The last Mexican night flies away slowly but inexorably, like the course of the rio Usumacinta, where we are staying now. The road that has lead us from the highlands near Comitàn to Frontera Corozal, it is a hard way through an incredible landscape. After the wonderful Lagunas de Montebello, some blue and green emerald lakes encircled by pines, the road falls down towards the jungle, along the border with Guatemala. That’s why it is called “carretera fronteriza”. Until the village of Benemerito de Las Americas, we observe the fruit of decades of totally irrational exploitation of the territory. With the promise of an easy land, the campesinos from the highlands were sent here (see the experience of ejido Emiliano Zapata), every time deeper in the heart of the Lacandon jungle. But the absence of a clever agricultural project forced to an extensive and unproductive exploitation of the land. As dramatic consequence, we see a forest in agony and the return of the large estate owners, in places where they could never have arrived even with enormous resources. Frontera Corozal isn’t free from these problems, but its inhabitants seem to have found a valid alternative in projects of “ecotourism”, thanks to the beauty of the river Usumacinta and the wealth of life along its sides (finally we have seen the howler monkeys!). Moreover a few kilometers from the community there are Mayan ruins such as Yaxchilan and Bonampak.
