San Cristobal de las Casas

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April 10, Friday

Good Friday, and height of Holy Week, which is also a national holiday week. This means there were many more crowds at all the tourist spots, more traffic on the roads, and big markets going on everywhere. We got up, packed up, and all rode off together towards San Cristobal. The road to S C is absolutely amazing. Take the “Tail of the Dragon”, and add spectacular mountain views, unannounced topes (speed bumps), sections of road missing, sunken 6 inches or gravel, buses on the wrong side of the yellow line - when there is a yellow line, more amazing views, no guard rails, tiny villages with villagers walking roadside, free roaming and hobbled horses, cows, goats and sheep, and about 120 miles and you’ll have Chiapas riding. We stopped at one village where “something” was going on. All the guys had ski-masks on, they were guarding the gated street into the village center, and someone was speechifying on a loudspeaker. Apparently Sub-commandant Marco is leading some kind of quiet revolution. I’m not sure what’s happening, or why the revolution, but as long as I’m not involved in the shooting, I’m okay with it. There are many T-shirts on sale in the markets pertaining to this, so it’s not a big secret from the Federales. I’m pretty sure it’s separate from the drug wars going on west and north of here also. I still decided that pictures would not be the rigth move here. Next stop was Chamula, where a great market was happening. We parked on a side alley, courtesy of the local cops, and after locking everything up that could be locked up, we all went for a walk through the marketplace. Lots of great Mayan goods for sale, and lots of locals having a good time buying and selling. The church was all prettied up, and once I was done “window shopping” I headed back to the bikes. I “chatted” with some of the locals that were interested in the bikes, and basically hung around until the womenfolk were done looking at everything that could be looked at. On we went into San Cristobal. This is another fairly good sized town, very pretty also with a large “zona central” or city center - of course surrounding the plaza. Rafa found a hostel, and we got a tiny little room, bad beds, and the community (cold) shower and bathrooms down the hall, for 130 pesos each person per night. This tiny room cost us 260 pesos as opposed to the palatial one the night before for 230. Parking was in the garage underneath the plaza about 3 blocks away, for 130 pesos, though there was 24 hour security there. I guess that really means we spent 390 in comparison. Geesh. We walked the plaza for a while, then Rafa took us to supper at a Mayan restaurant that served me the second best meal I’ve ever had. We discovered that quiet Carla could speak fairly good English, and she took over the translation job, since Carmen had to depart. We all spent quite a bit of time with more window shopping, as this was big market week everywhere. This town is a real tourist destination for many non-american tourists. We heard several other languages, and noticed more “white” skin here than we had seen in Vera Cruz. The music around town was great, and there are many jewelry stores along the streets around the plaza.

April 11, Saturday

Happy Birthday brother Andy ! Up for breakfast, and Rafa and Neder led Deb and I to the road to Canon del Sumidero, near Tuxtla Gutierrez. We rode the tollway to get there, and were rewarded with stunning vistas. I had no idea how high we were in elevation, until we reached a point where we could look down what appeared to be 3000 feet to the valley floor below. Quite amazing. Once into the town of Chiapa de Corzo, I took a page from Rafa’s book, and rode the moto directly to the embarcadero, or boat launch point. The guys let us park the bike there, I gave the kid 20 pesos to watch it, and we bought tickets for a boat tour up into the canyon. The river flows through this canyon, and the walls go up to a height of 900 meters above the water. That’s 2953 feet ! The tour was two hours long, cost us 50 pesos each ( $4.00), and it was one amazing sight after another. The boat held about 24 people, and again, the skipper only knew full on or full off. Once we reached the dam, we made the 180 and ran back again to Chiapa de Corzo. On the bike, and out of town along the two lane “caratera libre” (free road) back to San Cristobal. Again, this road was all “dragon’s tail” quality. If you ever want to do the twisties in Mexico, this is the area to be. Back at the hostel, we traded up to a room with a shower, met up with Rafa, Neder and Carla back from their ride, and all went out for supper and more window shopping. Another great day.

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Photos

Canyon del Sumidero
900 meters almost 3000 feet !

Volcanic extrusions?
Check out the 20 man boat close to the shore