The Cacahuamilpa Caves National Park or Grutas de Cacahuamilpa
as is named in Spanish;
comes from the etymologic Cacahuamilpa word of the Náhuatl language, which means
peanuts sowing. It is situated inside of the physiographic province of Sierra Madre
South, in the north zone of Guerrero State, Mexico.
Also, it can be situated 52 kilometres from Taxco city, and 220 kilometres from Acapulco port; very close to the states of Igual and Morelos at 66 kilometres and 81 kilometres, respectively. By car,
there are also two ways to get there, the Cuernavaca-Grutas and the Toluca-Taxco
roads.
Cacahuamilpa caves are considered one of the most amazing caves in the World, cover
1,600 hectares and 1,380 metres long holding inside endless strange figures such as faces,
facial expressions, animals, places, etc. which are cause of admiration and wonder
among the visitants, particularly of those scientists who are dedicated to the
Speleology. The caves are distributed in 80 both artificially and naturally full
illuminated rooms, at least; also, their heights ranged between 30 metres to 70 metres.
The formations of these natural caves belong to the ancient traces of the sea made
by the sediments that the water dragged. This is the principal reason why these
rocks are so soluble allowing the pass of water, and through its route creates fissures
at the beginning, to form later subterranean rivers in which bed deviation form
the caves.
At this location there is a warm semi-dry climate; however, during the rains the
forest becomes lush, while during the dry season the landscape turns a wood with
no leafs. The low latitude-rainforest vegetation include many trees such as Bursera
bipinnata, Bursera copallifera and Bursera jorullensis; as same as Crescentia Cujete
and Crescentia Alata, used in the cooking utensils production.
Furthermore, among some of the distinguished animals, there are the cacomistles,
badgers, racoons, rattlesnakes, iguanas and green iguanas, new world vultures, pumas,
small tigers, rabbits, armadillos, otters, golden eagles, lynxes, etc. The National
Park has also Limestone Mountains passed by subterranean rivers of San Jerónimo
and Chontalcoatlán, both converging in the Amacuzac River, which flows into the
Pacific Ocean.
This spectacular natural formation are open to the public with daily visits starting
at 10 am, the tour is 2 hours walking along 2 kilometres.
History
This site is full of histories and legends. The legend tells that in the past times,
long time ago, non pre-Hispanic tribe dared to enter. These tribes used to call
this place Salachi, and in their fantasies they assured that these formations were
the incarnations of bad spirits who denied the entrance to any foreigner.
According to this legend, there was a tribe that lived near to Tetipac village,
and when they decided to overthrew their leader, he was the one who found these
enormous caves close to the mountains, from where the water abundantly flowed. When
he got inside, he was astonished in front of the spectacular view; and started to
think about some way to recover his throne. Apparently, he had an unknown daughter
by the tribe, so the leader prepared her to present as a deity. So then, he visited
an ancient of the tribe and told him about the deity apparition.
Inside view of the Cacahuamilpa Caves
Lastly, this old man return to the tribe and told them about what he had seen in
the Salachi caverns. Followed by the oldest men, they all visited the cave, where
the daughter deity was over a wonderful formation in the middle of the place. When
she saw all those old men coming in, the said loud: “I will end with your legion
using these hell fires if you all do not put back in the throne your leader”. It
was in this way that the leader recovered his throne, and the entire tribe kept
for long time worshipping this secret and mysterious deity’s sanctuary.
So that and according to the studies, these places belong to the Chontales tribes,
who were used to using them as special places dedicated to their god’s ceremonies and worships.
These caves were discovered by Manuel Saenz de la Peña in 1834; but, on January
20th, 1936 they were declared as National Park by Lázaro Cárdenas Del Río, president
of Mexico in that year, with many more other attractions near.