Santiago Xanica

Santiago Xanica sits high in the Sierra Sur, on the slope that drops toward the Huatulco coast, at roughly 1,250 metres above sea level. It is the seat of a municipality of 3,029 people spread over 18 localities; the village itself counted 832 residents in 2020, well below its 1960 peak of 1,482 and a little above the 1990 low of 626. It is run by usos y costumbres, and its name is Zapotec, "place beneath the stone".

Coffee is what defines the place. Around 1877 the brothers Pedro and Teófilo Díaz brought plants from Pluma Hidalgo and founded the finca La Sirena on the slopes of the hill of that name; village memory says Pedro handed out seedlings to neighbours. In that same year Xanica moved from the Pochutla district to Miahuatlán, partly for better communications and because Miahuatlán backed coffee planting. The land stayed communal well into the twentieth century, and the fight over La Sirena pitted the Díaz family against the village authorities for years.

The church, dedicated to Santiago the Apostle, was built in 1820 and looks onto a plaza-cum-sports court ringed by mountains. The patron fiesta is on 25 July, with a procession, food, dancing and fireworks. Like most of the municipality, it is reached by mountain tracks: a long trip, suited to anyone who wants to see a working Sierra Sur coffee community with no organised tourism. Coffee roasted to order can be arranged with local growers, who bring it down to Pochutla.