Puerto Madero, Chiapas

Nostalgia, as the saying goes, ain't what it used to be. I keep butting up against that saying every time we hit a moment of memory on the road. Our latest failed effort to conjure up happy memories took place this week when we arrived, our of the mountains of Chiapas back onto the Pacific coastline.  23 years ago we sailed into Puerto Madero ready to file papers to exit Mexico and sail to El Salvador, four days away, to the port of La Union on the mythical Gulf of Fonseca. This week we went back to see what we might find.

We drove out of the mountains planning to find a surfer's campground reportedly in Puerto Madero on the beach. We reached level ground and drove into the largest city in this corner of Mexico, Tapachula, a city of 150,000 they say, half an hour from the Pacific.  Rusty was running out of food so that emergency had to be handled swiftly.

While I walked Rusty after the long drive Layne took the time to pop across the street and pick up some fruits and vegetables. Soriana is home to dog food for Rusty, loose dog food for street dogs, and cheap wine.  We were ready to camp by the beach.

We took the highway out of Tapachula toward the beach. We actually traveled part of that road when we were last in the area as sailors. To check out of Mexico boat travelers had to hitch a ride to Tapachula airport to have immigration stamp them out, and I remember a group of us hired a collectivo to do the job, a twenty minute ride. It was exciting to go inland and I was sorry when the ride was over. The insurgency was at its height at the turn of the century and I wanted to see more of Chiapas. Tapachula airport wasn’t enough! Now, 23 years later I got to see more and that was more than enough. 

It's just another highway. And Puerto Madero, a town I remember as vibrant and alive, a place where we hired a Guatemalan immigrant to pedal a tricycle taxi for us to go into town to eat tacos on the street. Time has not been kind to Puerto Madero whose name is being changed again, this time to Puerto Chiapas. 

It started out as Puerto Benito in the 19th century and was planned to be Mexico's southern bulwark on the Pacific, about 25 miles from the river separating Guatemala from Mexico. I remember sailing close by the coast and spotting a tall tower sticking up from the foliage, a pale blue and white horizontally striped tower marked the start of Central America. I sat in the cockpit of my boat and wondered where I was going. I had far fewer such feelings on my return.

We drove the Main Street and turned left at the waterfront, past crowds of waiting tricycle taxis, now equipped with motors and steered by young Mexicans otherwise unemployed in this dead end town. I found the lighthouse of fond memory, below. 

23 years ago it was not cut off by a wall so we walked up through the sand and met the keeper who showed us a tree we have managed to never forget. I had no idea cashews, those most delicious of nuts, grew  individually on a tree, hanging from a fruit that looked to me like a green bell pepper and this one nut was the sole product. I was amazed at nature's effort to put out a delicious cashew and I have tried ever since to eat them individually with respect.

We drove the back streets of Puerto Madero in an effort to find the campground but the streets were ruined and as we lurched we got more and more depressed by the filth and sense of post apocalyptic abandonment. We called it quits after we got stopped by low hanging wires and low hanging mangoes and narrow streets with badly parked motorcycles and so forth. 

It seemed like Puerto Madero's march to insignificance has not been changed by its new name, as pointed out rather ruefully in a commentary I read on line (love the Internet!) written by a Mexican scholar. The harbor too is closed now to the public and where we anchored is barely visible except as a slice of water and a buoy, spied from the street.

We haven't had much luck revisiting old haunts, Tenacatita Bay has been ravaged by lawsuits and Mulege is a fashionable overcrowded resort compared to my wife's fond memories. Like Puerto Madero, San Blas further north has been left to sag gently into dust and obscurity by the passing of time.

We fled back up the road to the airport and Tapachula beyond and started to plan where we would sleep. Needless to say nostalgia took a bad hit here and we left town thinking more about our immediate future than anything to do with the past.

We always try to plan a back up if the campground or resting place listed on the Internet or in a guide or by word of mouth doesn't work out. In this case we had planned to stop at a Pemex gas station for the night. However by the time we got back to Tapachula it was still 90 minutes till dark and we prefer to coincide with darkness when we arrive at a gas station and ask to spend the night. So we drove on, and as we drove we reminisced about our sailing trip and the places we had seen and how time ravages all of us in one way or another. I nixed the first several Pemex gas stations as too close to the city, then we were out in the country and darkness was falling and there was nothing anywhere. We made a U-turn and drove into one lonely gas station. The employee at first ignored us and when he approached he was so shifty we just said thanks but no thanks, took no gas and drove off.  

Highway 200 passed through the town of Acacoyagua where we saw another Pemex, not in our favorite location, a noisy town but with some room for us to park even though it was not large enough to serve as a proper truck stop. Nothing ventured nothing gained so we asked if we could "dejar" (stop) for the night. The employee pointed out a far corner I promised no mess and no fuss and we filled the tank with $75 of 87 octane Magna gas. Prices in southern Mexico are a little higher than the northern states but prices are regulated and there hasn't been the sort of gouging seen in the US. In Mexico regular gas costs a little more than $4 a US gallon. For us the price is immaterial when we are traveling. We burn it and we pay for it. However our night's sleep was free and very comfortable. Our van has excellent insulation and outside noises are very muffled.

Rusty and I went for a walk but we didn't go far. He wasn't in the mood for ambushes by street dogs and he was tired after a long day of keeping his balance as we drove and pretty soon we were tucked up and watching TV lost to the world outside. Van Life: sleep as you are.