The more you travel the state of Durango, each time you will find more novel surprises on all its routes
With a territory that ranks fourth in size nationwide, Durango is a propitious terrain to venture on a journey through time and memories. The traveler will rediscover old places that keep the essence of history, such as colonial towns and villages, haciendas, real de minas and the movie towns that have made the entity so famous.
The city of Durango is the ideal starting point to head in all directions, but not without first having savored its colonial atmosphere, full of temples and superb quarry mansions. Towards the south of the capital city, the former farm of La Ferrería meets, where Juan Manuel Flores established in 1828 the first beneficiation smelter for the minerals extracted from Cerro del Mercado. Not far from there is Los Alamos, a movie set that was built especially to film the story of the atomic bomb, which reproduced the town of Los Alamos, located in New Mexico, the site where the two atomic bombs dropped on were built. the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Crossing the famous Devil's Backbone, the road that heads towards Mazatlán also leads us to the meeting of filmographic images, such as those that evoke El Salto: the Town of Madera.
The southeast region takes us back to the origins of the state, a territory where the border between the Zacatecan Indians and the Tepehuanos was located in the 16th century. Precisely on that border, in what is now the Ojo de Berros ranchería, Fray Jerónimo de Mendoza officiated in 1555 the first mass on Durango soil. Nombre de Dios was the first settlement of the colonizers of the Guadiana Valley, and its temple of San Francisco, together with that of San Antonio de Padua in Amado Nervo, are two authentic jewels of the 18th century.
Towards the north of the capital we can discover the "cinema corridor" with its trilogy of sets: "La Calle Howard", San Vicente Chupaderos, and the ranch "La Joya". How many Hollywood stars left their mark here! As the legendary Pancho Villa left her in the north of the state, whose way of life was not very far from a film script. In La Coyotada, you can still visit the humble house where he was born; and further north, on the border with Chihuahua, the former Canutillo hacienda, the last residence of Pancho Villa, keeps the memory of the caudillo alive.
The northwest of the state gives us ghost towns, former farms and young cities that progressed quickly. Peñón Blanco and La Loma are the most important former haciendas in this area; In the latter it was where the famous Northern Division was organized and where Francisco Villa was appointed supreme chief. The population of Nazas also has its place in history, since the powers of the nation resided there for eight days in 1864, when President Juárez fought his struggle for the sovereignty of Mexico from the north of the country.
Already on the border with Coahuila, in the region known as the Comarca Lagunera, Ciudad Lerdo and Gómez Palacio are a palpable example of the tenacity of Durango people. In these two urban centers there is foreign influence, mainly that of Arab origin, as can be seen in the Mudejar-style parish buildings. In contrast to these two active cities, we will discover a little further north the memories of the mining bonanza, which began in the 16th century: Mapimí and Ojuela, the latter now converted into a ghost town of deep mystery, reinforced by an agonizing suspension bridge of more 300 meters in length.
Also in the northwest of the state, the gambusina footprint is present in Tejamen, one of the most beautiful and unknown ghost towns in Mexico. Later, in the foothills of the Sierra Madre Occidental, Guanaceví and Santiago Papasquiaro are the presence of the Colony and its evangelizing missions. Originally from Santiago Papasquiaro, the Revueltas brothers left a cultural legacy in the population that remains alive to this day.
On this same route you can visit the former estates of Guatimape and La Sauceda, in particular it is recommended to make a stopover in the latter, famous for having been attacked during the Tepehuana rebellion in 1616 while a patronal feast was being celebrated.
Memories, all these, of history and cinema, heritage and fantasy of wood, adobe and quarry that make Durango a jewel to discover.
