Villahermosa is the capital of Tabasco, a state on Mexico's Gulf coast that gets overlooked by most travellers but contains one of the country's most important archaeological sites. The city sits in the humid lowlands where two major rivers meet, surrounded by a landscape of lagoons, swamp, and tropical forest — the same watery terrain that allowed the Olmec civilisation to flourish here over three thousand years ago.
The reason most visitors come is the Parque-Museo La Venta, an outdoor archaeological park displaying colossal Olmec stone heads and other monumental sculptures salvaged from the ancient ceremonial site of La Venta before it was swallowed by an oil refinery in the 1950s. It is one of the most remarkable open-air museums in Mexico. The Museo Regional de Antropología Carlos Pellicer has complementary indoor exhibits on Olmec and Maya cultures.
The city itself is a busy, humid, working state capital — not charming in the way that colonial cities like Oaxaca or San Cristóbal are, but practical and interesting on its own terms. The Zona Luz, the pedestrianised historic centre along the Río Grijalva, is pleasant to walk and has the Cathedral and decent restaurants. Tabasco is cacao country: Mexico produces some of its finest chocolate from cacao grown in this region, and you can taste it in the local markets.