Villahermosa – Parque Museo La Venta
The open-air museum “Parque Museo La Venta” with the finds from the Olmec ceremonial centre of the same name is Villahermosa’s main attraction.
The tree-covered museum park forms a unit together with the adjacent zoo, where animals from the Tabasco jungle can be seen. Its most valuable exhibits are monumental sculptures, steles, altars and above all the famous colossal heads of the oldest Meso-American culture.
These 3000 year old, gigantic relics of basalt were excavated in a swamp area just 130 km west of their present location in 1940 and brought to their present location on the initiative of the poet Carlos Pellicer Cámara. There is a signposted tour with detailed explanations in Spanish and English. The Museo Regional de Antropología of CICOM, the Centre for Olmec and Mayan Studies, which is also an award-winning museum, provides deeper insights into the culture of the Olmec and Mayan peoples.
In contrast to the Parque Museo La Venta, which is located at the Laguna de las Ilusiones west of the centre, the Anthropology Museum is located in the restored old town of Villahermosa. Here, in the Zona Remodelada, you can also find numerous galleries, shops, cafés and restaurants where one can stroll undisturbed by the traffic.