The coast road
Although Highway 180 via Ciudad del carmen is narrow, crumbling into the sea in places and usually ignored by tourists intent on visiting Palenque, this journev is a beautiful one and more interesting than the fast toll road inland to Campeche. The road threads its way from Villahermosa 78 km north through marshland and rich cacao, banana and coconut plantations, passing turn-offs to several tiny coastal villages with palm-lined but otherwise mediocre beaches. It eventually leads to the river port of Frontera (Population; 28,650), where Graham Greene began the research journey in 1938 that led to the publication of The Lawless Roads and later to The Power and the Glory. The k’eria Guadalupana is held from 3-13 December, with an agricultural show, bullfights, charreadas and regional dances.
Calakmul
Three hundred kilometres southeast from Campeche town, and a further 60 km off the main Escarcega-Chetumal road, the ruins of Calakmul are only accessible by car The site has been the subject of much attention in recent years, due to the previously concealed scale of the place. It is now believed to be one of the largest archaeological sites in Mesoamerica, and certainly the biggest of all the Maya cities, with somewhere in the region often thousand buildings in total, many of them as yet unexplored.
There is evidence that Calakmul was begun in 300 BC, and continually added
Isla Aguada
Eleven kilometres beyond Carmen is the Rancho EIFfriix, with an interesting iguana (lagarto) hatchery. Highway 180 runs northeast along the Isla del Carmen and crosses the bridge to Isia Aguada (C Hotel Tarpon Tropical. D Motel La Cabana and Trailer Park at former boat landing just after the toll bridge. Full hook-up, hot showers, laundry facilities, quiet, US$12 for vehicle and two people), actually a narrow peninsula with more deserted shell-littered beaches on the Gulf shore. The road then undulates its way northeast through tiny fishing villages towards Campeche; there are many offshore oil rigs to be seen. At
Champoton
Back near the west coast of Campeche State, Route 261 runs 86 km due north from Escarcega through dense forest to the Gulf of Mexico, where it joins the coastal route at Champoton, a relaxed but run-down fishing and shrimping port spread along the banks of Rio Champoton. In pre-Hispanic times it was an important trading link between Guatemala and Central Mexico; Toltec and Maya mingled here, followed by the Spaniards; in fact blood was shed here when Francisco Hernandez de Corboba was fatally wounded in a skirmish with the inhabitants in 1517. On the
Hochob
Of the more remote and even less-visited sites beyond Edzna", Hochob and Dzibilnocac are the best choices for the non-specialist. Hochob is reached by turning right at Hopelche'n on Highway 261,85 km east of Campeche. This quiet town has an impressive fortified 16th-century church but only one hotel, D Los Arcos. A traditional honey and corn festival is held on 13-17 April; another fiesta takes place each 3 May on the Uia de la Santa Cruz. From here a narrow paved road leads 41 km south to the village of Dzibalchen; no hotels but hammock hooks and toilet facilities upon
Agua Caliente: Guadalajara
This is a place of the entertainment to stop especially if you have children and need a rupture of the cultural stops with Guadalajara. This park has hardly especially that you will need to camp and to enjoy you. It is of étinceler clean and has higher slides of the notch. Impulse of road 80 of Mexico de Guadalajara of the west towards the coast. The impulse through the crown of the country cottage beyond the park and the Hot Water of the water of "Chimulco" is less than 2 km right in the road.
Campeche
81 Highway 180 enters the city as the divided Avenida Resurgimiento, which passes either side of the huge Monumento al Resurgimiento, a stone torso holding aloft the torch of Democracy_ Originally the trading village of Ah Kim Pech, it was here that the Spaniards, under Francisco Hernandez de Cordoba, first disembarked on Mexican soil (22 March 1517) to replenish their water supply. .For fear of being attacked by the native population, they quickly left, only to be attacked later by the locals further south in Champotdn, where they were forced to land by appalling weather conditions at sea.
It
Jaina
The small limestone island of Jaina lies just off the coast, 40 km north of Campeche. Discovered by Morley in 1943, excavations on Jaina have revealed the most extensive Maya burial grounds ever found, over 1,000 interments dating back to AD 652. The bodies of religious and political leaders were carried long distances from all over the Yucatan and Guatemala to be buried beneath the extremely steep Pyramids of Zacpol and Sayasol on Jaina.
The corpses were interred in jars in crouching positions, clutching statues in their folded arms, some with jade stones in their mouths; food, weapons, tools
Dzibilnocac
Twenty kilometres northeast of Dzibalche'n at Iturbide, this site is one of the largest in Chenes territory. Only three temples have been excavated here (many pyramidal mounds in the forest and roadside milpas); the first two are in a bad state of preservation, but the third is worth the visit: a unique narrow edifice with rounded corners and remains of a stucco facade, primitive reliefs and another grim mask of Chac on the top level.
Much of the stonework from the extensive site is used by local farmers for huts and fences, keep an eye out in the vegetation for
Bad weather shuts down Mexico oil ports
Bad weather shut down two of Mexico's three main Gulf Coast oil export ports Monday, the government said.
Two ports in the Bay of Campeche -- Pajaritos in Veracruz state and Dos Bocas in Tabasco -- were closed as a cold front moved through, although the offshore oil loading terminal at Cayo Arcas remained open, Mexico's Communications and Transportation Department said in a statement.
State oil monopoly Petroleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, produces almost 3 million of its 3.4 million-barrel daily crude oil output in the Bay of Campeche.
The company exports about half of its crude,
Campeche is a city of Mexico located at 19°85′ N 90°53′ W, on the shore of the Gulf of Mexico. The city's population estimate for 2002 was 230,910 people.
The city was founded in 1540 by Spanish conquistadores as San Francisco de Campeche atop the preexisting Maya city of Canpech or Kimpech. The Pre-Columbian city was described as having 3,000 houses and various monuments, of which little trace remains.
The city retains many of the old colonial Spanish city walls and fortifications which protected the city (not always successfully) from pirates and buccaneers. The state of preservation and quality of its architecture
