On our last day in San Cristóbal, we decided to get an early start, drive to Chiapa de Corzo, and take a tour of the Cañón del Sumidero before heading to Tuxtla Gutiérrez. It's a very striking canyon that you tour via speedboats that take you up the river to look at the dam and back. To get there, we took the most harrowing ride of my life.
We hired a local cab driver to take us to Tuxtla Gutiérrez and drop us off to see the Cañón del Sumidero for a couple of hours. Kidnappings or robberies of tourists has been on the rise, so I was a bit on edge to begin with. About 15 minutes into the trip, I realized that kidnapping was the least of my worries. I was far more likely to die in a car wreck, tumbling down the side of the mountain. Although they are building a super highway (two lanes in each direction!) from Tuxtla Gutiérrez to San Cristóbal, the road was only available for the last 15 minutes of the ride. The first part of the trip was on an extremely winding road along the edge of the mountain. Our cab driver was not in favor of waiting for anybody or anything. He did not slow down on curves, he sped up (I'm not joking!). If a large truck was moving slowly in front of us, he would pass the truck on a blind curve. At least twice he had misjudged passing a car in front of us and slammed on the brakes to avoid having a head-on collision with the car in front of us. Every 500 feet, there was another sign that read "CURVA PELIGRASO" (dangerous curves) or "NO MALTRATE LAS SENALES" (don't disregard the signs). There were small shrines along the side of the road of people that most likely had driven over the edge and down the edge of the mountain. I eventually tapped into my inner Buddha and told myself that if I was meant to die on the road to Tuxtla Gutiérrez, then so be it. It would at least be a quick death. Oh...and there were no seat belts in the car.
We made it to Chiapa de Corzo and immediately got on a bus for a tour of the Cañón del Sumidero. We kind of lucked out and got on a group that was primarily comprised of a bunch of middle-aged Mexican women touring together. Although they generally didn't speak English, they were a hoot. They had one American travelling with them - a retired gentlemen from Madison, Wisconsin, who had moved here so that his wife could be closer to her family. He had decided to tour with this group of women more because they were so much fun. They would cheer, take pictures of each other, and in general have a great time. The canyon was very impressive. The pictures don't do it justice.
In the middle of the canyon is a small cave that our boat drove up to. You cannot reach this area by land, you have to use a boat. There's a small ladder up to a ledge where shrine was built to the people that discovered the area and worked to keep the local wildlife protected.
We drove to the dam and instead of going right back to the spot that we left from, our driver took us to a small restaurant along the river for drinks and snacks. Unfortunately, we learned first hand the meaning of "tourist trap". It was obvious that our boat driver either owned the restaurant or was getting a lot of money from the owner for bringing tourists. We were in the middle of the river with no way to get out. Everyone ordered a full lunch. We were stuck in the restaurant for about an hour and a half. David and I started becoming worried because our cab driver had been told that it would be a two hour trip. It ended up being a four hour trip. On the plus side, there were a couple of cute parrots at the resturant that were very social.
We were very relieved to get back to our starting point and see our cab driver there and not overly pissed off that we took two hours longer than we originally thought. We went to Tuxtla Gutiérrez, had a nice lunch at the airport cafe, and headed on to Mexico City for the final portion of the trip.