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For many years, my interest in finding caves took me to remote nooks and crannies of Western Mexico. While traveling through the backwoods, we would again and again come upon natural wonders known only to local ranchers.

Mexican long-distance thru-hiker Zelzín Aketzalli has an all-consuming goal she’s been working on for seven years.

Her mission: to connect the Pacific Crest Trail with the new National Trail of Baja California, “empowering the region’s most iconic mountain ranges and its native communities.”

The Copalita Trail is 100 kilometers long — 70 kilometers of walking and 30 of rafting — and includes five nights of camping “in a million-star hotel.”

It starts in high mountains at 3,200 meters (10,500 feet), passes through five ecosystems, takes you down the Copalita River, and ends at sea level on a gorgeous Pacific Coast beach.

For at least 300 years, the rumors have persisted: beneath the streets of Guadalajara, there is a vast network of tunnels; these connect many important buildings in the city, such as churches and convents, mansions and monuments, chapels and cemeteries; the tunnels are wide and high enough to accommodate horses and even carriages.

November is Jaguar month, and the 29th is International Jaguar Day. To celebrate the occasion properly, Mexico’s Alianza Jaguar is inaugurating a photo exhibit the night before, at the Tierra Tropical Beach Club in the town of San Francisco—popularly known as San Pancho—in Nayarit.

The opening gong for the age of international trade was struck in 1522 when Juan Sebastián Elcano succeeded in sailing around the world. Elcano’s coat of arms bears a talking globe which says, in Latin, “you were the first to encircle me.”