Usumacinta - the sacred monkey river

by Clare Ann Matz (Italy)

A leap into the unknown Mexico

The train slowed down with a grinding scream, metal wheels on rusty tracks, coming to a jolting stop in the dead of night on the outskirts of Tenosique, a village off the beaten track in Tabasco, Mexico. What I was doing here, I wasn't quite sure, traveling with a stranger I had met only a few days earlier in Palenque. Klaus was a young German who had been living in the region for several years. He had first appeared to me stepping out from between long jungle lianas onto the white stone ledge of the Agua Azul water basin, wearing nothing but a loincloth and a red bandanna around his head, taming his long red hair. He looked wildly handsome and absolutely unattainable. And yet within a few hours, he had convinced me to travel with him into the depths of the Sierra de Lacandon, buy a cayuco (a long canoe carved out of a single tree trunk) from the indios. The scope of this was to paddle 200 km. downstream the Usumacinta river and sell the cayuco in the port of Parque La Capechanita on the Gulf of Mexico for twice its original price. I had been on the road for many months and was running short of cash, so it sounded like a good plan to me. Now as I scrambled off the train dragging my few belongings (a hammock, a mosquito net and a small bag with a few rags) I was starting to have some doubts. But as the sun rose over the dusty streets of Tenosique and after having breakfast with hot, bitter cafe and steaming corn tamales, I was already feeling better about my decision. We set off hitching a ride to San Jose Los Rieles and then in the scorching afternoon heat continued to Santo Tomas where we spent the night hanging our hammocks and mosquito nets from the branches of tamarind trees in the yard of one of Klaus' numerous friends. He was well known by the locals and appreciated his wicked sense of humor, most of which was lost on me because I couldn't speak Spanish that well. The next morning we left at the blue hour and walked following dirt roads throughout the day until we reached the village of El Porvenir. With only a brief pause to drink a warm, fluorescent green Fanta from a tiny shack-shop we continued until we met the jungle which rose towering high, a wall of dense vegetation, a labyrinth broken by tiny paths that separated and rejoined creating a riddle I could only follow by complete faith in my guide Klaus. The canopy high above our heads allowed for only a few shafts of sunlight to filter down and illuminate the trail below our feet. The damp heat created an overpowering smell of decaying wilderness, and soon all details of leaves, vines, exotic flowers, and tree trunks soon blended into one extraordinary hue of nauseating green. Stumbling over the roots and rocks I soon had the impression we must be walking in circles, and time seemed to dilate transforming hours into eons, and kilometers into infinity. Bellowing, shrieking, hollering animal sounds burst out close and far. Terrifying, roaring spider monkeys. A million insects, silvery snakes, huge spiders all needed to be stepped over, ducted under, avoided in a dance that made walking even more exhausting, and frightening as the sun started to set above the arbor dome. When all hope was gone and every ounce of energy drained from me the jungle vanished, as suddenly as it had appeared, all vegetation closing behind, as my body fell exhausted on a sandy beach. And below... flowing gently with the warm reflections of dusk the Usumacinta, the Sacred Monkey river. When I managed to adjust my eyes to the change of light I noticed nestled high up on the opposite shore a tiny hamlet made up of half a dozen bamboo huts. The indios had already recognized Klaus and were chanting out his name. We had made it at last! I was going to buy a cayuco and sail down the rapids facing an adventure that would change my life. But that, is another story...