El Chorreadero is called the sportiest cave in the world by some due to its many jumps and slides. After reading about it online a few years ago, I’ve been looking for an excuse to go to Chiapas, Mexico, and do it! For spring 2021, I found sub-$200 round trip tickets to Mexico City out of Las Vegas, so I put a trip together with the first half focused around Mexico City and the second half down in Chiapas. With our group of 11 people, we toured Mexico City, Climbed the 17,000-foot volcano Iztaccihuatl, and visited the amazing Tolantongo caves before flying into Tuxtla Guiterrez, Chiapas.
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| El Chorreadero |
El Chorreadero was the only canyoneering type activity we’d be hitting on the trip, so we opted to hire Petra Vertical to run the shuttle for us, provide all the gear, and take us through the canyon. We were doing this whole trip without any Spanish speakers in the group. There were very few people who spoke English down there, so we had some challenges getting around. We stayed in an Airbnb in Tuxtla Gutierrez for the first night and checked out the area. Looking back, I wish we had stayed in the nearby city of San Cristobal, which was much more tourist-friendly.
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| Chilling out on the roof of the Airbnb in Tuxla |
The guides picked us up the next morning at our Airbnb and the driver dropped us all off at the top entrance to the canyon. Most people who explore the cave go in through the bottom entrance for a shorter, less difficult route, but I had talked the guides into taking us to the top to do the full route. There was an incredible amount of garbage near the top trailhead, and I got the feeling that I was wading through a dump as we cut down into the canyon. The trail put us right at the head of the canyon, which was quite impressive with high limestone walls covered in greenery and vines.
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| The upper entrance |
The upper part of the canyon usually flows from December through the first few months of the year but was not flowing anymore by the time we got there. This initial intro section of the canyon contains a few downclimbs and short rappels, with high canyon walls and a few rock arches.
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| An arch in the upper slot |
The upper slot is one of the most scenic canyons I've descended. One of the most unique features of El Chorreadero is that it switches from being a slot canyon to a cave early on. A rappel at the end of the slot section deposited us into a dark chamber where we got the last view of the sun that we’d have for the next 6 hours or so.
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| Heading deeper into the slot |
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| Entering the cave |
Despite being completely underground, the cave's walls made it look like we were traveling through a slot canyon. The section from the start of the darkness to the first huge chamber was the most challenging and time-consuming part of the cave. It was filled with many pools of clear water. We even encountered a few water-filled potholes in this section, which could become very difficult to escape if water levels were lower.
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| Rappelling into a pool |
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| One of the many short drops |
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| Escaping a pothole |
Most of the rappels were in the first cave section, along with quite a few jumps. The guides knew which drops could be jumped, and saved us tons of time that we would have spent depth checking. They only agreed to take a group as large as ours through the cave because of our experience and expected us to do all the jumps for efficiency's sake. Some of the jumps were sketchy, like a precision jump into a smallish pothole, and another one where we had to crawl out on a ledge and slide into a 20-foot drop. You had to slide off of the cliff, because if you jumped you’d hit the opposite wall!
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| Crawling out to the jump |
There was an amazing sequence of back-to-back jumps, which was a highlight for many in the group. Cliff jumping in a cave was unique and one of the best parts of the experience.
We took a lunch break in a giant room and admired some amazing cave formations, including a 40-foot-tall flowstone feature called the Medusa.
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| The Medusa |
The giant room led to an even bigger chamber, that was so large that a passenger airplane could've fit inside it! This second large room marked a transition in the cave from a slot canyon shape to more of what you’d think of in a traditional cave. A stream soon entered from the side and we had flowing water for the rest of the canyon.
We were getting pretty cold in our 3mm wetsuits after spending hours swimming and jumping through cold pools. We were relieved to discover that the flowing water was warmer than the standing water we had just spent hours swimming through. I thought that this section of the cave was the best part. There were more cave formations and beautiful waterfalls.
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| Hanging out under one of the slides |
This part of the canyon can be accessed through the bottom entrance through a side passage, but I can’t imagine missing out on everything above it. The final section had jumps and even a 20-foot-tall natural waterslide! The final rappel deposited us in a large pool filled with bat guano that he had to swim across. We got one last jump in while exiting the cave and continued down to the park entrance where many people swim.
Overall, it took us about 7 hours from car to car with nearly all of that time being spent in the cave. El Chorreadero is more like a canyoneering adventure underground than it is a typical spelunking trip. It's in my list of top five most enjoyable canyons that I’ve done. It’s kinda like California’s Jump Canyon, but underground. Multiple people in our group said they’d come back to Mexico just to do El Chorreadero again. I’d like to do it in December next time when the first half of the canyon is flowing, but I’d probably want my 5mm wetsuit to stay warm. We were fine in 3mm wetsuits but got pretty chilly at times, so if you are skinny and run cold I’d take at least a 4/3 wetsuit in there.
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| Group photo at the lower entrance |
Hiring Petra Vertical turned out to be a great choice. They were very flexible and provided what we needed based on our group's experience. It allowed us to fly around during the Mexico trip without checking a single bag. They moved our group of 11 through the canyon a lot faster than we would have on our own, though from a technical standpoint, we could have self-guided the Canyon. I have heard from others that the people who own the bottom entrance of the cave have extorted foreigners seeking permission to descend El Chorreadero. The guides had a relationship with the property owners so we didn't have to deal with paying them off.
We capped off our trip by visiting Palenque, Aqua Azul, and rafting the Rio Shumulja. Some might want to combine El Chorreadero with the Rio La Venta expedition nearby, but working your way across Chiapas from the Chorreadero area to Palenque like we did is another incredible option that allows you to see a lot and fly back home out of Villahermosa. There really aren't enough canyons down there to make a canyoneering-only trip down to Chiapas, but there are plenty of other things to do down there that any canyoneer or caver would love.
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| Somewhere in the first section of the cave |
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