‘If  one is not inclined to exaggerate the importance of exactitude’, wrote Charles Macomb Flandrau in his classic book Viva Mexico, ‘and is perpetually interested in the casual, the florid and the problematic, Mexico is one long, carelessly written but absorbing romance.’ 

Our seven-year love affair with the country was drawing to a close as we set off from Mexico City in a huge 4,000 kilometre loop from east to west coast, via the highlands of Chiapas and thence back inland once more. According to the map, we could expect mostly tarmac roads, and some dirt tracks. There was just one rather sinister-looking set of little black dots on a stretch of coast road where we’d hoped for something more substantial.

Escaping thankfully the smoggy stresses and strains of the city, we made our way eastwards towards Orizaba and Fortín de las Flores. The already menacing skies blackened perceptibly at our approach. On arrival in Fortín they unleashed their tropical contents upon us as we scurried, drowned-ratlike, to our rooms. At dinner, we asked the waiter how long it had been raining like that. ‘Oh, about twenty years,’ came the laconic reply. We fell into bed with the music of plashing raindrops and the skittering of banana palms in our ears.

The peak of Orizaba, yesterday shrouded in mist, was today triumphantly clear and sparkling with snow, providing us with a rare breakfast treat. Orchids dripped from trees; huge crow-like birds, disturbed by the stone-masons sauntering through the hotel gardens, clattered in the tops of the trees in mild annoyance. In the distance, the once-weekly train, courtesy of Weetman Pearson’s phenomenal engineering skills a century earlier, sounded its mournful horn.

We drove on down the sugar cane-lined highway towards Veracruz, passing papaya trees drooping their bosomy fruit, and coffee bushes sheltering gracefully in the shade of banana palms. Scissor-tailed flycatchers perching on the telegraph wires observed our arrival for lunch in Boca del Río, at the mouth of the river just outside Veracruz. The heat inside the restaurant was oppressive, and a couple of lethargic fans did little more than stir up the available heat and redistribute it liberally over the assembled diners. 

As we feasted on firm white fish wrapped in delicate anise-flavoured leaves, a local lady wandered from table to table trying – vainly – to interest us in some eminently resistible coconut candy. A group of musicians enlivened the proceedings with a serenade of música jarocha, that unlikely but magical Mexican combination of harp, marimba, guitars, fiddles and double bass. Our luckless coconut candy friend finally gave up the whole unequal struggle, dropped the bucket, hoisted her skirts, rolled her hips and treated us to a stupendously rhythmic display of tap dancing. The music over, she calmly retrieved her bucket and went her way, batteries apparently recharged, and ready for a renewed assault on the unwary clientele.

Still on tarmac roads, we headed south for Catemaco, lured by its reputation as a bird-watchers’ paradise. Our hotel was perched on the edge of the lake, and enquiries about an early-morning boat trip proved fruitful. We awoke next morning to a scene of heart-stopping beauty, as though a nineteenth-century watercolourist had been busy in the night: through the mists, mute fishermen gently and rhythmically did the rounds of their four fixed rods, checking hopefully and repeatedly for a breakfast catch. Our twentieth-century motorboat shattered the spell as we set off across the silken water, scattering nervous herons, teal and kingfishers. Our own breakfast featured pellizcadas, large tortillas with their edges pinched up to form a convenient cradle for their topping of black bean paste and flaky, freshly caught lake fish.

The town of Villahermosa was a brief aberration after our earthly paradise: evil sulphurous fumes filled the air, all was noise, confusion and naked telegraph wires in this petrochemical boom town. We gratefully obeyed the eloquent calls of Palenque, which beckoned us from the guidebooks.

It's difficult to believe Palenque without having seen it. Easier to believe is the fact that the ruins of this magnificent Mayan city have been lost, found and carelessly lost again at least half a dozen times over the centuries. The jungle crouches all around, silent, watchful, ready to move in again the minute man should cease his endless chopping and clearing. 

Today’s explorers are apt to rediscover the site in the comfort of an air-conditioned bus. Yet somehow in spite of the roaring of impatient engines in the car park, the chewing gum wrappers and the ice lolly sticks, Palenque manages to hold herself aloof, like a well-bred old lady of unequalled, unfathomable mystery and beauty. We fell under her spell and found it hard to drag ourselves away.

By now about halfway through our trip, we started to climb once more, this time on dirt tracks, up past the deep blue waters and falls of Agua Azul, into the highlands of Chiapas and San Cristobál de las Casas. From here, after a fascinating interval of discreet people-watching in the market, it was a short drop back down to the Pacific and up the coast in the direction of Acapulco. We were approaching ‘black dot country’, where the coast road looked questionable on the map. Our luck had so far held – could it last? Maybe they’d improved things since the map was published. We had our answer a few hours later when the road came to an abrupt, unscheduled halt before a river.

At either side of the river there were some quite promising bits of road which seemed to be supported on stilts. There was a marked lack of bridge in the middle. Eager brown faces popped up from behind bushes and asked how much it was worth to us to find out about ‘a ferry’. The only alternative was to drive two days inland to Oaxaca and two days out again to the coast. We had no time for that. We opted for the ferry.

While we later agreed that none of us had a clear idea of what exactly to expect, the so-called ‘ferry’ would not have passed muster with P & O. We gazed in miserable apprehension as two flimsy fibreglass boats hove into view, strapped precariously together and straddled by two wooden planks. My husband, grim-faced and watchful, considered the implications of loading a soon-to-be-sold car and a soon-to-be-returned-to-Europe family onto this contraption. My daughter squatted, pale and interested, intently studying the planks. My son, with all the scorn that a five year-old can muster, was heard to mutter: ‘not much of a ferry, Pa!’ He then proceeded to cry noisily. I proceeded to take photographs to record the scene for posterity (or for insurance purposes).

The gangplanks beckoned, the ferry master gesticulated encouragingly. The car crept gingerly up onto the ferry, which reared and plunged alarmingly as several tons of Dodge station wagon spread itself over the available space and came to rest within inches of the edge. We crept on after it, holding our breath. After some energetic tugs on the outboard motor, which caused still more alarming lurches, we shot out into the stream. Some donkeys over on the other bank raised their heads, watched with interest and shook their woolly ears in apparent disbelief. We made it. Women and children disembarked first, the Dodge walked the planks once more and we were back on terra firma. 

Journey’s end was Acapulco, noted more for its dust, drains and packaged tourists than for any inherent promise of Mexican adventure. We just had to see the famous divers once more before our return to Europe. A spotlight picks out the lithe, supple brown body, bare feet, bare hands, climbing up the sheer cliff face to the flat rock which provides the diving platform. There’s a quick intercession to the Virgin at the clifftop shrine and a cheery wave to the expectant crowds. The diver flexes his arms and legs and assumes the diving position, awaiting with precision timing the incoming wave hundreds of feet below. Then with an arching of the body up and out from the cliff, he plummets swallow-like in a perfect arc to meet the swelling water in the gully far beneath. There’s a ripple of relieved applause, and the diving demi-god climbs back amongst the assembled mere mortals to receive congratulations and other more tangible signs of approval. 

The magic is dispelled. But the utterly absorbing romance of Mexico which captivated Flandrau back in 1908 lingers on.