Platform provides sweeping views of the area and what is directly below travellers' feet
Puerto Vallarta-area Canopy River park is clearly in a position to provide visitors with a view to a thrill.
The adventure park – found in a mountainous area a little outside of the city – includes among its attractions a platform found 429 meters above sea level, enabling guests to take in views of rugged landscapes, distant ocean – and terrain literally directly below their feet.
The centre of the platform is made of concrete that is flanked on both sides by thick, tempered, clear glass guests can walk on, allowing them to look directly down.
The shifting below depths reach up to 80 metres.
“Nobody should be nervous,” Canopy River’s Omar Zepeda says of opportunities to stand on the glass, adding the lofty platform was designed by an engineering firm that created a structure able to withstand an earthquake.
The 150-square-meter attraction – accessible by a walkway – can hold 100 people and a mariachi band performed on it when it opened.
Visitors must remove their shoes before walking on the glass, helping keep it clean.
They’re also forbidden from jumping on the glass, something Zepeda says would be safe, but which might unnerve other guests.
Canopy River also has ziplining and rappelling but Zepeda notes that there are numerous other activities for visitors who don’t have a daredevil streak, including hiking, horseback riding and ATV excursions.
The site has a restaurant and there’s a new hotel with different types of guest units.
Zepeda reports that Canopy River employees are local, providing area residents with opportunities to support themselves through ecotourism, rather than less environmentally friendly cattle ranching.
Canopy River is on private land on which hunting is forbidden, providing a refuge for a host of creatures, among them mountain lions, armadillos, deer and parrots.
Meanwhile, Zepeda says those who are are somewhat uneasy about standing on that part of the platform that is glass should try to convince themselves to do so, adding it provides a memorable experience.
“I would say, ‘Just do it,'” he states. “You only live once.”
More information can be found at canopyriver.com.
Information on the site’s River Park Hotel can be found at riverparkhotel.mx.
