The Expedition to the Rio Lacanja

10 minute YouTube video. Lots of footage from 2 GoPros, Nikon D5000, and a Kodak Playsport.

Tom roaring at the jungle covered Landeros Ruins

Google Earth image of the surrounding areas

The transcript of the video narration:

Our adventure began in San Cristóbal de Las Casas a day before the end of the Mayan Calendar on December 20th, 2012. We packed Alejandro’s van with a 14 foot NRS self-bailer and other expedition gear. From San Cristóbal we wound our way to Palenque where we met the expedition leader, Rocky Contos.

Rocky Contos has explored nearly every river in Mexico and has over 200 first descents in Mexico alone. He explored the Lacanjá in 2011 and this would be the first SierraRios.org expedition to make it’s way down the entire length of the river. From Palenque we headed east passing near the Bonampak ruins to reach the put in at the town of Lacanjá.

The turquoise waters of the Rio Lacanjá flow from the pristine jungle mountains in Eastern Chiapas near the border of El Petén in Guatemala.

A quick look at a satellite image of this region reveals nothing but green, green and more green with very few access points. This is one of few relatively untouched stretches of jungle left in Central America.

The Lacanja stretches nearly 90 kilometers dropping around 700 feet in that distance. Instead of a gradual change in elevation, it is concentrated in dozens of travertine limestone drops ranging from a class II to V.
 

Landeros Ruins

This was our white Christmas…

Although the river was filled with innumerable white water treats, there were a few hardships we had to endure in the jungles of southern mexico.

Some days we needed to use the saw and the machete to hack our way through vine covered passages that blocked our way on the river.

Ancient Mayan temples and cities lay in ruins alongside the river. It felt like we were the first explorers stumbling across the strange stone structures reclaimed by the jungle for the first time.

On Day 7 we arrived at the confluence with a much larger river, the Lacantún. We paddled another 20 kilometers to reach the first river beach we had seen in over a week. The full moon shone brightly as we set up our tents for the last time and said our goodbyes to our jungle adventure.