You can read about our adventures in Part 1 HERE
We recently took an impromptu trip to the SOCONUSCO (southern) area of Chiapas. We actually had another trip planned, but we had to cancel it at the last minute. A return trip to Chiapas has been a dream of ours ever since we left San Cristobal a year ago. There is so much to see and do in Chiapas that one trip really isn't enough.
In part 1 we visited the geological rock formation of Pico de Loro and we ate some amazing food in the pueblo of Union Juarez.
In Part 2 we venture into the town of Tapachula. With around 320,000 residents, Tapachula is a border town near Guatemala that despite coffee tourism in the region, isn't a tourist destination in and of itself.
Day 3 in Southern Chiapas
Our tour to a chocolate plantation was cancelled. That’s a bummer. We were really looking forward to seeing the cacao plant in the wild.
We are going to spend a few hours exploring the town of Tapachula instead...
10 hours later...
Woa!
You know that scene in movies where the character walks into a bar that he or she clearly doesn’t belong in and as they enter the juke box stops and everybody stops talking a looks at them?
That’s kind of what it felt like whenever we arrived to the main plaza in Tapachula.
We got out of the taxi and we could feel eyes on us from everywhere! The city of Tapachula isn’t much of a tourist destination so I think people were just genuinely surprised and curious as to why we were there filming and taking pictures. I would be lying if I said it didn’t feel uncomfortable at first. We have traveled to a lot of small towns in Mexico, so we are used to sticking out a bit, but this was on another level.
It felt as if nobody had seen a gringo before! Even the Raramuri deep in the canyons of the Barrancas del Cobre seemed more accustomed to seeing foreigners. Our uneasiness slowly faded away as we met locals and got to know them. The people of Tapachula are so incredibly kind. Yes, they were staring at us…but they were just wanted to know why we were in their town, where we came from, etc. They were so extremely helpful and kind as we wandered through the market and around downtown. We truly felt the kindness and warmth of Mexicans today.
We are exhausted.
We didn’t do that much but walking around a new city can somehow be really tiring.
This afternoon we are going to travel the main attraction, the entire reason we came to the SOCONOSCU region of Chiapas, the century old coffee plantation of Finca Hamburgo. It’s about a two and a half hour drive away from Tapachula up in the mountains.
Like usual, we have no idea what to expect, so it should be interesting!
