Catemaco

Laguna Catemaco is a a gorgeous lake, and a quiet place to walk the malecón during the down season. We´re camping next to a restuarant right on the water, where we´re woken up by the screams of herons and other birds, as well as the smell of huevos in the morning. Camping on the restaurant´s property is cheap and especially convenient for wandering out to a view of the lake - where there are tons of guys asking us if we want a boat ride every ten seconds. It´s November and I think we´re the only tourists in town.

Today we took a lancha out on the lake, after finding a good deal among the many men offering tours, and it was a beautifully warm overcast day to ride on the water. Before we boarded, our boat guide walked us to the back of a restaurant on the malecón where he had his boat parked, and showed us the caged crocodile and turtles that he "trains". He said "you will see many cocodrilos."

Among the places of interest in the lake that you can only reach by boat - Islita de las Garzas, little island of herons, the aquatic garden (which, from what I could tell, was just a bunch of lilly pads), and the Isla de Changos, monkey island! Our boat pulled up super close to a tree hanging over the water where there were at least five hanging out. He tried calling them over for us, then another boat pulled up and threw crackers at them and they came in really close. Obese fuzzy ugly red-faced monkeys, the first I´ve seen outside of a zoo! Apparently they were put there on that island, monkeys from Thailand, for the purpose of giving some guys a job to do by taking tourists out to see them... a type of ecological experiment.

We got off the boat at the Parque Nacional Nanciyaga, a rainforest reserve with a hokey little tour we had to pay for. We also got mineral mud masks of the lake sediment, and drank the mineral water that occurs naturally there, out of banana leaf cups. Here there are smaller brown monkeys that are natural to the jungle, but we could only see one waaaay up high in the trees.