San Mateo Río Hondo

San Mateo Río Hondo is the seat of the municipality of the same name in the district of Miahuatlán, in the southern Sierra Sur of Oaxaca. The village stands at about 2,300 m in steep, forested mountains whose peaks reach around 3,000 m, a few kilometres east of San José del Pacífico and Highway 175. It had 956 inhabitants in 2020, while the whole municipality, which takes in San José del Pacífico, San Ildefonso Ozolotepec and dozens of smaller settlements, had about 3,200. The Río Hondo and Río San Antonio drain its valleys.

In colonial times the town was known as Tetiquipa Río Hondo; its Nahuatl name Xaltengo and Zapotec name Yegoyoxi both mean 'river of sand'. The first settlement probably lay lower down, near the river. During the colonial period it was a stopping place on the Camino Real between Oaxaca and the port of Huatulco and lived from trade and services to travellers, until Huatulco lost its importance as a port. With thin, eroded soils, the local economy turned to forestry, small plots of maize and orchards of coffee, peaches and apples.

San Mateo is far less busy than San José. Many houses still have adobe walls and wooden beams, and the old adobe wall of the former church enclosure survives on the main square beside the town hall. A handful of small guesthouses, the oldest a set of rustic cabins opened in the 1970s by an American traveller, sit on the eastern edge of the village, close to paths into the forest. The year's main fiesta honours the Señor de las Siete Velas from 5 to 8 March, with a calenda of giant puppets, the town band, basketball and a dance; San Mateo himself is celebrated on 21 September. For several years the village has also hosted a Festival del Hongo devoted to the wild mushrooms of its cloud forests, with walks, talks, cooking and crafts.