It’s that time of year when a caravan of real estate agents large enough to keep Trump up at night bear down on potential home buyers.
It may not be common knowledge to those hordes of North Americans coming south that Mexico is one of the most “seismologically active” regions on earth. And this area around Lakeside, especially. Ironically, Lake Chapala itself resulted from these drastic earth movements and faulting, which occurred some 12 million years ago. But since only a handful of hippies were here then, few people remember it.
So it’s always good to be reminded that our beloved Mexican landmass, situated on bustling North American fault lines, is actually in constant rolling motion. Its sudden booming shock waves are the reason for so many ongoing homeowner repairs and Feng Shui screw-ups. And of course, it’s the explanation behind the mysterious nervousness of the Mexican Jumping Bean.
There are serious fault lines at a number of locations around the north side of Lake Chapala. Soil engineer, architect and builder Gustavo Rivera, who sits of the board of directors of the Architectural Association of the State of Jalisco, told me: “There are fault lines running through La Floresta and Chula Vista,” he explained. Also, the terrain on the way to Chapala through Riberas on the mountainside is unstable in many locations. So it pays to know the quake “pitfalls.” Emphasis on pit and falls.