Sontecomapan

Sontecomapan is a village in the municipality of Catemaco, about 18 km northeast of the town of Catemaco on the road to the Gulf coast. It stands almost at sea level on the southwestern shore of the Sontecomapan lagoon and had 2,432 people at the 2020 census. The name comes from Nahuatl tzontecomatl, "head", and apan, "river", and is translated as "river of the heads". The village has a central park with a kiosk and a parish church dedicated to Saint Peter the Apostle, and its embarcadero is the starting point for boat trips on the lagoon.

The lagoon, officially the Manglares y Humedales de la Laguna de Sontecomapan, has been a Ramsar wetland of international importance since 2004 and covers about 8,900 hectares with its surrounding wetlands. Although called a laguna, it is a body of fresh and brackish water about 3 km wide and 4 km long, fed by rivers from the Los Tuxtlas and Santa Marta ranges and by the region's heavy rain, and joined to the Gulf of Mexico by a winding channel about 4 km long. Sand carried by the current has partly closed the mouth, so only small boats can come in. Its mangroves are considered environmentally threatened.

Local boatmen take visitors through the mangroves from the village dock. A typical trip lasts three to four hours and stops at the Poza de los Enanos, a shallow spring where local children dive and where legend says anyone who goes in will shrink, passes the Río de los Cangrejos and ends at La Barra, a hamlet of a few streets on the sand bar where the lagoon meets the sea. About 377 people live there, mostly from fishing and from looking after visitors, and there is time to swim and eat seafood before the return. Visitors also head to the nearby beach of Jicacal.