Los Sueños Grandes

El Chonta, Mexico's Dreamy Stalactite Wrestling

Forecast Satellite

An English teacher once taught me to start stories with something attention-grabbing, so here it goes: deep in the mountains of central Mexico, you’ll find a limestone cave so immense, it requires seven severely overhanging pitches to ascend.

Got your attention? Then let’s begin. Mexico exists in extremes. Kidnappings, drug lords, corruption, and violence are all too common in Mexico City and the border towns, while along the coasts you’ll find huge, white-washed buildings with thumping night clubs and dolphin shows. Then there’s the interior. It’s here in sleepy, idyllic villages that you’ll experience the warmth that truly defines the country. It’s also here that you’ll find Hoyanco Cave (aka El Chonta), two hours southwest of Mexico City. Perhaps the world’s wildest climbing grotto, El Chonta is a 600-foot-deep, stalactite-filled cavern with approximately 50 routes from 5.10 to 5.14. The locals started climbing here only five years ago, which might be why you’ve heard nothing. The place is intimidating, mostly solid, and offers huge holds that require creative 3-d techniques — in spots, you can no-hands rest on terrain that’s 45 degrees overhanging.

I don’t remember when I first saw photos of El Chonta. I just remember that, grainy though they were, they revealed its unreal nature. (I told my wife, Aimee, “That’s just a place we need to find.”) After months gathering clues, I’d unearthed contact info for Jaime Velasco, a Toluca local who’d taken one of the photos. We’d visit in autumn 2008, with Jaime keen to show us around. Arrangements made, Aimee and I left home in Flagstaff, Arizona.

After two days of travel, we met Jaime at the Toluca airport. He embraced us and kissed each of Aimee’s cheeks, his hair well-coiffed and his top few shirt buttons rakishly undone. A gracious, gregarious host, Jaime drove our rental car out of the city traffic while recapping the local scene. The climbing in Mexico, he said, consists of much more than El Potrero Chico. In Mexico City’s environs alone, you’ll find about 20 little-known yet incredible areas, including El Chonta.

Around 2001, a group of enterprising climbers — Jonathan Canche, Daniel Castillo Chacahua, Diego Lopez, and Javier Solano — discovered a beautiful, 100-foot, blue-streaked wall at El Chonta, well below the cave, naming it Agua Brava for its proximity to the river. With about 10 good routes, it would be a standout . . . if not for the main cave, later discovered by the same crew during a “psychedelic” hike. That day in 2002, they stood awestruck by the bizarre columns, positive holds, and giant, tentacle-like stalactites. El Chonta, I would learn, is like Thailand on steroids but without the grease.