Not long ago a friend sent me photos of a huge cave entrance entirely composed of tall basaltic prisms: roughly hexagonal columns which are sometimes formed as basaltic lava cools. The cave was located near a pueblito called Los Reyes, located 7.5 kilometers northeast of San Sebastián del Oeste, as the crow flies. The only problem, I had heard, was the road, which was said to be in bad shape, requiring four-wheel drive and nerves of steel to put up with hours of negotiating blind curves overlooking deep chasms. Amazingly, I found someone interested in going to check out that bad road: my neighbor Josh Wolf, who said he needed a break from sitting in front of a computer screen day after day. “My family and I are up for an adventure this weekend,” he told me.
How could I resist?
The following Saturday, we drove from Guadalajara to Ameca and then west through the Sierra Madre Occidental. Our first stop off was for lunch at Doña Mary’s unmarked restaurant in Guachinango, famed for its beautiful plaza and church whose shimmering walls are covered with pieces of broken porcelain. Doña Mary’s, by the way, is said (by all the mining folks) to be the place to eat in Guachinango and is located at N20.57537 W104.37561.
Next we arrived in Mascota where we simply had to stop and see the extraordinary archaeological museum housed in the town’s Casa de Cultura. In addition to hundreds of artifacts and bones found near Mascota, the museum has the most elegant and informative displays on petroglyphs I have ever seen anywhere, all thanks to the hard work of local archaeologist Joe Mountjoy and first-class photos contributed by none other than National Geographic.
At last we reached San Sebastián del Oeste and checked into our hotel. Besides being a Pueblo Mágico truly deserving of the name, San Sebastian has the honor of having once served as the capital of Jalisco. Before the revolution, it had been a very prosperous mining town with a population of 20,000. The revolution forced the mines to close and the population to drop to 600. Now it is once again on the rise with tourists arriving from Puerto Vallarta (a one-hour drive away) and the recent reopening of some mines by Canadian companies.
The next morning, we enjoyed a truly exquisite breakfast at La Galerita Hotel, so exquisite that it was already noon when we took a walk to check out the infamous dirt road leading to Los Reyes. It was too late to go there, we figured, but we still had enough time to walk up to a mirador (lookout point) on the same road, from which you can see all of San Sebastián huddled beneath dramatic, fog-enshrouded mountains.
As we hiked up to this lookout, several mining-company trucks came down the road and we stopped each to ask about driving conditions to Los Reyes. “The road is fine,” they all insisted.
“Any kind of car can get there.” We asked how long it would take and were pleasantly surprised to hear: “Only 20 minutes.”
Obviously, the camino had been upgraded recently and we decided to go get the car and see if we could actually lay our eyes upon the glorious Los Reyes prisms. No sooner had we started out than we were captivated by the stunning view of jagged mountains and steep precipices stretching off to the horizon. As our informant had claimed, the road was in about the best condition a dirt road can get in Mexico. However, one hour after setting off, we found ourselves in the middle of nowhere with no town in sight. Then we came upon a motorcycle rider.
“Where are you coming from?” we asked.
“Los Reyes,” he answered.
“How long to drive there?” we said.
“Twenty minutes,” he replied, with a winning grin.
A half an hour later, we came not to the town, but a busy mining operation with piles of rock, a noisy crushing mill and vast expanses of snow-white cal (lime) which a miner there told us was the waste product left over after silver had been removed from the pulverized native rock.
“By the way, how far is it to Los Reyes?” we asked.
“Twenty minutes,” said the amiable miner ... of course.
We valiantly pressed on until we reached a very high point where, in the far, far distance, we could see what must surely have been Los Reyes. “It looks like it’s going to take a lot more than another 20 minutes,” commented Josh. And, by common consent, we turned around there and then, no easy task on a road barely one car wide, with the usual 1,000-foot drop on one side – and headed back to Guadalajara.
But don’t worry. We now know there’s a decent road leading to Los Reyes and the Cave of Prisms and one thing is certain: next time it will take us only 20 minutes to reach it.
How to get there
Head west out of Guadalajara on Highway 15 to Nogales. Instead of getting on the toll road, take the highway to Ameca and keep going west toward Mascota. Upon arrival in Mascota you will come to a gas station and a fork in the road. Take the left fork and follow this street northwest, right through and out of town. After 40 kilometers of twists and turns you’ll come to the turnoff to San Sebastian, 9.2 kilometers east of you. To reach the start of the royal road to Los Reyes (and the Mirador) from the plaza, just go north on Calle La Cieneguita 380 meters to N20.76480 W104.85236. A nonstop drive from Guadalajara to San Sebastián might take you four hours. From there to Los Reyes, is, of course only “20 minutes,” and good luck to you!