The Parable Of Paracutin

  Zihuatanejo, Mexico
Thursday, November 29, 2007

From Uruapan the bus wound its way up into the hills, depositing me after an hour by a white archway that marked the entrance to Angahuan. Here I met Jesus, who was touting for business on horseback. His brown mare followed me along the track leading into the village. Jesus was a Purépecha Indian - twenty odd, dark skinned, with a Colgate smile and an easy-going demeanour. I lied that I was afraid of horses but he didn't give up so easily, waiting outside while I picked up some supplies in the village store.

Along a dirt track that ran out into the country on the far side the village, the fencing continued - I was playing hard to get. Arriving at a mirador that looked out over a broad blackened valley to a range of hills, Jesus drew up his horse and pointed across to the dark treeless stump of a cone, which stood out in contrast to the higher, pine-covered ridge beyond. 'El volcán', he announced, lest there be any doubt.

Cielo Rojo (Red Sky) sung by Lila Downs

Jesus wasn't interested in guiding me on foot - there was more money to be made from horses - but he knew a man who would be and went off to find him, while I stayed put to survey the lie of the land. Some distance off in the valley below, a lone church tower raised its head above the fossilised torrent of black rock, which had otherwise smothered everything in its path. A dozen kilometres upstream - and still exuding a vague air of menace - stood the source of this carnage.

A few minutes later Jesus returned with my would-be guide, an old Indian man with a bandage wrapped round his head to cover an eye injury. Francisco stood barely five-feet tall even with a straw hat on his head. Upon learning that he was seventy-six years old, I grew somewhat sceptical - the summit was a long way off - but Jesus was a reader of minds. The old man was extremely fit he assured me, before riding off in towards the bus stop, having earned his commission.

I followed my aged guide down into a mazy pine forest, a thick layer of ash underfoot. As we walked Francisco recounted to me the story of the volcano and I came to really appreciate the fact that he was seventy-six years old. Because the man was, literally, older than the hill - and how cool was that! As a child of thirteen, Francisco had endured the prolonged terror of Volcán Paricutín's birth. And as an adult the mountain had provided him with his living - down through the years he'd climbed it several thousand times.

In 1943 a farmer was ploughing his cornfield when the ground beneath him started to rumble. A crack opened up in the earth's surface and subterranean explosions began spewing rocks, magma, ash and poisonous gases into the atmosphere. The farmer unyoked his oxen and fled. When he returned the following day a volcanic cone the size of a two-storey house had arisen in his field.

Over the course of the next year the volcano was to be extremely active and there were frequent eruptions. Thick black smoke filled the air, blocking out the sun for days on end. Ash fell from the sky, ruining crops and causing respiratory problems. Rivers of molten lava poured down the valley, overwhelming villages and forcing populations to flee. Being higher up, Angahuan was comparatively lucky. But the people lived in constant fear, not knowing what the next day would bring, ready to leave at a moment's notice. Violent lightning storms caused by severe atmospheric turbulence did nothing to steady their nerves.

After climbing steeply we emerged from the forest at the edge of a black jumble of rock - an old lava field. We picked our way carefully over sharp brittle edges on a roughly hewn path. Here and there, the odd bush or tree had somehow managed to put down roots but otherwise there was only a barren sea of blacks and dark greys. You could tell the vintage of the lava according to the shade, said Francisco. A crevasse, a dozen centimetres wide, stretched off across the wastes, the result of an earthquake. Francisco had been asleep when it struck. He came to beneath the wreckage of his house. Neighbours dug him out and doctors patched him up. But the eye was useless.

Little dots of orange wildflowers sparkled in the sunshine. Around the base of the volcano, wisps of steam drifted out from secret vents. The top of a spur, which abutted the main cone about a third of the way up, was positively smoking. 'El Volcán Chico', explained Francisco, as we struggled up to the saddle on a powdery path. Breaking off to the left, we arrived on the edge of a crater that was maybe fifty metres wide. Inside the volcano, beneath a salt-and-pepper streaked crust of charcoal and cinders, a furnace burned.

Older Than The Hills

We turned our backs to the heat and descended again to the saddle. Above us loomed Paricutín, now a bulbous dome. Thin green patches of vegetation clung to its scorched slopes. A slide of ash curved up towards the unseen crater. Battling our way up through the dust, we strained every sinew in our legs to avoid backsliding. Finally our efforts paid off and we stood, winded, on the lip of the volcano. To my surprise, the fire inside had gone out.

After a frenetic first year of existence - during which it grew by over three hundred metres - Paricutín settled down to a more peaceable existence. But the volcano still had it moments and erupted several times over the course of the ensuing years, much to the anxiety of the villagers of Angahuan, who eked out an ever more precarious living in its shadow. With every new eruption, more of their precious farming land was consumed by lava. But all was not lost - news of the America's newest volcano had spread throughout the continent. Tourists began to arrive, drawn by curiosity and the quest for adventure. They needed board and lodging and they needed guides - thus Francisco's career was born.

View From The Summit Of Volcán Paricutín

In 1952 Paricutín erupted for the last time. Over the previous nine years it had risen by more than four hundred metres from the cornfield where it was born - to a height of 2800 metres above sea level. Henceforth it would remain silent, its crater a blackened amphitheatre of scree, weeds and scorched rock. From our position at one of a pair of low points on the lip of the old volcano, the crater walls arced upwards on either side to form a pair of twin summits, while, across the chasm, the tops of higher, greener peaks stood out above the depression in the rim opposite.

View Across The Crater Of Paricutín

I followed Francisco along the well-worn path circling the crater. Stunning views greeted me from all points of the compass. The burnt blasted landscape below gave way to lush backdrops of gently sloping cones smothered in thick green forest. On the north-western skyline was visible the distant Volcán de Colima, which had been predicted to go off sometime in the not too distant future.

On the Lip Of Paricutín

Descending quickly via a long slide down the cone's far slope, Francisco pointed to where a black river of lava had recently encroached on fields in the valley below. It had emanated from another 'little volcano' that lay a short distance away. This time there was no crater, just immense heat and a large pile of gently cooking rocks. Good for a barbeque, I surmised, by this stage almost volcano-ed out.

Smoking Crater

The old lava fields that we'd crossed en route to Paricutín now towered above us to the right, cutting off our return. Instead we would follow the longer 'horse path' back to Angahuan. This involved a twenty-kilometre detour along the valley and around the furthest extent of the lava flows. The scenery was pleasant and time was on our side but I hadn't reckoned on the going, which was 'soft' to say the least. A thick layer of leg-sapping volcanic ash covered the track. The old man, light as he was, seemed to float over it, while I seemed to sink deeper with every step. Lagging behind, I prayed that Jesus and his nag might offer me deliverance from the heat of the sun.

Volcanic Cone

Time passed. Fields planted with avocado trees glowed green in the soft light flooding across the valley. Ahead, a three-tiered bell-tower stood out above a wall of black basalt. As the abandoned church drew closer my tired legs seemed to acquire a new lease of life (for the end that I sought must surely have been nigh). Finally, a handful of makeshift structures clustered around a dusty parking lot indicated that we had arrived. I left Francisco sitting in the shade with a much-merited cerveza and went off to explore the solitary ruin of Patziguaro.

Volcán Paricutín

Clambering across a jumbled jagged mass of black rock, the scene was one of devastation. Where once a village of 1,000 souls had thrived there remained not a trace, save for the church of San Juan. With its walls caved in and one of its twin bell-towers toppled by the sheer force of slowly advancing molten rock, the building, though inundated, had somehow managed to survive. One of the towers had defied the lava, and continued to stand sentinel at one end of the church's elegant stone façade. Further back - amid crumbling walls - lay the altar, its pale cloth festooned with flowers, candles and other offerings. Some parishioners argued that its salvation was proof of a miracle. Sixty odd years after they'd had fled, terrified and destitute, to be resettled elsewhere, people were still coming to pray at the altar of the church of San Juan.

Miracle Of San Juan de Paricutín

Our return to Angahuan coincided with a rush hour of sorts as the lanes filled with horses on their way to pasture. Overhead, strings of bunting - blue, red, green and yellow - fluttered like Buddhist prayer flags on a welcome breeze. From loudspeakers fixed to the tops of telephone poles, a disembodied female made mysterious pronouncements in the Asiatic language of the mountain people. Dark-skinned children drove cattle through the streets and, momentarily, I found myself dreaming of some displaced Shangri-La. But earthly affairs soon intruded upon my reverie - there was the guide to be paid. After complementing Francisco on his fitness, I took my leave of him and went to find the bus for Uruapan.

Tirineni Tsitsiki (Marigold) sung in Purépecha by Lila Downs

ENDS