Is the Ghost Town of Guerrero Viejo Tamaulipas Mexico Under Water Again?
The Ghost Town of Guerrero Viejo, Tamaulipas Mexico.
December 4, 2010 past Hector D Astorga
With all the bad press and the bad things happening in Falcon Lake recently, I decided to re-publish some of my images from Guerrero Viejo. These were taken dorsum in May of 2009. As most of you lot know or heard in the news, an american tourist was recently killed there while visiting the Guerrero Viejo ruins by jet ski. Information technology'due south a shame that such an interesting place has been taken over by the Mexican drug cartels. I wouldn't dare to visit the Guerrero Viejo ruins at this fourth dimension, but back in 2009 it was fairly safe. I ventured out there with two other photographers from our photo club TexNEP. (click on images for a larger view)
Street scene in Viejo Guerrero. Old storefronts forth the route leading to the main plaza.
Guerrero was a very important town along the Texas-Mexico border during its meridian fourth dimension in the belatedly 1800's and first iv decades of the 1900's. In the 1950's when Falcon Lake was congenital to provide a steady supply of water to both countries, engineers knew that ii towns forth the border would be flooded by the ascension waters of the lake. The towns of Guerrero in Mexico, and the town of Zapata in Texas, would need to be moved. Guerrero was evacuated and it's residents were moved to higher ground where the new town of Nuevo Guerrero now stands. Zapata, on the Texas side, was also moved to a new location.
In the 1990's due to severe years of drought, Guerrero Viejo began to sally from the lake. About of the buildings had fallen down but some structures had withstood the lake and time. The church outer facade has remained practically intact and efforts on the Mexican side to restore the old church building have practically brought the outside of the church back to life. It hadn't been until this year, with the recent hurricanes and tropical systems that the lake has re-taken the boondocks. In 2009 when I visited, 75% of the boondocks was not flooded so you could visit the ruins without a boat.
The Church of Nuestra Señora del Refugio
Nuestra Señora del Refugio w/ droppings pile in front.
The Church of Nuestra Señora del Refugio is by far the most preserved building in the sometime ghost town. The outside walls still stand and have also been partially restored recently. You can still see how high the water level got since the pillars at the front of the church building have been permanently marked past the lake waters.
Front facade of the church. Sun peaking over the cross.
W side of church edifice. Water line mark is ix anxiety tall.
The church interior has received major renovations in the last 10 years. A new roof has been erected and the interior has been cleaned up after decades where water and silt tore away at its walls. It is a shame that all this renovation work might go to waste since the lake has recently re-taken the structure.
The renovated roof and interior.
The Central Plaza
The key plaza is all the same in place, complete with its kiosk and cement benches. I was amazed to see that some of the benches are all the same intact despite the fact that they had been underwater for 50+ years.
Central Plaza demote's item.
Some of the damage of being underwater for 50+ years.
Cardinal plaza Kiosk and benches due west/ church and lake in background.
The Market and surrounding storefronts.
Where I imagine was a very busy center for trading goods that came upwardly and down the river, now stands just a few outside walls that made upwards the marketplace. But 1 building of the chief market remains standing.
The old market place ruins.
A tree grows where the sometime market place used to stand.
You tin notwithstanding tell where the streets stood that surrounded the master market identify. Ruins of the buildings that held storefronts still stand.
Ruins of former storefronts overlooking the market.
Some of the ruins yet have the erstwhile brick stoves and ovens that were used by the local residents. The prototype beneath shows us an former stove in a edifice surrounding the market place. I imagine this could have been a restaurant or kitchen that sold food/meals to the residents and merchants visiting the marketplace.
Brick stove inside a edifice by the market place.
Residences
The Chief residential corridor was never submerged totally underwater. A good department of the old houses are still here. Some in bad shape since they were abased over l years ago, but some still show off the workmanship of the builders back then.
Residences along 1 of the roads.
Interior of doorway looking at street.
Looking into the backyard of i of the residences.
Residential Doorway
Door lock/keyhole.
Ruins along the road.
Tech Stuff
All of the above images were candy in HDR (High Dynamic Range). I processed these using Adobe PS4 and created the HDR images using Photomatix Pro 3. I decided to process these in HDR since most of these images were photographed in harsh lite. For security reasons I did non want to be driving out of Guerrero at night so we photographed in the center of the day when the light weather were non the best. By processing in HDR I was able to partially fix the harsh calorie-free atmospheric condition of that day. For nearly of these images I used the Sony Alpha a900 photographic camera and the Sony Carl Zeiss 16-35mm 2.viii lens. I also used the Sony 15mm fisheye, trying to get something a piddling different and fun.
Thanks for stopping by and until next time, may yous notice the beautiful light in all of your photographing travels.
Ciao.
All images © 2010 Hector D. Astorga. All rights reserved.
Source: https://hectorastorga.wordpress.com/2010/12/04/the-ghost-town-of-guerrero-viejo-tamaulipas-mexico/
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