through the forest, night began to fall – the last remnants of the dusky sunlight barely lighting the way for us. It felt so magical wondering through the icy forest in the early hours of the night – the moon above us shone with a pink halo above the lightly clouded sky and we could just about make out the patches of ice on the floor beneath our feet.

Around 60,000 Native American people still live in this region, called the Raramuri – which means 'those who run fast'. They are one of the most traditional indigenous people in Mexico and have inhabited this region for almost 10,000 years. Traditionally, the Raramuri hunted by chasing down and exhausting deer. Today, the Raramuri Indians live in caves and small shacks scattered around the mountains of the canyons, set apart from the towns. They have very little material wealth, believing that the less you need to survive the better. Their knowledge of plants and herbs is exquisite and they survive from what Mother Earth provides for them. Despite their ability to hold on to their identity through thick and thin, health problems and high rates of infant mortality trouble these people. Their children are married off as teenagers and upon encountering them you do not get a sense of happiness from them at all. It's easy to resume a default position and blame the Europeans for desecrating the native people's lives - it does seem that these days the Raramuri appear to be outsiders in their own land, but...upon adopting a different perspective, one could observe that the oppression of these people may come from within the tribes themselves. It's almost as if their insistence on grasping on to their traditions keeps them locked in a cycle of...dare I say...ignorance that does not serve a greater evolution. In contrast to the Maya, it appears that in some respects, the traditions of the Raramuri keep them locked in a state of stagnation. Whereas the Maya, whilst keeping their traditions, have synthesized the best of the ancient and the modern, thereby enabling them to integrate with other people and live happy, healthy lives.

The canyon itself covers a region that's four times the size of the Grand Canyon. Around 25 million years old, the breathtaking mountains were formed from 10 million years of volcanic activity. The canyon itself was created when the Earth's tectonic plates started to move, tearing apart the volcanic rock and forming the majestic mountains and dramatic ridges. The landscape here looks epically prehistoric. The volcanic rock is rich in copper, gold and silver, powdering the mountains with different shades of copper, gold, red, yellow and purple. Enormous organ-pipe cacti are scattered up the mountainsides, but set against the majestic mountains, they look like tiny little leaves. Up high at the top of the canyon, sitting on the edge of one of the ridges one can hear the true sound of silence, broken only by the faint screech of an eagle circling in the cloudless azure sky. We took a drive down the winding dirt-roads from Creel to the little riverside village of Batopilas, nestled at the bottom of the canyon which really gave us a feel for the canyon. We had been warned that the hair-pin bends and bumpy roads were not for the faint-hearted...but apart from the slight inconvenience of having to stop and wait a while because of some road-works, Lucy and I really didn't see what all the fuss was about. I've been on much scarier roads driving through the Alps down to Italy! Maybe we're just too hardcore for our own good!

Batopilas is a gorgeous, sleepy little village that you can walk around in under 10 minutes. Sitting on our pretty riverside terrace, surrounded by flowering trees, listening to the sound of the trickling river in front of us really was such a delight. The restaurants here are very small eateries that are literally extensions built onto the front of people's houses. The kitchen they use to cook the food for their restaurant guests is the same kitchen that serves the household, and you have to walk through the family's own dining room to reach the bathroom. We ate our meal to the soundtrack of the family watching their evening TV shows in their living room which was just behind us. The village also has one of the best-stocked little shops I've ever frequented – nowhere else have I seen horse saddles sold alongside general groceries, DIY materials and clothes!

One of the things that Lucy and I had so been looking forward to was taking a train ride through the mighty canyon on the Copper Canyon Railway down to the warm sub-tropical riverside town of El Fuerte. Finally the day dawned for us to embark on our rail-road adventure. Over the course of our stay in Creel we had ascertained that the train (there is only one this time of year) runs notoriously late (or sometimes early) so we were prepared for the uncertainty of the time of it's arrival. On this occasion, it was almost half an hour late, but we boarded it excitedly in anticipation for the adventure ahead of us. Upon boarding the train, we were confronted with an overly-righteous train conductor, who we later realised was just awaiting an opportunity to exert the petty machinations of his authority. An hour and a half into our journey, and a stop to take in the splendid view at Divisadero, we were told we had fifteen minutes during which we could disembark the train. We chose to use our fifteen minutes expediently, in acquiring a shot of orange liqueur over ice at the rather luxurious solitary hotel. We'd paid a Monte Carlo-esq visit to Divisadero the day before, to absorb the view in our own sweet time and enjoy a leisurely lunch to the backdrop of the dramatic canyon.

We kept a fastidious clock-watch as we did not want to miss the only train with all of our belongings on it...but, my friends...despite our meticulous time keeping, on leaving the hotel, Lucy was no less than mortified to witness the train pulling away from the platform with baby forumla et al on board. I ran as fast as I could up the hill to the platform, with Lucy in tow, 12kg of giggling Isis in her arms, to watch the train vanishing into the distance. The local street vendors quickly cognized our rather unfortunate predicament and one local immediately stepped up to the mark, shepperding us briskly into a nearby vehicle to speed us to the next train stop. A speedy car ride and 200 pesos later, we boarded the train at the aforementioned station and gave the righteous conductor a hefty piece our adrenaline-infused wrath. The word 'idiot' translates almost perfectly in Spanish. Coupled with the look on our faces, there was absolutely no ambiguity as to our sentiment. And all that happened no more than an hour after Lucy and I were almost lamenting the lack of compulsory slapstick travel incidents on our journey thus far. Good to know the universe is almost immediate in its response – and that we are obviously excellent manifestors. The phrase “be careful what you wish for” will now be viewed in a completely new light!

Now, talking of excellent manifestations, as we disembarked the train at El Fuerte, we were greeted by a charming chap speaking perfect English, who enquired as to whether or not we needed a hotel. Now Lucy and I are pretty highly organised ladies, and we had already planned to stay at another hotel, but when we tried to book it in advance, nobody had answered the phone. We asked how much it would cost to stay at his hotel and the price he quoted was double what we were prepared to pay. “It's the best hotel in town” he said. Lucy and I looked at each other “that's what they all say” we were both thinking. We were not budging on our price, so after a little negotiating, and a call to his boss, he agreed to give us a room according to our budget. A brief taxi ride later and we had arrived. It was no less than a luxurious 5-star hotel, complete with a swimming pool, pool-side bar...and a beautiful room. It appears our charming friend was telling the truth – it really was the best hotel in town. The rooms here actually cost double the price he quoted us – around £70 a night. We got to stay here for £8 a night each. Lucy and I literally jumped with glee, clapping our hands in delight – Isis was pretty happy about the situation too. We've coined a new motto for ourselves: “gold out of thin air”, because more and more, we are manifesting the simply splendid from seemingly nothing. And we fully intend on continuing this phenomena on our return home to bring into manifestation the tremendously exciting plans for the next phase of our lives.

Needless to say, our train ride through the canyon was nothing short of magnificent. When you look upon sights as breathtaking as these it's hard not to become totally awestruck at the wonderment of Mother Nature and all of her creations. I consider myself an extremely lucky girl to have had the opportunity to see such a sight. It will be a memory that I will carry with me forever. Down at El Fuerte the temperature is considerably warmer than up in Creel...it feels great to be able to put away the winter coat and get out the flip-flops again!