How the Water Flows

We spent a week following the Río Santiago from beginning to end, Lake Chapala to the ocean.  We wanted to find out how the water flows, connect with people and movements along its path, and witness dams, new tributaries converging, and where it meets the sea.  Fishing, dams, and the cleansing power of nature were recurring themes on the journey.  

There is so much to say about the tour and the complex issues in different parts of the watershed.  There are three large scale functioning dams: Aguamilpas, Cajón, and Santa Rosa.  The Yesca is another incredibly large dam in construction.  The water quality improves along its path to the sea, with nature cleansing the river and cleaner confluent rivers diluting the contamination.  Communities that once traveled by horseback to visit larger populations now need to pay expensive boats to leave due to reservoirs created by dams.  Fish are contaminated with mercury and other heavy metals from Chapala all the way to the ocean, yet many livelihoods and diets still rely on harvesting fish.  Despite and sometimes because of its level of contamination, the river continues to be an important part of many lives in the river basin.

The Río Santiago posseses many sacred sites for the Huichol and the Charo indigenous groups, including sacred caves that were indundated without warning for the Aguamilpas dam.  Lake Chapala and San Blas, a coastal town very close to where the Río Santiago feeds into the ocean, are two major spiritual points for the groups that each member must visit at least once in their life.

The tour was rich in information and exchanges.  Along with the other participants, we presented at IMDEC upon our return.  We plan to create an interactive map with different personal stories along the river and there is even talk of creating a children's book from the point of view of a fish to share with the communities we visited.

The footage we shot during the tour truly enriches the documentary material. I couldn't think of a better way to finish up our time in Guadalajara or to connect to the river before we left.