Creel

About two hours east of Barrancas, the train stops in Creel. The town is not especially attractive, but the surrounding area is lovely. About half-an-hour’s drive from the train station, you can stay in the Sierra Lodge, a small hotel built on a rise just above the river. Here you feel a part of this primitive, beautiful environment. The hotel has no electricity and no phones—at night the rooms are lit by kerosene lamps and warmed by pot-bellied stoves. Wholesome, hearty meals are included in the room rate and served family-style in a charming, rustic dining room with a large, open fireplace. The building, made of logs and stucco and topped by a corrugated tin roof, looks like an old-fashioned motel—a long strip of rooms with a porch stretching across the front, where rocking chairs are set for relaxing and enjoying the vista. The hotel is very primitive in many respects, but you are not really roughing it at the Sierra Lodge. Although the price is unbelievably low, the simple accommodations are very pleasant, with hot water in the bathrooms, comfortable beds, plenty of warm blankets, fluffy bath towels tied with ribbons, and even bathrobes in the rooms.