Visiting Camino Reale de Tierra Adentro – a route which probably has a history of very harsh conditions hundreds of years ago, makes you somewhat respectful. Nevertheless as an overseas traveler the knowledge of these facts is superficial, but still we would like to look into this site - at least some of the authentic places that the site comprises of - to see what it’s like today.

On our three week visit to Mexico july 2017 we had singled out a number of sites on the “Camino” for potential visits, in addition to WHS cities. It’s easy to tick of this site with no extra effort, but we would like to see if we could find other parts of the old road.

Three days into our visit, on our route from Tula de Allende towards Morelia, we headed to Cañada de Madero, Hacienda la Cañada and the vicinity. The gps was taking us from major roads and onto the smaller roads when we finally arrived at a location that in fact was a piece of the original road. This is now a calm part of central Mexico. We drove several kilometers of cobblestone street passing a romantic stone bridge – the Colima bridge and passed a few riding “vaqueros”. Houses and buildings along the road are hardly as old as the road, but very nice looking. Together with the lush vegetation it makes up a “picture” that really looked nice. In “the end” of the stub there was the hacienda la Cañada. The inside wasn’t accessible to us, but the World Heritage sign was right outside the hacienda. This first encounter made a good impression on us.

Like everyone else, we visited the historic centre of Zacatecas, Guanajuato, San Miguel de Allende and Queretaro and they all are separate World heritage sites. In addition we stopped by Aguascalientes for lunch, and went to the Museo del Muerte. If you’re Spanish speaking and are more than medium interested in death this might be more rewarding site than it was to us.

On the road from Zacatecas to Guanajuato we went to the former hacienda San Blass of Pabellon de Hidalgo. The hacienda was recently restored and is used as a museum. It includes pieces from the revolution and also several murals from the artist Alfredo Zermeño Flores, where he catches the cultural, political and social events of the last 200 years. There was also a nice collection of different types of cactuses. It was a very beautiful place to visit even though it was extremely hot.

We took a few detours searching for a bridge and another part of the old road without result, but that’s part of the game. This “treasure hunt” takes time and there isn’t always enough time on the road.

Outside San Miguel de Allende we visited the baroque sanctuary of Jesús Nazareno de Atotonilco. We arrived to early in the day and the church was closed. We had to return a few hours later, but it was really worth it! The church has fantastic inside decorations, is incredibly detailed, artistic and just great! The wall paintings/decorations were mostly done by the artist Antonio Martinez de Pocasangre. We also visited the hospital of San Juan de Dios, and could not see anything but the exterior. This site has also been reviewed well.

The eighth site we visited was the chapel of the former hacienda of Buenavista. The Hacienda wasn’t that hard to find, but we had to drive around the Hacienda a couple of times to find the chapel. The Chapel was quite simple, but still in use. The hacienda hasn’t been in use for a while and looked liked it. Was it worth a detour? Not really! The best experience was to see the big “Patrimonio Mundial” sign outside, which even had a bronze statue of a man with a sword and a flag. Viva Mexico!

With five cities and four “other sites” we have visited around one seventh of all the 59 sites. It’s far from enough but we now have a small impression of the “Camino”. The search and find activity is satisfying in itself, if you have the time. We still have more sites to visit in Mexico so we have to return one day, maybe up in the north in Durango.