Christmas at the Beach
For about two weeks in the middle of December, I had intentionally scheduled very little at all. There were two beach stops on the calendar; extended stays where the only things to worry ourselves with was whether to swim in the morning or in the afternoon. That was the plan and, lucky for us, that’s mostly how it went.
It’s a longish drive from Mazatlan to the tourist areas near Puerto Vallarta. No need to split the drive in two – there’s nothing to see – just get it done. The free road (which we took) is fine as well. There are the usual slow bits through towns and around trucks, but it is not until after Tepic (when there is only one option anyways) that things really bog down.
We hadn’t realized we were so high until we had to snake our way back down to the coast. Any vehicle traveling south towards Puerto Vallarta has to come this way and traffic backs up through all the twists and turns. For us, it was the scariest bit of driving for some time, the seemingly short drive taking ages as the afternoon wore on. Leave yourself time and be cool. After that, things are flat and fast again, with turnoffs to all the various burgeoning beach destinations in the southern bit of Nayarit.
Our destination was a stopover in Sayulita. We came here in 2017 and hit the crowds at Easter. At the time, we quite enjoyed our stay but felt that the place was about to hit the popularity tipping point. Well, it seems that’s happened. Part of the appeal of Sayulita is its compressed footprint. Every square inch of the two main streets straddling the central square in a lopsided Y-shape are worth checking out. Great food options, drinks, fun boutiques, little convenience shops to stock up on anything vital you need. The hotels are all unique and the beach is decent – safe and wide if prone to a bit of outflow from the creek that bisects it.
This time it was more of a convalescent stay after our shared illnesses and the place just felt too crowded. There’s still very little room in this beach town, but there are now more visitors than ever. Our timing was poor perhaps, right before Christmas. And if you walk a ways from the action there are more quiet spots to be found. Also, it’s hard to deny the appeal of how easy this place is – everything is right there. But it was too ‘hip’ for us this time round and we were happy to move on.
Next up was five nights in Lo de Marco, a place I had not heard of it until I had to scan the area for affordable accommodation: roomy, near the beach, dog friendly, and a decent kitchen please. Places are a bit more expensive here so I took what I could, which was a bit of a mixed bag. More on that, below.
Roughly 300 kilometers beyond Sinaloa and the climate has changed. It feels like a jungle. I don’t remember it being this green and lush, the shadows smelling rich of earth and vegetation. The effects of the rainy season are still felt in December, I suppose. The verdancy makes for cool evenings and dewy mornings. Leave items out overnight to dry and you’ll wish you hadn’t. It also leaves home with that jungle-damp smell. It’s not as hot as you might expect, either. Another reminder that this is still winter and we should be grateful it isn’t sweltering.
The town itself is simple, welcoming and relaxed. If Sayulita feels overrun, this is your antidote. Days are calm, the beach spacious, commercial action constrained to the main road running from the highway to the beach. Along this stretch of several blocks is a surprisingly rich mix of restaurants. Despite the town being tranquilo, there are plenty of Americans/Canadians down here for the winter that give it a more cosmopolitan* feel than you may expect. Between a couple RV parks near the beach and a handful of dusty streets of nice homes behind stone walls, it feels like the winter population is nearly split between locals and gringos. You have to wonder how quiet it feels if the visitors empty out later in the year.
The water was a little rough here with a steep beach, but we made a point to swim at the more sheltered southern end. It’s our first opportunity to simply walk to a nearby beach and hop in the water. The freedom is amazing; the water warm. There are strange things you notice: how bold the pelicans are as they hit the water next to you as they fish, the little tug of ocean currents or are those curious fish, the lull of the swell when you put your head back and merely float.
It’s an easy few days, but probably too sleepy for us. Even though I get to watch the World Cup Final with a lively bar half filled with expats, I feel a little out of synch with the energy here. Maybe it’s too early in the trip for this place and we’ll long for it later. Time to head on anyways, through the slow crawl of Puerto Vallarta (we really need to come back here, just not with a car), and into the far southern reaches of Jalisco.
We got a few of our wishes granted. There was something about coming over the hill from Bahia Banderas and Puerto Vallarta to the other side… It was hot now and much drier. The mountains not pressing in as they were, the land greatly devoted to agriculture. There was a kind of sea change for me on the 3 hour drive – this was now, officially, all brand new. For the next 6 weeks or so when we would reach the Yucatan, it was a string of unknown places and experiences. We were going on my pre-trip planning. I hoped that I had done a half-ways decent job of it.
Melaque/San Patricio (maps go with the latter, but local branding is all the former – two small towns merged as one) is not a tourist town and it is better for it. The town is at one end of a wide, reasonably sheltered bay. Down at the other end is Barra de Navidad – hipper, more visited certainly, but with a terrible, steep beach totally unsuitable for swimming (although decent for surfing if that’s your thing). Most of the middle of the beach is no-man’s land, good if you like a lonely walk under a hot sun.
Because it was Christmas, we got a weird impression of the place. It was crowded. Each day a dozen big tour busses would come from cities elsewhere and drop off loads of Mexican families. I imagine a visit outside this busy week would yield a very different experience. But we didn’t let the crowds get to us, we merely changed up our approach.
In the mornings, Sarah would often zip out for a run. There’s a nice paved path at the north end that works it’s way out to the headland, or you can take the dirt path from the edge of town that runs up the ridge behind for a great view. Because our place was so nice, we didn’t feel the need to spend a day at the beach. Instead, we would wait until late in the day, taking only our towels and a cool drink for the road and spend half an hour floating in the gentle swell before returning home. The rest of the day was ours: chores, reading, little day trips, the time passed with ease.
We noted that there were other ‘white’ tourists here too, but they easily melded in with the background. The beach is just an add-on here. The town itself mostly focused on the everyday activities of life – busy markets, narrow jumbled streets of vendors. Little in the way of typical tourist infrastructure, which was all fine with us.
There are three nearby places we explored worth mentioning. There’s Barra with the aforementioned bad beach. It’s worth it for a better selection of restaurants and a pleasant (short) malecon where a gentle river emerges. Back northward to the next town brings you to La Manzanilla (not to be confused with nearby massive port city of Manzanillo). I can’t speak to the beach or much else about this little hamlet, but can highly recommend the crocodiles reserve. You’ll walk along rickety boardwalk encircling a pond where dozens of crocs lurk. The big, sleepy reptiles feel awfully close and the flimsy fencing slightly inadequate.
And then finally, there is a small beach up and over the hump north of town, Cuastecomate. If you’re up for a fun challenge (as we were), you can run from Melaque and plunge into the water when you get there. It’s about 2 km from town and yes it is uphill both ways. It’s a funny place with a lot of new investment – fancy sidewalks, signs, parking, accessibility options – all for two hundred meters of beach and three square blocks of a town. Still, it’s too easy to not investigate if you’re staying nearby.
Which brings me to some final thoughts on our two stays. The first bother with Lo de Marco was that I had to wire money to secure the reservation (wouldn’t have gone this way had I noticed when booking). I don’t want to receive mystery international calls laying out instructions – put it in an email and accept credit like every other vendor. Next hassle was check-in: we had to locate the silly place, at a specified time, via chat and phone and the third party who was actually on location. The directions could all have been laid out before hand. A similar thing happened when we were ready to leave – we couldn’t just walk out. We had to meet the local representative to hand back the keys (they hosts even went so far as to suggest there was a ‘window’ for checking out.
There were other things too. I had to light the hot water heater (“and please turn off when finished…”); the home really needed to be aired out on arrival; the kitchen was wanting, the fridge overzealous, the pool filter system manic. Just a series of little issues that felt really easy to solve (or maybe not even create in the first place).
In contrast, our stay in Melaque was terrific. When we arrived, the AC was on ‘arctic’ setting, pre-cooled for our arrival. There was beer and water in the fridge. The rooms were more comfortable, the deck was spacious and sunny. Things seemed clean. There were no complicating rules, no unnecessary interactions.
It was nice, in its way, to spend Christmas away from home. The weather, for one, has been perfect and sunny every single day. Nice too, is to get away from the pressures of gift giving, family dinners, and related holiday pressures that we do to ourselves every single year. Yet at the same time, I found myself a little homesick with perhaps too much time to relax and ponder. Of course, this trip doesn’t leave you much time to worry – there’s always a new adventure on the horizon. Next, we plunge further into the unknown, leaving tourists like us behind.
*What are the rules for using the term cosmopolitan? Can a tiny hamlet with mostly dirt streets ever be deemed cosmopolitan? Let’s just say, less Mexican.
