Just to get a little exercise, hundreds of joggers, walkers and bicyclers clutter the Malecon in Catemaco Veracruz, starting before sunrise. Even tourists join in the huffing and puffing, climbing the measly 144 steps of the Eyipantla waterfall.
But Catemaco has a hidden treasure for physical exercise aficinados.More than 500 hand fitted stone steps lead straight up the slopes of Cerro Pipiapan to a communication transmission tower. Remnant jungle foliage closes in on each step and in the early morning hours hundreds of rare birds chirp over the loud slither of various snakes and other creeping crawlers.
Locals claim it has been 5 months since they last saw the cub of one of the few remaining pairs of mountain lions (tigres) in Los Tuxtlas. The view on top is fantastic. Both Laguna Catemaco and Laguna Sontecomapan bare their distant hearts to the intrepid observer.
Unfortunately that is only true for the intrepid criminal jumping a fence, and climbing hand over hand a few meters up the transmission tower. Otherwise, after 500 or so steps, the cardiac workout gets a headache when realizing the tower platform is totally overgrown with impermeable bamboo and has no view.
The tower is reachable off the road to Sontecomapan, about a mile northeast after the Coyame turnoff, at the "RMO Pipiapan" sign then up about 2 miles on a poor dirt road towards the village of Vista Hermosa.
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