Years ago I was told tales about “two stone giants” standing guard over ruins deep inside one of the barrancas of the ubiquitous Santiago River. The exact location of those monos, as people call them, escaped me until yesterday, when my friend Rodrigo Orozco offered to show them to me.
We drove east along the northern Periférico until we came to a rather shabby-looking barrio romantically but deceptively named Jardines Del Prado (Meadow Gardens). Here a winding cobblestone road leads you down to a checkpoint manned by armed guards. “Proceed no further,” they told us, “unless you have written permission from the State Water Commission.” Fortunately, we did have permission from on high and were allowed to continue along “El Camino a La Planta Potabilizadora Colimilla.”
No sooner had we passed the guards than we caught a glimpse of the river below us with a towering canyon wall on the other side. Although the Santiago is horribly polluted at many points, here we could discern no bad smell and to tell you the truth, we were astounded at the beauty of the scene. It was dead quiet. White and gray egrets were frolicking in the river which was full of fish, and on a branch above the water a kingfisher was preparing to dive. On the canyon wall behind us, a lacy waterfall was trickling. It was hard to believe we were only 13 kilometers from the bustling Periférico.
As we followed the river downstream toward the dam, we stopped again and again, jumping out of the car, even though it was drizzling, to take yet another photo. “This canyon could be turned into a gorgeous park with little cafés overlooking the river,” I told my friend. “Yes,” he said, “but instead we Tapatíos dump our excrement and toxic waste into it—¡que lástima!”
We soon reached the huge, impressive Cortina or dam and just beyond it the ruins of what was once the main hydroelectric plant supplying electricity to Guadalajara. It was built between 1945 and 1950 and once upon a time supplied 51 megawatts of power. Today, however, it is utterly abandoned and has been replaced by another plant further down the river. Wandering around the ruins of this once impressive operation, we started looking for the “5000 stairs” that rumor says lead down, down, down to the river. Well, the actual number of steps turned out to be 200, which I know because my grandnieces Xela and Meli counted them.
But it was well worth the effort. At the bottom you come to the Dam Command Center which is flanked by huge statues of two young men wearing nothing but hairstyles right out of the 1950’s. Each is about three meters tall and they reminded me of statues I saw in Italy commissioned by Mussolini in a futile attempt to bring back the grandeur of ancient Rome. So far, I’ve found only one hint at who might have sculpted them. Perhaps it was a certain Ramiro Sergio Gaviño Rivera who created obras de arte for other dams of the era. These statues are the last thing you’d expect to find at the bottom of a deep canyon three hundred meters below the streets of Guadalajara.
At a distance of 7.3 kilometers from the checkpoint, we came to the hot baths, a place you don’t want to miss. Believe it or not, it seems we were now standing inside the remains of Colimilla Volcano which was eroded away two million years ago by the Santiago River. At that time it seems much of Jalisco was a big lake and when water began to drain from it, colossal canyons were slowly formed, those same canyons which we can appreciate today all along the northern edge of the city of Guadalajara.
I put on my swim suit, anxious to take a dip in the hot water, which I had assumed would be coming from a hot spring. However, to my surprise I learned there is a full-fledged river here, which tumbles down hundreds of meters from somewhere high up the steep canyon side. Local people have made all sorts of clever little outdoor dams here, allowing you to pick the pool of your choice. At least this was the case on the Saturday I was there. On that occasion, there were only a couple dozen people present. How had they reached here, considering that this road is closed to the public? “Oh, there’s a path that leads down here from the barrio up above,” we were told. Ah yes, I had once again forgotten that this peaceful natural wonder is smack on the edge of a city teeming with four and a half million people.
In case—like the bathers—you succeed in finding your way past the checkpoint into this most impressive canyon, I will put the driving route from the Periférico (and waypoints) on Wikilock.com under the name “Colimilla Canyon.” Driving time from the Periférico to the hot river: less than 30 minutes if you never stop to look at the marvels along the way. But like us, I think you will be unable to resist stopping again and again along this fascinating route.