A travel essay about a recent trip to the central Pacific Coast of Mexico

By Marlys Hersey, Editor

Editor’s Note: I wrote this article a couple of months ago, but when the H1N1 (“Swine”) flu broke out in Mexico and many Americans and others were reluctant to travel to Mexico, it seemed a silly time to publish this. Now, however, the flu is certainly not confined to Mexico.

Furthermore, at press time, according to the World Health Organization, out of a confirmed total of 70,893 cases worldwide, found in some 113 countries, the United States now leads the number of cases of H1N1 flu (27,717 with 127 deaths), while Mexico ranks second (8,279 cases , 116 deaths), and Canada third (7,775 cases, 21 deaths). Chile and Argentina occupy 4th and 5th places. Which is not to say your concerns over a flu epidemic are to be dismissed, only to make you aware, if you are not already, that that may not be a reason to avoid travel in Mexico, especially if you are not hesitant to travel in the U.S.

Also, the discount airline mentioned, Viva Aerobus, has since cancelled service out of Austin, however you can fly with them out of Chihuahua City, Mexico, just a few hours’ drive or bus ride south of Presidio, TX.

When Waters sees the two-for-one special, he insists we jump on the deal. Earlier this year, Viva Aerobus, a discount Mexican airline, began flying out of Austin directly to three cities in Mexico: Monterrey, Cancún, and Puerto Vallarta. To jump-start the service, they offered two-for-one airfare. I say we can’t really afford it. He says at $225 round trip for two, we can’t afford not to.

We opt for Puerto Vallarta: any warm salt water sounds good to me, and as a surfer now living in the desert, Waters opts for waves. A few years ago, we had a great trip in Mexico, training and bussing it all the way to San Blas, in the state of Nayarit — a small town on the coast, just a few hours north of Vallarta. To return to that region in just a few hours is a lovely prospect.

Finding the South Terminal of the Austin airport turns out to be something of a project (it’s miles south of the main terminal), but once inside the green warehouse of  South Terminal, we find Aerobus agents at the counter who are friendly, bilingual, highly competent and laid back.  The Mexican vibe is unmistakable already. And it takes all of about two minutes to get through TSA security. Aerobus appears to be the only airline that uses this terminal.

The plane is just like all the other planes I’ve flown on, no indication of this being any sub-par operation.

We fly over the Sierra Madre Occidental, a mountain range in the northeast part of Mexico, which looks nothing like any other range I’ve seen: dark, very spiny… otherworldly.

Puerto Vallarta, itself, is nestled up against lush green, steep mountains that come right down to the sea. It’s a spectacular tropical setting.

We get through customs relatively quickly, then beeline through the hotel- and taxi-solicitors crowding the airport. We hop on a city bus going to La Zona Romantica, in central Vallarta. The bus seems really old, really beat up. Typical city bus in Mexico. Were the buses ever new? It’s hard to imagine.

When the bus driver pulls out and drives really fast, weaving through traffic in this loud, hulking mass, shock absorbers long since gone, just narrowly avoiding collisions, Waters and I look at each other and smile: Now we’re in Mexico!

The bus ride costs 11 pesos for both of us, or 5.5 p each: at this exchange rate (1 peso = about 7 cents; one dollar equals about 14 pesos), we get from the airport to other side of town for the equivalent of about 38 cents each. A Welsh guy (an architect who now lives in Austin, he tells us) asks how much the bus driver charged us. It seems the driver saw the four of us gringos getting on the city bus at the same time, assumed we were all together, and charged this guy for the four of us – and then accepted my payment for two right after. Now the Welsh architect bemoans that he overpaid – by all of about 38 cents.  

We find a really nice, clean, second story hotel room just a block and half from the beach, La Playa de los Muertos (don’t let the name fool you).

To stay at the Hotel Jasmín costs only 600 pesos per night, or about $42 US dollars — if you pay in pesos. Note: most hotels don’t give nearly as good an exchange rate as the current bank rate.

The water is beautiful, but the air and water are not quite warm enough for swimming, so we just get our feet wet in the Pacific and watch brown pelicans and magnificent frigatebirds flying and diving. If you have not yet seen a real live magnificent frigatebird, put that on your list of things you must do in this life. Soon.

We go out in search of dinner: we must have seafood. We are not keen on crowds, especially not big crowds of loud gringos, but on our first night in this touristy part of this big tourist-driven city (pop. 300,000?), we are hard pressed to find a little more out-of-the-way joint we’d prefer, the kind with authentic Mexican food. We are hungry and tired. We resort to Joe Jack’s, where we are surrounded by non-Mexicans: boisterous white people speaking entirely in English. Even the Mexican waitress speaks to us in English though I am speaking Spanish.

“I don’t think they’re American,” says Waters, nodding towards the biggest, loudest party next to us. “I think they’re Canadian.”

“How can you tell?” I ask.

Just then, one of the guys at that table bellows “Calgary RULES!”

One morning, we walk along El Malecón, the boardwalk along the bay. A guy with a huge watertank strapped on his back is misting one of several huge sand sculptures, wetting it down to make it last. I put money in the sculptors’ tip box.

We’re in the state of Jalisco, home and major producer of tequila, made from agaves. There are tequila-tasting bars a plenty, and every time we walk by one of them, someone calls to us from inside: “You’re just in time for free tequila tasting!”  (“I think it’s always that time,” notes Waters.) This morning, a tequila shopkeeper sees me taking photos and calls out: “You know how’ll you’ll get better photos? Drink some tequila!”

Besides watching people and birds on the beach, other highlights include shopping for pens, notebook, toothpaste and sunglasses at a Woolworth’s, and eating frutas frescas – mango, papaya, jicama, and melon – presented in plastic bags with forks by street vendors, for about 20 pesos each. We drench our fruit in key lime juice, and sprinkle it all with chili and salt.

Hibiscus, ficus, palms, and birds of paradise grow right out of the ground here. On nearly every street, amidst the backdrop of colorful buildings, vendors peddle beautiful textiles and pottery and jewelry and paintings. At night, we eat more seafood at a restaurant on the beach, are entertained by musicians and firedancers. And we drink really good coffee; espresso bars have caught on here, yet café americanos, cappuccinos, and lattes cost just a small fraction of what they do in the US.

After two days in Vallarta, we are ready for smaller towns, less crowded, less Americanized and Canadianized. From the descriptions in our Lonely Planet Mexico guidebook, Rincón de Guayabitos, Nayarit, about 60 km (36 miles) north sounds like a good choice: small, mellow resort town where Mexican families go to enjoy the ocean.

To get there, we need to catch an out-of-town bus; to get that, we need to ride a city bus to the central bus station. After about 45 minutes on the crowded city bus, we see the sign for “la camionera central.” We assume the city bus will go right to the station. Yet five minutes later, there’s been no stop, and we’re still on the bus. The guy in front of us, when I ask, says we’ve already passed la camionera central, that we’ll have to go back. When we get off at the next stop, lugging our heavy backpacks, we’re in a dusty, semi-industrial part of town. Who knows how far away the bus station is.

“Let’s ask those guys,” says Waters, gesturing towards the only people around, at a grungy counter to what looks like an auto repair garage.

We walk over, backpacks on, and I ask (in Spanish) how to get to la camionera central. “Caminando?” they ask. (Walking?) It’s about a 25-minute walk, they tell us. They ask where we’re going. “He’s going to Guayabitos right now!” one of them says, gesturing towards a customer/friend. “He’ll give you a ride.”

Waters and I are amazed. “¿Te veras?” I ask. (Really? You’re telling the truth?)

“Si! No problema.”

We hesitate for a second, exchange glances. Is it safe? We shrug to each other and Waters accepts.

“No se preocupan, amigos,” says one. “El es mi primo!” (Don’t worry, friends. He’s my cousin.)

The driver leads us a few feet to his white mini-van, opens the doors and we get in, holding our backpacks on our laps. A woman in the front passenger seat smiles at us, a girl in the back seat, now between us, nods. Presumably his wife and daughter? No one seems alarmed. They don’t talk much to us, maybe because of our limited Spanish, but they also don’t talk much to each other.

We get a free, comfortable ride through agave fields and mountains, our driver going twice the speed limit, just like everyone else on this narrow, two-lane road, peppered with blind curves.

An hour and a half later, he pulls to the side of the highway, points across the road to a town, and says “Guayabitos.” We thank him many times, hop out and start walking. We don’t know their names, never got a photo, and never got to buy them even a token of our appreciation or give them money.

We are in awe. I still am. For a lot of the ride, I thought about on how magnanimous Mexicans are on the whole. Here we are, Americans on vacation, a bit lost on the outskirts of Vallarta only because we are not fluent enough in Spanish, and they give us a ride – for no reward or gain. It’s just what they do for other people. If these guys were lost on the outskirts of a big town in the US, how likely is it someone would give them a hassle-free ride to their next destination?

Not only is this a great travel story, but it’s emblematic of a profound cultural difference.

For years now, we hear so much anti-immigration flak, particularly anti-Mexican immigration. They’re coming here to take our jobs, damnit. And they need to SPEAK ENGLISH.

Yet even after decades of invasion of Vallarta by loud, non-Spanish-speaking, affluent Americans and Canadians on vacation, the Mexicans are still, by and large, capable of treating us each as individuals, and trusting, and being very generous.

This may seem like I am reaching a bit, overgeneralizing based on this one story, but from my experiences and from similar stories from friends’ travels in Mexico, it’s more often than not accurate. How do they do it? And why?

Guayabitos is a beautiful little resort town, indeed, although it looks like it had its heyday some 50 or more years ago. And it, too, is partially overrun by English-speaking Canadians; we enjoy it, nevertheless. We walk the crowded beach, watching pelicans and frigatebirds, and watching people. Waters eats sarandeado (fish) and camarones (shrimp) at every chance, sold for pittance by vendors on the beach. We sit on the beach at night, too, and listen to the waves. I get to use my Spanish a little more. We even converse with a few Mexican locals about food, weather, their work, their relatives in California and Texas.

It gets overcast and chillier, still not swimming weather.

After a couple of days in Guayabitos, we catch a bus south to Sayulita, Nayarit, a surfing town which has also been discovered and colonized by gringos – even more so than indicated by our now 5-year-old guidebook. Grainy breads, chi-chi coffee shops, health food stores, and pizza joints are the norm. Surfer culture dominates: tents near the beach (and dogs) are abundant. There are also high-end hotels here way out of our range. And lots of SUV’s with Colorado plates. We are hard-pressed to find some mid-range accommodations.

We find a room in a place that’s one step up from a youth hostel, in the center of town. As we check in, Buena Vista Social Club’s “El Cuarto de Tula” emanates from the stereo in the coffee shop, downstairs. We eat a big seafood lunch, walk the length of the town via the beach. That night, in little twin beds in our bright orange and blue room, windows open, we fall asleep to the sound of the Pacific – and a Cuban band playing live at the club on the corner: again, “El Cuarto de Tula.”

It’s overcast again and even colder the next day. Not surfing or swimming weather.

We take a bus back to Vallarta, the gruff driver weaving and speeding on the narrow mountainous roads through spellbinding tropical forest. The older white guy in the seat next to me wears a pink wristband that reads “Paradise Village.” He and his companions exit the bus at Nuevo Vallarta, another metropolis just north of Vallarta proper, built almost entirely for affluent foreigners. Enormous billboards dot the landscape, hawking real estate deals, all written in English. (Just imagine if we had billboards here in the Big Bend aimed entirely at foreigners?)

Back in Vallarta, we enjoy a last day in town and on the beach, staying one more night at the Hotel Jasmín and visiting our now-familiar coffee shop and convenience store.

The weather is finally warmer, and Waters plays in the surf – amidst throngs of others in the water, and parasailers, taking off and landing, their ropes lifting up out of the crowded waters. The crowded beach reminds me of photos of the French Riviera, or of the beaches of my youth in Connecticut and Rhode Island. Still, it’s warm and sunny and people are having a good time.

We wonder if there’s an off-season for Vallarta.

For a price, a guitar player on the beach serenades a couple with a beautiful acoustic version of – you guessed it – “El Cuarto de Tula.”

As we walk the beach, Waters says “Let’s do a hike next week in the Chisos, maybe camp out at the South Rim.”

When I don’t immediately concur, he asks what’s wrong. “It’s just that we’re in beautiful tropical Vallarta, and I’m trying to just be here now,” I say.

“I know,” he says, smiling. “I guess I am just ready to be away from crowds again.”

The next day at the Vallarta airport (which we reached via another city bus ride, replete with one-eyed driver; to travel by bus in Mexico is to give up illusions of control), we chat with the Aerobus agent who asks how we enjoyed our time in Mexico and if we’d return. We say yes, but mention how crowded and invaded this area seems.

“Ah, yes, Vallarta, Sayulita, they are just American colonies now,” responds the agent, with no hint of rancor in his voice. And then he tells us about places several hours to the south, in Michoacán, that might be more pleasing.

A few weeks later, at the end of a hike to Cattail Falls in Big Bend National Park, we meet two young guys in the parking lot who hiked down from the Basin Campground and now have to get back up. The hike was longer and harder than they expected; it’s late in the afternoon and kid of warm. They ask if we have extra water or if we’re headed up to the Basin.

We are headed in the opposite direction from the Basin, but I think of our ride from Vallarta to Guayabitos from our generous neighbors to the south…. We give these tired hikers a ride back to their campsite, and learn they are cousins, both software engineers. One lives in Austin, the other in São Paolo, Brazil. The Austinite tells us how he likes to go to a certain dog park in Austin: “The dogs are jumping around in the water, there’s just all this happiness. You can sense it even from the bridge looking down on the park.”

We enjoy the detour through beautiful national park and the conversation with these interesting visitors we’d otherwise never have met.