A CDMX couple vanishes at Tamul Waterfall — 5 years later, the river recedes and something appears in the roots 🌊
The Tampaón River held a secret for 5 years. In January 2012, after a storm stirred the earth, the roots of a sabino tree snagged something that shouldn’t have been there. It was an elongated bundle wrapped in yellow tarp, bound by rusty chains and weighed down with stones.
Inside were fragments of a story that began on a November morning in 2007 when Héctor and María smiled as they walked down the trail to the waterfall. They never returned from the little beach where they planned to sleep, listening to the rushing water. The photograph had the characteristic white border of early 2000s digital cameras with a red stamp marking the date: November 18, 2007.
The Last Photograph
Héctor Morales Vega, 56, and his wife, María del Carmen Ruiz Hernández, 55, pose at the start of the trail. Both are smiling with the peacefulness of people who have found their rhythm in life. Héctor, with his dark complexion weathered by years of outdoor work, has a discreet mustache flecked with gray. His plain cap, without any logo, shields his head from the morning sun of the Huasteca Potosina. He wears a striped gray polo shirt, dark jeans, and brown boots that have seen many trails. On his back is a navy blue camping backpack, 55 to 65 L, with an internal frame that distributes weight correctly. At the base of the backpack, a green sleeping pad is rolled up, another yellow one on top, and tightly secured is the dark-fabric sleeping bag—which will become crucial to this story. A translucent blue bottle hangs from a side carabiner, reflecting the morning light.
María, also dark-skinned, has her hair tied back in a practical braid that keeps her face clear. Her small earrings shine subtly as she smiles at the camera. Her floral blouse in red and blue tones contrasts with the gray fleece vest she’s wearing, typical for cool mountain mornings. A blue windbreaker is tied at her waist, waiting for the clouds to descend and the wind to pick up. Her gray tactical pants and cross-training shoes speak of a woman who knows the mountains. Her smaller beige canvas backpack, about 35 to 40 L, shows an aluminum canteen that also reflects the sun. Around her neck is a necklace of dark beads, a personal detail that always accompanies her on excursions.
They are a quiet, childless couple who have built their happiness on weekend hikes. Héctor retired two years ago from a state-owned company where he worked for 30 years in maintenance. María continues to teach visual arts at a middle school in the Narvarte neighborhood, where they have lived since they were married. Weekends are sacred. Ajusco, Desierto de los Leones, La Marquesa—they know every trail within two hours of the capital. This time, they decided to venture farther. The Huasteca Potosina in November is low season, with fewer boats on the river and more silence on the trails.
The plan was simple: leave on a Friday night for Ciudad Valles, arrive early on Saturday, enter through Aquismón towards Tanchachín, camp near the Tampaón River, and return Sunday afternoon. They had arranged with María’s sister to call from a Telmex booth on Sunday afternoon to confirm they were okay. The preparation was meticulous, as always. They bought local groceries at a market in Valles, a new screw-on gas cartridge, and a laminated map sold at downtown stationery stores, which showed the beach, the viewpoint, and the main access points. They registered with the community authorities, who gave them a clear warning: if it rains, the river rises in minutes and all the safe crossings change. Their gear was consistent with years of experience: a waterproof tarp, sturdy rope, plastic rain ponchos, a headlamp with new AA batteries, a backup halogen flashlight, and mummy-style sleeping bags with the labels still legible inside. On the map, they had marked with red pen: “overnight stay,” “beach,” and “leave at 6 AM.”
The Descent
The trail snaked down through dense vegetation. The first sunbeams filtered through the treetops, creating a play of light and shadow that María commented on with enthusiasm. Héctor, quieter but equally happy, mentally calculated the timing. Two hours down, set up camp, rest, watch the waterfall at sunset, and get up early to be back on the road before noon on Sunday. They couldn’t have imagined that this photograph would be the last evidence of them alive, or that the river they loved so much would become the guardian of a mystery that would take 5 years to reveal its secrets.
The descent to Tamul Waterfall takes about 2 hours when done at a leisurely pace, stopping to take photos and hydrate. Héctor and María had made this calculation based on their experience on similar trails in central Mexico. But the Huasteca Potosina has its own rules. The humidity is more intense, the terrain is more irregular, and the stones on the path become slippery at the slightest provocation. They advanced slowly, stopping at every natural viewpoint. María took photos with her compact digital camera, focusing on the details that always captivated her: the rock formations, giant ferns, and wild orchids growing on tree trunks. Héctor, more practical, constantly checked the laminated map, orienting himself with the marked geographical features.
Mid-morning, they crossed paths with other hikers going up—a family from Tampico with small children who had gotten an early start to avoid the midday heat. They exchanged typical trail courtesies: comments on the weather, recommendations for the best photo spots, and warnings about loose rocks. In the late afternoon, as the shadows began to lengthen, two young men from Monterrey, returning from a day at the waterfall, saw them for the last time. The students, who were on a weekend adventure, would later recall the moment with precision. It was around 5:30 PM, and the couple was walking down to a small pebble beach visible from the main trail. The young men took a panoramic photo of the area and, without realizing it, captured the figures of Héctor and María in the background, setting up their camp. In the image, later enlarged by investigators, Héctor’s dark sleeping bag cylinder, tied to the outside of his blue backpack, and the unmistakable shine of the translucent blue bottle hanging from his side carabiner are perfectly recognizable. The beach they had chosen was perfect for their purpose: a natural clearing among the rocks, protected from the wind, with easy access to the river for water and a privileged view of the waterfall. The ground was relatively flat, covered in coarse sand and small stones rounded by centuries of current. Some fallen logs provided natural seats around the spot where they planned to make their fire.
The Storm and the Search
The clouds began to thicken at sunset. This wasn’t unusual for the region at that time of year, but the wind funneling down between the rocky walls brought a sticky humidity that announced rain. María commented that it might be better to check the river before fully setting up camp, just to get familiar with the sounds of the place at night. They put their ponchos in the outer pockets of their backpacks and made sure their headlamps were handy. The idea was simple: sleep light, wake up early, and return via Tanchachín before the sun got too hot. The laminated map went with them on this reconnaissance walk to the riverbank.
The sunrise on Sunday, November 18, brought an unexpected discovery. The community members, who always woke early to take advantage of the cool hours, found Héctor and María’s campsite in a state that didn’t align with a normal departure. The tent was half-open, as if someone had left in a hurry without fully securing the entrance. The unlit campfire, meticulously prepared, retained the perfect arrangement of small sticks and paper that only experienced campers make. One of the backpacks, María’s beige one, was outside the tent, leaning against a rock, as if she had left it there temporarily. Héctor’s headlamp was on the ground, but without the new AA batteries they had bought in Ciudad Valles. The translucent blue bottle lay near the tent’s rainfly, empty, with wet dirt clinging to its sides.
The footprints leading to the rocky riverbank disappeared after just a few meters. It had rained heavily during the night, and the water had erased any useful trace for rescuers. There were no signs of violence or struggle, nor any indication that they had packed up their camp in an orderly fashion. Everything suggested haste, maybe urgency, but not panic. The strangest thing was that the laminated map was nowhere to be found, even though they had been seen consulting it constantly during the descent.
The alarm was raised when María didn’t call her sister on Sunday afternoon from the Telmex booth, as they had agreed. Rosa Elena Ruiz, 5 years younger than María, knew her sister’s punctual habits perfectly. In 30 years of weekend excursions, María had never failed to make that confirmation call. On Monday morning, Rosa Elena went to the Narvarte precinct to report their disappearance. The police, accustomed to tourists who extend their vacations without notice, suggested she wait until Tuesday. But Rosa Elena knew her sister. María was a teacher; she had classes early Monday and would never miss them without a medical excuse. On Tuesday, when María didn’t show up at the middle school, the director confirmed Rosa Elena’s suspicions.
The search and rescue protocol was then activated, involving Civil Protection from San Luis Potosí, state police, and local guides from Aquismón who knew every bend in the Tampaón River. The search began on Wednesday, November 21. Three teams systematically combed the riverbanks, the eddies where objects dragged by the current often get caught, and the deep pools where the water swirls. They used fiberglass canoes provided by local tourism operators, and a state police helicopter performed a 2-hour flyover that yielded no results.
Canine units arrived on Thursday from the Potosina capital. The dogs marked a specific spot in an area where the river becomes wider and shallower, approximately 300 meters downstream from the beach where they had camped. But after sniffing the area intensely, they lost the scent at the same rocky bank, as if everything had evaporated into the water. The Civil Protection commander, a man with 20 years of rescue experience in the Huasteca, wrote a preliminary report that considered three main hypotheses: First, they tried to cross the river outside of safe hours during a sudden swell caused by the overnight rains. Second, the riverbank they were on was undermined and collapsed under their weight, a common phenomenon in the Tampaón during the rainy season. Third, they became disoriented by the deafening noise of the water and the fog that forms in the early morning hours.
Local guides, men who were born and raised by the river, explained its peculiarities to the rescuers: it is a river that “swallows and returns,” in their words. During swells, it undermines the base of the banks, creating hidden cavities where tarps, bags, branches, and stones can get trapped. When the water recedes, the roots of the ancient sabino trees on the banks act like a giant comb that catches everything that has been rolling downstream.
Rosa Elena traveled to San Luis Potosí to personally follow the search efforts. She stayed in a modest hotel in Ciudad Valles and every morning accompanied the rescue teams, carrying thermoses of coffee and sandwiches for the volunteers who joined the effort. Her silent but constant presence kept the urgency of finding a clue alive. On Sunday, November 25, a week after the disappearance, the first rumors appeared. A vendor at the Sunday market in Ciudad Valles claimed to have seen a backpack similar to the one described on the posters plastered throughout the region. When Rosa Elena and two police officers showed up at the stall, it turned out to be a green and pink school backpack that had no resemblance to the camping gear they were looking for.
The December rains complicated rescue efforts. The river level rose considerably, making it impossible to access many areas that had been checked in November. Volunteer divers who arrived from Tampico were only able to work for three days before water conditions became too dangerous. For Christmas, the searches were temporarily suspended. Rosa Elena returned to Mexico City with an open investigation file and the authorities’ promise to resume work as soon as weather conditions improved. In her Narvarte home, she kept María’s planner open to the page where she had underlined in yellow marker, “Call from booth.”
The River’s Secret
The first months of 2008 brought sporadic searches. Whenever someone reported finding camping gear in a corner of the Huasteca, Rosa Elena traveled personally to verify: a rusty canteen in Río Verde, a faded backpack in Xilitla, muddy sneakers in Tamasopo. Nothing matched the detailed descriptions she had provided to the authorities. The river had kept its secret very well. The rains of 2008, 2009, 2010, and 2011 constantly reshaped the paths, moved the stones at the bottom, and changed the underwater currents. The trail’s signage was renewed, new tourist service providers appeared, and Tamul Waterfall continued to receive visitors who walked happily down the same path that Héctor and María had taken.
The anniversaries of the disappearance brought brief notes in Mexico City newspapers: “One year since disappearance,” “Two years without a trace,” “Family seeks answers.” Rosa Elena had learned to deal with the media cycle: a peak of attention for a few days, followed by months of absolute silence. Every November renewed her hope, and every December buried it again.
In 2009, a civil organization specializing in missing persons took the case pro bono. Two criminologists reviewed the files, interviewed witnesses, and developed a psychological profile of the couple. They concluded that Héctor and María did not have the profile of people who would disappear voluntarily. They were emotionally stable, had no serious financial problems, no known enemies, and no addictions or mental health issues. A hydrological study commissioned from an expert at the Autonomous University of San Luis Potosí yielded technical data that Rosa Elena memorized like a litany. The Tampaón River has unpredictable behavior during the rainy season. Its flow can multiply by 10 in a matter of minutes when rainfall is intense in the mountains. The seemingly solid banks can give way without warning due to the underground erosion caused by the water. But the most unsettling part of the study was a phenomenon that locals knew well but had never been scientifically documented: the river “swallows and returns.” During sudden swells, temporary cavities form in the banks where all sorts of objects get trapped. These objects can remain hidden for years, compacted with mud and sediment until another swell releases them and brings them back to the surface.
In 2010, Rosa Elena turned 60 and decided to take early retirement from her job at an insurance company. She used half of her severance to hire a private detective specializing in cold cases. The man, a former investigator with 30 years of experience, stayed in Ciudad Valles for 3 months and systematically covered the entire Tampaón basin. His 120-page report definitively ruled out the hypothesis of voluntary disappearance and leaned toward an accident with subsequent elements that he could not determine. The most disturbing conclusion was that someone had manipulated the campsite scene. The inconsistencies were subtle but evident to a trained eye: María’s backpack outside the tent, the missing batteries from the headlamp, the empty bottle when they always carried reserve water.
2011 brought a false lead that consumed 3 months of investigation. A German tourist visiting Mexico claimed to have seen a necklace identical to the one María wore in the photos at a crafts market in Oaxaca. Rosa Elena traveled to Oaxaca, visited all the city’s markets, and interviewed dozens of artisans. The necklace she found was similar but not identical. The beads were a different size, and the color pattern didn’t match. By then, Rosa Elena had developed an involuntary expertise in everything related to her missing sister. She knew by heart every detail of the gear they carried, every piece of clothing they wore on their last day, and every brand and model of their camping equipment. She could describe with millimeter precision the dark beaded necklace, the exact stripes on Héctor’s polo shirt, and the color distribution on María’s floral blouse.
Meanwhile, in the depths of the Tampaón River, something patiently awaited its moment to return to the surface. The rains of each season moved sediments, rearranged stones, and changed the underwater currents. An elongated bundle wrapped in a deteriorated yellow tarp and secured with rusty chains had found its place in a natural cavity formed by the roots of an ancient sabino tree.
2012 began with one of the most intense rainy seasons the Huasteca Potosina had ever seen. During the first week of January, rainfall was constant and heavy. The secondary rivers feeding the Tampaón came down loaded with mud, dragging logs, stones, and all sorts of debris accumulated for months in the mountains. The water level rose 2 meters above normal. Tourism activities were suspended. Hanging bridges were closed as a precaution, and riverside communities prepared for possible evacuations. The roar of the water could be heard for kilometers, and the river’s color changed from emerald green to milky brown. When it finally cleared up on Thursday, January 12, the landscape had completely changed. Banks that seemed solid had been devoured by the current. Ancient trees had fallen, creating natural dams, and the banks had been redrawn by the river’s fury. It was as if the river had decided to rearrange everything according to its will.
The Discovery
The community crew, which went out on Friday, January 13, to assess the damage, was accustomed to finding surprises after major swells. Dead animals, vehicles dragged from distant communities, missing structures, but what they found that morning in an arm of the Tampaón didn’t fit into any known category.
It was 7:30 AM on Friday, January 13, 2012, when Aurelio Castañeda, the head of the community maintenance crew, decided to check the damage in the northern arm of the Tampaón River. The storm had been especially intense in that section, where the water makes a sharp curve and tends to deposit everything it drags from the upper parts of the mountains. Aurelio walked slowly along the bank, assessing the damage. An entire ravine had disappeared. The roots of several sabino trees were exposed, and the water ran turbid with the whitish foam that forms when the river carries a lot of organic matter. It was a landscape he had seen many times after heavy rains, but something about the configuration of the stones caught his attention.
A meter from the flowing water, lying on the pebble beach and partially trapped between the exposed roots of a sabino, was an elongated bundle that did not belong to the natural environment. It measured approximately 1.70 meters long and 35 cm in diameter. It had an irregular cylindrical shape and was wrapped in what appeared to be a very deteriorated yellow tarp. What most struck Aurelio were the chains. Several thick chains, completely rusted by years of humidity, systematically crossed the bundle, as if someone had wanted to secure its contents very well. At the ends of the chains hung large stones of the type that are abundant in the riverbed, clearly used as ballast to keep the package submerged. The yellow tarp was torn in several places, ripped by dragging and years of being in the water. Through these tears, a completely frayed black fabric was visible, which Aurelio immediately identified as the typical material of a sleeping bag. The smell emanating from the bundle was unmistakable: old mud, decomposing organic matter, and that penetrating dampness that only objects that have been submerged for a long time produce. There were no other objects around. The scene clearly suggested dragging and subsequent entrapment in the roots during the receding water.
Aurelio, who had lived by the river his whole life, immediately understood that what was in front of him was not a casual find. The chains, the stone ballast, the systematic way it was packed—everything indicated deliberate human intervention. Without touching anything, Aurelio marked the perimeter of the find with branches and ran back to the community to give notice. By 9 AM, the news had reached the authorities in Ciudad Valles. At 10, a Civil Protection team was heading to the location with photographic equipment and material to cordon off the area. The first officer to arrive was the same commander who had coordinated the searches for Héctor and María in 2007. He immediately recognized the implications of the find and ordered that it be treated as a crime scene until proven otherwise.
Photographs were taken from every possible angle, the exact distance from the riverbed was measured, and the position of the bundle among the roots was meticulously documented. The decision on how to proceed was not easy. The package was clearly disintegrated in some parts, and any rough movement could destroy important evidence. It was decided to transport it whole, keeping the ballast stones in their original position to prevent it from coming apart during transport. The retrieval was done with extreme care. A new tarp was placed under the bundle. It was tied with new ropes to maintain its structural integrity and was carried by four people to a Civil Protection truck. The retrieval report recorded all the observable details: the streaks of rust left by the chains on the tarp, the branches and plant fibers stuck to the outside, and the multiple layers of mud clinging to the fabric.
During the journey to the city, the commander couldn’t help but remember the case of the couple who disappeared 5 years earlier. The dates coincided too perfectly: November 2007 for the disappearance, January 2012 for this find. Five years was exactly the time an object could remain hidden in the cavities the river forms during floods.
The bundle arrived at the forensic medical service (SEMEFO) in San Luis Potosí at 3 PM that same Friday, January 13. The forensic doctor, alerted to the delicacy of the case, decided to wait until Monday to begin the opening. Over the weekend, the package remained in refrigeration to halt any decomposition process that might still be occurring.
Unraveling the Mystery
Rosa Elena received the call on Monday morning. The Civil Protection commander’s voice warned her that something had been found that might be related to her sister’s case, but that it was necessary to wait for the expert report results before making any claims. He asked her not to travel to San Luis Potosí yet, to wait until she had more precise information. But Rosa Elena knew the tone of authority too well after 5 years of procedures and searches. This call had a different weight, a gravity she hadn’t heard since the first days of November 2007. That same afternoon, she boarded a bus to the Potosina capital.
The examination began on Tuesday, January 17, on a specially conditioned stainless steel table at the San Luis Potosí SEMEFO. The forensic doctor, with 20 years of experience in complex cases, decided to proceed in layers to preserve as much evidence as possible. Each step was meticulously photographed and documented. The first layer was the outer yellow tarp, completely saturated with water. When manipulated with specialized tools, a dark liquid mixed with fine sand and river sediment drained from it. The fabric was so deteriorated that it fell apart at the slightest contact, but it still had enough strength to have protected its contents for years of immersion.
The chains were removed one by one. They were common steel chains of the type sold in any hardware store for basic industrial use. The rust had corroded them almost completely, but they still maintained the structural integrity necessary to have fulfilled their ballast function. The stones tied to the ends were indeed from the Tampaón riverbed, selected for their weight and shape to sink.
Below the yellow tarp appeared the black sleeping bag. It was completely ripped in multiple places with the synthetic filling scattered and compacted by the humidity. But what most caught the forensic doctor’s attention were the biofilm and silt stains clinging to the fabric, clear evidence of prolonged exposure to an aquatic environment. The process of drying and sifting the contents was carried out for 3 consecutive days. Each recovered fragment was cataloged, weighed, and photographed before being sent to the forensic anthropology laboratory.
Preliminary results arrived on Friday, January 20. Very worn and disarticulated bone fragments compatible with two adult individuals. The state of the remains was consistent with years of exposure to constant humidity and movement from river dragging. The bones showed the characteristic wear of erosion by sediments but had no clean cuts or perforations that might indicate the use of weapons. The fragmentation pattern was compatible with trauma from a fall, prolonged dragging, or simple post-mortem disarticulation by environmental factors.
Among the sifted sediments, objects appeared that made the forensic doctor’s heart race. Pieces of paracord of the type used in mountaineering activities. A simple carabiner, completely rusted but still recognizable, and fragments of green foam that corresponded exactly to the material of the sleeping pads used in 2007. But the most conclusive evidence appeared on Saturday morning when the lab technician sifted the finest sediments. An inner fabric tag, completely soaked but still legible, showed initials embroidered in blue thread that the moisture had faded but not completely erased: M.R.H. María del Carmen Ruiz Hernández always marked her camping gear with her initials. Along with the tag, several dark beads similar to the necklace María always wore on her excursions appeared. The beads were loose, scattered among the sediments, as if the thread that held them together had disintegrated after years of humidity. Their color and size matched the detailed descriptions Rosa Elena had provided to the authorities exactly.
On Sunday, Rosa Elena was formally summoned to recognize the recovered objects. She arrived accompanied by the lawyer she had hired two years earlier and a cousin who worked as a public notary. She didn’t need more than 5 minutes to confirm what she already knew from the moment she received the first call. The objects belonged to María and Héctor.
The anthropological identification took two more weeks. A segment of an upper dental arch found among the bone fragments matched María’s dental records provided by Rosa Elena. The metrics of the long bones, despite their fragmentation, allowed for an estimated height calculation that was compatible with Héctor’s physical build. But what most concerned the investigators were not the remains themselves but the circumstances of their packaging. Someone had made the deliberate decision to wrap those remains along with the camping gear, secure the package with industrial chains, and weigh it down with stones to keep it submerged. This was not the action of someone who had simply found bodies after an accident.
The analysis of the chains provided additional but not conclusive clues. They were common chains available in any hardware store in the region. The oxidation pattern suggested prolonged exposure to humidity, but determining whether they had been placed immediately after death or years later was technically impossible after so much time underwater. Two main scenarios were considered.
The first: Héctor and María suffered an accident during the early morning of November 18, 2007, possibly a fall into the river during the nighttime swell. Subsequently, someone found the bodies and the gear, and, fearing involvement in the case, decided to hide the evidence by wrapping and sinking it in the river.
The second scenario was more disturbing: Someone had intervened from the very moment of the accident or had even caused it. This person would have manipulated the campsite scene to simulate a hurried departure. They would have systematically disposed of the bodies and gear and kept the secret for 5 years until the river betrayed them.
The investigation was reactivated with renewed resources. All the 2007 witnesses were re-interviewed. The alibis of the people who had contact with the couple during their stay in the region were reviewed, and sales records of industrial chains in hardware stores in Ciudad Valles and…
