Our stop in Creel gave us a chance to see some of the local indiginous peoples called "raramuri".
Originally inhabitants of much of the state of Chihuahua, the Rarámuri retreated to the Copper Canyon in the Sierra Madre Occidental on the arrival of Spanish explorers in the sixteenth century. After discovering that the Copper Canyon did not, in fact, have any copper, the Spanish abandoned that idea but did find silver locally, and enslaved the local natives to work in their silver mines. Many many natives died from the working conditions in the mines or the diseases brought by the Spanish people and their animals. Those who hid from the Spanish in the mountains survived.
Current estimates put the population of the Rarámuri in 2006 at between 50,000 and 70,000 people. Most still practice a traditional lifestyle, inhabiting natural shelters such as caves or cliff overhangs, as well as small cabins of wood or stone. Staple crops are corn and beans; however, many of the Rarámuri still practice transhumance, raising cattle, sheep, and goats. Almost all Rarámuri migrate in some form or another in the course of the year.
There was a store in Creel that sells locally made handicrafts to raise money for a Christian mission hospital and school. The goal of these missions are to provide health care and education for free to the local Raramuri people.
Many of the women and girls we saw were wearing "traditional" outfits, even though they looked more like 19th century prairie dresses than indigenous clothing. I wondered why the men all wore jeans and sweatshirts, and then Dave found a picture of traditional Raramuri men, and decided that once jeans were available, none would voluntarily wear loincloths very often.
This mural was painted on the wall in our hotel room:
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