This hotel was the first stop in Mexico, on a Caravan Tour, which began in El Paso, TX on February 19, 2006. I arrived to see all of Creel's main street torn up due to street construction. After spending the whole day on a bus to arrive in this town all I wanted to do was to have a good meal and rest. The room I was assigned was 102. It was two doors from the bar / restaurant. My dinner consisted of weak margarita's and cold, substandard mexican food. (I live in California and love Mexican food). I decided to call it a day and go to my room. The hot air from the heater came blasting out of a 12" exhaust pipe, lined with raw fiberglass, causing fiberglass to blow into the room. There was not an individual thermostat so that I could turn the heater off. The telephone did not have instructions on how to reach the "front desk" and my tour director never gave any instructions as to what to do in case of a problem with our rooms. This was only the beginning of a very miserable night. The door did not have a safety peep hole in it. The room constantly smelled of raw sewage. But this was not the worst! When I finally settled in, and tried to sleep in this awful room, I was continually disturbed by the traffic in the parking lot to and from the bar. The traffic consisted of many trucks coming into parking lot, people talking, (the windows were single pane and the people, 99% men, could have been in the room with me,it was so loud). Every time someone would park their truck the horn would honk when they locked the doors of their vehicle. The band continued to play until 1AM and the patrons of the bar were there until the band stopped. Finally sleep....until 6AM when the restaurant employees began banging around in the kitchen. This hotel was awful. There are many problems with it. I would never reccommend it and would never stay there again. The next day I talked to our tour director about some of these problems and he did say that the proper procedure would have been to talk to the management of the hotel about my discomfort. Even if I had, the entire place was booked with our whole tour. I could not have been moved, unless it was to a different hotel. I do not like to make complaints without solutions. The suggestions are as follows:

Make a garden out of the parking lot and have the patrons of the bar and restaurant park elsewhere.

Put peep holes in the doors.

Replace the windows with double pane glass.

Stop the music at 11PM and warn the motel customers that here will be music until that time.

Repair the heater. That heater is a health hazard!

We stayed at the Parador de la Montana as part of a tour through the Copper Canyon. We enjoyed the mountain feeling of Creel and after driving from El Paso that day, we had a good feeling of the area. This property is basic rather than rustic. One level and doors to the rooms lead out to the parking lot. Motel 6-like. However, everything in this little Mexican town as a bit below par, so I would not be too harsh. Food was very good that night-- so I am not giving it a 2 star. Staff helpful. Clean but very basic is what I would rate it.

Located on the main street of Creel, about 4 blocks from the train station, this is an OK place to spend the night. The restaurant is a good site for breakfast. The place is old and has seen better days, but that is true for most of the buildings in Creel.

We just returned from a trip through the Copper Canyon, on the "premiere class" El Chepe train. We spent much time reviewing places to stay and trying to decide how long to stay at each location.

I can say that we were very, very pleased with the Parador de la Montana hotel, where we stayed for two nights. The hotel consists of a main building containing the reception area, nice seating area with fireplace and very good restaurant. External to the main building are two buildings, each containing a row of rooms, facing each other across a parking area. The buildings are done in that quaint Mexican style you would expect. Each room is quite large, with a pair of large double beds, a night stand, a table, color TV, and phone, and high wood-beam ceilings and stucco walls. The sink/vanity is in an alcove off of the main room. Off of this is the separate bathroom containing the toilet and shower, allowing two people to get ready at once essentially.

Creel is a fun little town, obviously very in tune to its role as a tourist stop on the train line but still a mountain town where people live and work. There are many restaurants and cafes, and a couple of internet cafes (one is still under construction) albeit small with only a few stations in each but high-speed, and not much in the cafe aspect. But you can get very tasty Latte's elsewhere if you need to, but think genuine coffee cup size latte, not the Starbucks vente Caramel Machiato variety. It has primarily a single main street, with some lodging/food facilities but predominantly houses off the main street as well.

The Best Western, which we considered but couldn't get a room at, also looked nice from the outside though we did not investigate.

Lots of shops selling Taramuhara and locally hand-made wares, including great wood hand-hewn furniture. Any of the hotels can arrange tours.

Cell phone service at major stops along the train route, like Creel, is fine, if you have a GSM phone that handles the relevant frequencies.