Photos: Children on a dangerous journey north

A girl, who refused to be identified, looks nervously from a raft crossing the Suchiate River near El Carmen, Guatemala, directly beneath the border crossing bridge that joins Mexico and Guatemala. She was beginning a trip to the United States. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

July 3, 2014 5 AM PT

Some Central Americans feel encouraged by rumors that children who cross the U.S. border will be allowed to stay. But other fundamental reasons fueling migration have remained unchanged for decades: family unification, hometown violence, inescapable poverty and lack of opportunity.

A raft carrying goods and immigrants bound for Mexico and the United States crosses the Suchiate River near El Carmen, Guatemala. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

Migrants carry their belongings across the Suchiate River. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

A family crosses from Guatemala into Mexico on one of the makeshift rafts that regularly ply the Suchiate River. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

The Suchiate River in the Guatemalan border city of Tecun Uman is busy with raft traffic bringing products and people across the porous border. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

A man known as “El Rambo” carries a raft toward the river. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

Migrants in El Carmen, Guatemala, make their way quickly toward a raft that will take them into Mexico. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

El Carmen, Guatemala, is a popular crossing spot for undocumented Central Americans entering Mexico on their dangerous journey to the United States. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

Relatives wait at Nuevos Raices in Quetzaltenango, Guatemala, a shelter for deported migrant children. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

Relatives at the shelter in Quetzaltenango ask an employee about the status of their loved ones. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

The parents and relatives of children deported from Mexico back to Guatemala wait inside Nuevos Raices, a shelter for young migrant children. They are shown documentaries to dissuade them from allowing their children to make the dangerous trek through Mexico to the United States. The relatives are given 72 hours to come and pick up their children. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

Wilson Uvaldo, 12, who was caught in Mexico trying to get to the United States, is welcomed home by his grandmother outside the shelter in Quetzaltenango. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

Horcones is typical of many small towns in Guatemala: High unemployment and crime rates have led to a steady exodus of children and adults heading north to make money to support their families back home. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

Oscar Arrella, 14, hauls firewood through one of Guatemala City’s many slums. Harsh economic conditions coupled with chronic unemployment are pushing many to go north. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

Members of the Mox family gather on the side of a highway near Finca La Primavera, Guatemala, to gather wood from nearby mango trees. Some family members have immigrated to the U.S. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

People pray outside the cathedral in the small mountain town of San Pedro Las Huertas in central Guatemala during a festival for the town’s patron saint. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

Parishioners leave the cathedral in San Pedro Las Huertas, Guatemala. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

Sindy Laucel, 16, back home in Horcones, Guatemala, recalls her ordeal in trying to reach the U.S. with her sister. She had hoped to join -- and get to know -- her mother in North Carolina. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)

Sindy Laucel is greeted by her grandmother at a shelter in Quetzaltenango, Guatemala, after being deported from Mexico. (Michael Robinson Chavez / Los Angeles Times)