By Daniel Muñoa

Early on a Friday evening in mid-January 2002 I arrived with two close friends at the Hotel Ruinas del Real, a hacienda in Real de Cartorce. This is a small mining community 364 miles south-southwest of Laredo, made famous recently by scenes shot for the Brad Pitt-Julia Roberts movie The Mexican. Just as the movie reveals, you get to Real de Catorce by driving through a two-mile long tunnel cut through a mountain. In fact, the hacienda we stayed at was the same one used by Roberts. We were the first of a large group to arrive Friday evening with one goal in mind for the weekend, to mountain bike across the splendid terrain for the next two days.
Upon our arrival, we checked in and promptly asked the concierge, Don José as he likes to be called, where we could get a freshly cooked meal. He suggested we head to El Eukalypto, a small Italian restaurant half a block away from the hacienda. The food was incredibly fresh and made to order. After complementing the chef on wonderful food, he sat down at our table, opened a bottle of wine and talked to us for a bit. He said his name was Feliciano and that he's from Italy. He said that for the last 11 years he's been working in Real for about half of the year. The other half of the year, he works at restaurants in Italy. Asked what keeps him coming back, he told us he enjoyed the peace and quiet in addition to the splendid mountainous scenery, but most importantly, the pace of life in Real de Catorce: "Time moves differently here; everyone takes their time in doing things, and they aren't hurried as you see in cities and urban areas."
He went on to mention that the majority of the restaurants in Real de Catorce are run by Europeans and that a good percentage of the tourists are from Europe. After dinner, an evening stroll through the pueblo was becoming a challenge as there are no level streets in this small town. You're either going downhill or uphill and the fact that you are at an elevation of 8,600 feet doesn't make it much easier. In addition, all the streets are laid out in stone, which are slippery when wet.
I awoke early Saturday morning in desperate search for fresh coffee. Feliciano wasn't joking about the laid back attitude. None of the restaurants open before 9 a.m. I walked around for a few hours, waiting patiently for the rest of my friends to wake up because they arrived in the early hours of Saturday morning. The mountainous view surrounding Real would constantly distract me if I lived here. The town is literally nestled alongside the slope of a mountain.
By the time everyone was up and ready for breakfast, it was 10 in the morning. The meals were traditional Mexican breakfasts and hit the spot with a couple of cups of coffee. After planning and prepping our cycling gear, it was close to noon when we departed on our first day of mountain biking. The terrain was rough, and several of us, including me, took a couple of nasty spills, but nothing too serious. We spent close to six hours biking around Real del Cartorce on trails that would become extremely challenging from time to time. After showering and doing an equipment check, it was time for dinner, and we headed out to a restaurant owned and operated by a Swiss couple. That night they were catering a wedding across the street and the wife would continuously walk back and forth from the restaurant to the party all the while with her baby strapped on her back.
Sunday was both sweet and bitter. We woke up early and planned to cycle to the peak of one of the mountains outside Real. Our destination was the sacred ground of the indigenous Huichol. Every year, several tribes of Indians and spiritual leaders from the surrounding countryside come to Real de Catorce during the month of October and perform peyote rituals at the sacred site. The ride up was hard and very challenging, all the while constantly surrounded by some of the most beautiful scenery I've seen yet.
The last quarter mile to the top was steep and very treacherous so we left our bikes and peaked the mountain on foot. Our altitude at the top was about 10,000 ft. according to the GPS unit Dr. Tom Vaughan lent me.
At the top, we were greeted by a sign stating in Spanish that you are within the sacred circle of the Huichol. Around the sign are several circular arrangements of rocks in which Indians build fires in the center and sit around during their spiritual enlightenment on peyote. The locals refer to it as speaking to God. In fact, on the night I arrived, I hadn't finished unloading my gear from the vehicle when I was asked by a local, "¿Quieres hablar con Dios?" (would I like to speak to God?). I politely declined and carried on with my business. Returning to the hotel was a fast descent, lots of fun, but at the same time I was somewhat saddened that our excursion was quickly coming to an end. We had seen so much in such little time, yet there still remained a great deal to explore in and around the town.
If time permits, I plan on being in Real during the spiritual festivals in October. Don José says it is an interesting time to be in Real. The town takes on a different persona with Indians trading and selling hand-crafted items at the market during the day and festivities at night with camp fire chants and good folks. In addition to peyote rituals and tribal celebrations by Indians, the birth dates of Catholic saints like Saint Francis are also celebrated during the month of October. More than half of the population of 1,200 is Catholic. Don José said that over 5,000 make the pilgrimage to Real every year during October. In fact, the tunnel used to access the town is closed off to vehicles and open only to pedestrian traffic during peak times. "Some camp out for several days on the other side of the mountain before they make it to the town," he said.