Tuesday-Wednesday 8-9 July 2003
Another tough night went by hunting mosquitoes and resulting in too little sleep. Next morning we flew to Tuxla Gutierrez expectant of what the poor Chiapas area would reveal for us. The plane was late, but we enjoyed the view over the southern Mexico and the Caribbean Sea.
We arrived at Tuxla Gutierrez late in the afternoon just to realize that this city was not adorable at all. It was a big and modern city, much more worn down and sordid than the other cities we had seen. We had great fun walking around and watching people, but the city itself had not much to offer. The moisture and the 35 degrees Celsius heat almost knocked us out. We were sleepy and hungry.
It was a lazy day for us and after a great lunch of lamb, pepper, onion and guacamole we went back to the small rooms of “Hotel Casablanca”, all the green plants and the so-it-is-said thievish staff.
We slept all next morning enjoying the fact that we were on holiday. Unfortunately, but expectantly, our stomach upset and we were queasy and dizzy. After a nice breakfast, we found the bus to “Chiapa de Corzo” as we were going to explore the nature of Mexico, in this case the ravine “Cañon del Sumidero”. The bus was an old, noisy, local minibus without much space.
The bus stopped and we got off at the spot were highway 199 intersects the river. We walked the short distance to the boat service, bought tickets and we were placed in the open boat. Here we waited almost half an hour in the baking hot sun before the departure. The trip was absolute fantastic. We sailed through the gorge with impressive steep cliffs, at times up to a kilometer in height. The boat slowed down under small waterfalls and at nice ravines, and we enjoyed the fresh air and the many nice birds. The boat trip was about two hours and the best tour so far.
Back in Tuxla we fetched our luggage and got on a first class bus to the mountain city “San Christóbal de Las Casas”. The tour was spectacular as we drove to 1.500-meter altitude with an astonishing view all the way.