Northern Mexico
Discover Northern Mexico
Introduction
Northern Mexico is the big, dry, industrial half of the country, and it feels different from the centre and south in almost every respect: fewer people per square kilometre, more cattle, more wheat and beef than corn and chilli, and a musical tradition — norteño, with its accordion — that came from central European immigrants rather than from Spain.
Monterrey, below the jagged Cerro de la Silla, is the manufacturing and financial capital of the region and the third-largest city in Mexico. West of it, the Sierra Madre Occidental holds the Copper Canyon, a system of gorges larger and in places deeper than the Grand Canyon, crossed by the Chihuahua-Pacífico railway on one of the great train journeys in the Americas; the Rarámuri people who live there are known for long-distance running. Colonial silver built the other reason to come: Zacatecas and San Luis Potosí are UNESCO-listed cities of pink stone and baroque churches.
The Chihuahuan and Sonoran deserts cover much of the ground between, with real extremes — hot summers, cold desert nights, and winter snow in the sierra. The United States border runs along the whole northern edge, and the border cities have an economy and a culture that belong to both countries at once.