Sumidero Canyon, Chiapas

From the Oaxacan Coast on the Pacific I traveled southeast to the state of Chiapas on yet another night bus. After nine hours I made it to Tuxla Gutierez, the capital of Chiapas. The city is a major transportation hub, and close to the Sumidero Canyon, but not a particularly pretty place. Later that day I was planning to make it to the much more charming town of San Cristobol but first I wanted t to see the impressive Sumidero Canyon located between the two cities.

When I arrived at the bus station and got my bearings I found some other travelers and asked if they were also heading to the Canyon. I figured there was a good chance of it and we could all share a taxi or two and make things a lot easier. They were a group of five students from the UK spending there last bits of summer break in Mexico. I helped with the Spanish and together we made it to the small town of Chiapas de Corzo to take a tour of the gorgeous Sumidero Canyon.
















The tour started off tame enough then the banks of the river and man made reservoir began to rise. Before long we were skimming along the water between two huge canyon walls. The riding at the back of the boat oh the main deck was nice, but the seat next to the captain on the flying bridge looked much more appealing. Early into our trip I asked if I could sit up top with him and it was no problem at all. That's one of the things that I have really grown to love about Mexico. The people are fairly loose and there is always a way. The view from up top was amazing and I even earned my seat by translating parts of his tour from Spanish to English.

The canyon was gorgeous and truly impressive. At one point the canyon walls climbed to nearly 1000 meters; it's greatest depth near the hydroelectric damn was 300 meters. The force of the water falling through the turbines was reported to produce half of all of Mexico's electricity. There is something about doesn't sound right about that, but that's what he said.























Along the way we passed a number of water falls that were gushing due to the recent rainfall. The most impressive was the “Christmas Tree” cascade which, as you would imagine, looks like a Christmas tree from the distance. The only drag about the canyon was all of the trash floating in the reservoir. washed into the canyon from the nearby towns with recent rain. It was a shame to see so much trash in such an amazing landscape, but that is Mexico unfortunately.

On the way back we found some crocodiles hanging out along the banks of the reservoir. That was an exciting part of the trip, but not enough to keep three of our group from falling asleep on the way back to the docks. We all had a long night on the bus.
















After our boat ride, back in Chiapa de Corzo, we had lunch and saw some of the town before making our way to San Cristobol which was less than an hour away. I had originally planned to hitch hike so I asked them if they were up for it. We decided to split into groups of two and race each other to San Cristobol. The winners would be buying the losers a round of beers.














Brick gazebo