{"id":39662,"date":"2026-07-20T08:00:18","date_gmt":"2026-07-20T15:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/community.nrs.com\/duct-tape\/?p=39662"},"modified":"2026-07-15T10:40:19","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T17:40:19","slug":"usumacinta-the-greatest-river-trip-ever-forgotten","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/community.nrs.com\/duct-tape\/2026\/07\/20\/usumacinta-the-greatest-river-trip-ever-forgotten\/","title":{"rendered":"Usumacinta: The Greatest River Trip Ever Forgotten"},"content":{"rendered":"

Along with 98% of river permit lottery entrants, I was unsuccessful. But unlike most years, I received the emails informing me of the bad news while standing up to my ankles in the Usumacinta River in southern Mexico, rigging boats for a weeklong trip down the legendary Highway of the Maya. Minutes earlier, I\u2019d heard a family of howler monkeys for the first time, their ghostly crescendos (somewhere between an elk\u2019s bugle and an owl\u2019s hoot) carrying through the jungle.<\/span><\/p>\n

I traveled to the Usumacinta for a river experience that wasn\u2019t too far from home or too costly and would suit my amateur kayaking skills. But the river itself, even after investigating a whirlpool from the fishy side of a kayak, paled in comparison to the entirety of the experience. <\/span>Imagine a wilderness as idyllic as the Yampa through Dinosaur National Monument but replace desert walls with jungle and the sound of geese with howler monkeys. Then add riverside access to Mayan ruins on par with Mesa Verde and river guides with ancestry going back to the very people who built the ancient cities.<\/span><\/p>\n

There may be no more vibrant wilderness archeology tour on Earth, and my disappointment in not drawing a single river permit scarcely registered.<\/span><\/p>\n

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We\u2019d met our guides from Global Grand Canyons in the town of Palenque, situated at the heart of the Usumacinta watershed\u2019s otherworldly electric blue-green tributaries draining the jungle highlands of Chiapas. The outfitter has bases in eight locations on four continents with a Martin Litton-esque mission to use river tourism to help protect waterways threatened by hydropower developments.<\/span><\/p>\n

Palenque was on track to become one of the world\u2019s epicenters of river adventure. Then, in the late 1990s, a group of banditos started preying on river runners. According to local legend, one group handed over some money and a few semi-valuables (it\u2019s not like river runners travel with Rolexes). The banditos seemed to be satisfied when Machete Jim, a man carrying $15,000 to fund a long stay in Mexico, blurted out, \u201cTake it all!\u201d and handed over a dry bag containing the most cash the banditos had ever seen.<\/span><\/p>\n

When Rocky Contos, our trip leader and Global Grand Canyons founder, told us the story, one of the other boaters on our trip, Erik Etl, commented, \u201cNot a very brave move for a guy with such a name.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Had Machete Jim kept it together (or better yet, left his stash with a bank) perhaps the incident would have been little more than a story for a few river rats to tell back home, and the river\u2019s increasing popularity would have continued. Instead, those banditos decided the Usumacinta rafters were the golden goose. For the next couple of years, the banditos robbed multiple groups. Even worse: as hits on subsequent groups yielded few riches, the banditos\u2019 tactics escalated.<\/span><\/p>\n