La Venta expedition "Selva Chiapas 2013" has been divided into two explorative periods, both within the forest. The first part focused on the area of forest around the village of Veinte Casas, in particular the exploration of a large cavity, the Cueva Chute Redondo, a karstic resurgence of 1100 meters of development where we have been engaged in speleodiving explorations. We had taken the committment to reach a big Sotano, called by us "Chiccivà", identified by aerial photographs in the forest of Veinte Casas. It was not easy but in the end, machetando for three days, we reached it. Unfortunately we had to postpone until next year its full exploration for a lack of ropes.
The second part of the exploration, ten days literally swallowed by the forest, covered the area around Rabasa, a colony surrounded by the luxuriant green of a primary forest in the protected area of El Ocote, and precisely settling the camp in the Tierra Colorada area.
Tierra Colorada is the last human outpost on the edge of a green ocean: an explanade stolen from the forest to cultivate corn and beans. Because it is "stolen", the selva demands it back constantly, to the point that imperceptibly takes possession of it inch by inch every day. So Tierra Colorada was our starting point for our blitz into the forest. In the first days of exploration we reached a big sotano detected by aerial photos. The chasm, which we called "Sotano de las Huellas" opens at about two hours walk from the camp. The progression in the forest was certainly not an easy thing, due to the intricate vegetation that put a strain on our physycal and mental endurance. Anyway we were in good company during the explorative trips: we were constantly followed by hundreds of chattering monkeys and parrots. Truly a unique setting.
The sotano collapses for about 60 meters. At the base there is a large area of collapse covered by vegetation . After a difficult progress on a slope of debris you enter with a passage in landslide in a room with wonderful eccentric concretions and walls covered with inflorescences. Later, crossed an area of beautiful fossil basins, there is a large underground void, a large hall. The development of the cavity is about 700 meters.
The remaining days were devoted to reaching points for access to remote valleys, where there are chasms identified from aerial photos. Unfortunately proceeding on that type of terrain it is sometimes almost impssibile, anyway it is a never crossed area, where, besides the vegetation, you often find yourself fighting with suffocating humidity, great slopes and passage balancing on endless blades of "Carren" (thin and sharp rocks, sometimes several meters heigh).
However the most real danger is making unpleasant meetings with the landlord, represented here by Nauyaca, a large and aggressive viperide of lethal bite. In this expedition the meetings were only two, luckily all with a good end. There were, anyway, the usual spiders and scorpions, our stable company.

In conclusion we can say that the results of the expediton were surely positive: we now know a large area of forests, new caves and, more importantly, we have cut down the time required to reach with new explorative trips the most remote points of the forest. Francesco Lo Mastro

The participants in these explorations: Gianni Todini, Paolo Forconi, Francesco Lo Mastro, Umberto Del Vecchio, Laura Pala, Laura Russo, Daniel Paharnicu, Pietro Cortellessa, Chiara Pulvirenti, Cecilio Lopez Tercero, Kaleb Zarate Galvez, Lucas Ruiz, Abraham Ruiz, Alberto Ruiz.
This expedition was made possible thanks to the sponsorship of our friends: Dolomite (mountaineering and trekking footwear), Intermatica (satellite phone), Ferrino (outdoor materials), Scurion (LED lamps), Amphibious (dry bags), and a contribute in material from Mountain House (freeze-dried foods for hiking and extreme environments), TTM Mobile (phone - outlimits line) and Styled (illuminators for diving).