Mexico - Chiapas

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From Mazunte we took a Collectivo (mini bus) to San Christobal De Las Casas, a charming colonial town nestled in the mountains of Chiapas. Chiapas is the most southerly region of Mexico, the poorest, and has a high proportion of indigenous people. It is apparantly quite similar to Guatemala as it is tropical, mountainous, covered in forest, and the people of the many different indigenous villages wear brightly coloured textiles. Chiapas is also home to the infamous Zapatista, a guerilla group justifiably fighting for the rights of the supressed and previously under-represented indigenous people. The state also froms the border with Guatemala, creating problems of drug trafficking, illegal immigration, and bandits. However, the entire area is crawling with the national guard patrols and roadblocks, which appear to have stablised the area and we felt quite safe.

San Christobal

My first impression was that the place is freezing! The town is quite high in the mountains and makes a stark contrast to the searing heat of the state of Oaxaca. Second impression - there are more tourists here than locals. The town is understandably a favourite hangout for tourists as it is relaxed, attractive, and makes a good base for exploring the rich, diverse surrounding countryside.

The day after we arrived was the final day of a festival marking the start of lent in a village called Chamuyla, a short bus ride from the town. The people dress up in traditional garb, dance through the streets, drink, and then run accross a track of burning straw. Afterwards, bulls are set free in the street and people attempt to ride them.

Unfortunately, the next day I got my second bout of food poisoning - mercifully this time I just suffered from stomach ache lasting several days and was only sick once. I think it was caused by a piece of flan I had in a pretty up market cafe in the main square: it appears that it´s a total lottery. I spent the day recovering.

The next day I was feeling better and we took a trip to a spectacular canyon which is a 1000m deep. We took a guided boat trip along the river at the bottom and saw quite a few crocodiles, a monkey, and other wildlife.

Socialising wise, our stay in San Christobal was fairly quiet. We met up with a friend of mine, Kjell, who's a German guy married to a local girl living in SC that I met in York through Hospitality Club some time ago. We had dinner and a couple of drinks. The only other evening out of note was our last night where we went out with another backpacking couple and stumbled (literally by the end of the evening!) accross a great bar playing Salsa, Merengue, and Reggaeton and which gave us free shots of Tequila.

Santa Rita

Two friends of Kjell and his wife Rosario were staying with them while we were in SC, and they also came out to dinner that evening. They are prominent members of a small self sufficient isolated community close to the Guatemalan border. They invited us to stay with them so we took a slightly arduous journey through spectacular scenery to their village and stayed in the house of one of them, Eufemia, for two nights. My Spanish skills were really tested and I had constant brain ache because no one there spoke any English. Luckily Tina was fantastic as a translator and helped me a great deal to understand and communicate with them. I felt very fortunate to have stayed there as this was something that many travellers would not been able to experience, and indeed the local people seemed fascinated to see us, as the only gringos. They were very welcoming and really helped us to feel at home there.

Our host, Eufemia, recounted the story of how their community was founded, which gives a real insight into some of the problems the people here face, so I will briefly summarise it. Her family were resettled by the Mexican government some twenty years ago due to a shortage of land in her home state of Veracruz. Soon after their arrival they began to have problems with neighbours growing Marujana and smuggling drugs accross the border. A wealthy man then arrived, built a large and expensive farm, and tried to get the local men to work for him smuggling drugs. He tried to force her brother to work for him, who repeatly refused despite death threats, and was eventually shot by the man's gang whilst working in the fields. Finally, the local people took up arms against the gang and killed two of them. The gang weren't used to such resistance and promptly withdrew from the area. Eufemia's other brothers were accused of murder by the Mexican police but provided with a false alibi by the military, who had secretly supported the community. Since then the community have had no such problems although it is still too dangerous to travel by night along the main road due to bandits.

Lagos De Montebello

In order to facilitate crossing the border to Guatemala during daylight hours we made a stop at Lagos De Montebello - a network of around 50 lakes lying along the border about halfway between Santa Rita and our intended crossing. We stayed in a log Cabana on the shore of one of the larger lakes. Again the scenery was spectacularly beautiful: deep lakes, mountains, and forest. We canooed around the lake, swam a little, hiked, and stayed an extra night before leaving early in the morning to take the Collectivo to Guatemala.

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Photos

Lagos De Montebello
From accross the Guatemalan border

Comments

[james]

hi
sounds like you're seeing some amazing things, things not seen by the other touists. You've also covered a hell of a lot of ground! How was the scuba diving you did the other week?

[anonymous]

have you grown a goatee?

[LukeStableford]

No. I just didn't shave for a while. It's gone now - it doesn't suit me!