Visit to Puerto Vallarta…

It’s an older RV park here in PV, but with WiFi only in the office I wander over there the next morning to check my email. The gate at what I thought was the office was open so I just walk in and make myself comfortable in the main, open air court. Nice. It was past it’s glory days but you could tell how nice it had been. Big comfy couches, nice coffee tables, big kitchen, etc. The WiFi was a little weak but I came in there twice a day for 3 days before the owner mentioned that I’d been wandering into their living room! I thought it was a common area for RV’ers but no, the owners live there. That explained why their bedrooms were right off the common area. Huh. Sorry! From then on, I used the buzzer and asked to come in for the WiFi instead of just walking in like I owned the place. There were always people in there when I walked in but no one had said anything. Finally, they started locking the gate. That was the tip off. They’re nice people though and didn’t seem to upset about my lack of manners.

The RV park, Puerto Vallarta Trailer Park, on Francia, is on the north side of town so it’s in a newer part…but it’s been here for 30 years. Old town is a short bus ride away, the coast the same. With Stacy off checking out her apartment, I had the chance to wander around this area of town and enjoy the flavor and culture by myself. There’s a near by Walmart too. Never went there because I prefer to shop in Mexican stores.

The next day, Stacy shows up all excited to get me to go to her favorite area of PV and visit. She’s stayed there many times over the years and has gained many friends amongst the locals. Her apartment was due south of PV a few miles, right on the coast. If you’re familiar with Mexican building styles, you’ll know that often the buildings look like they’re hanging onto the rocks by a thread. Her place was one of those. The apartment had a 100 foot drop to the ocean. Can’t help but think it’ll go right into the sea if they have an earthquake.

Anyway, before we went to her stomping ground we did a tour of the malecon in PV, visited some shops and some of the bars along the way. Lots of fine art was displayed and then tons of junk. Very few tourists though. Even then, we didn’t get bothered by aggressive shop owners. Stacy wasted some money on even more trinkets. I don’t know where she puts all the crap she buys.

You can see from the preceding picture how empty the town is. The malecon is wide and attractive with public art and hundreds of nice businesses along the way. Unfortunately, this was the only picture I have of our tour of downtown PV. The rest had an accident.

After our tour, we jumped on a bus and headed south. Several miles later we exit the bus onto a dusty road leading into a small village, the name of which escapes me. It’s not very big, maybe 500 people with some shops and restaurants. I guess it’s claim to fame is the Tequila distillery there. Obviously there’s a regular tourist crowd bussed in as we ran into a Tequila tour while we wandered around.

It does have some very old buildings so I suspect that this village has been here quite a while but I didn’t find out much history of the place.

It’s kind of cool here and I really enjoyed hanging out. As always, the weather was perfect.

I really don’t care that much for Tequila so I didn’t join the tour group we found in this distillery but I enjoyed wandering around checking the place out.

There were about 25 participants in the tour but the place didn’t seem all that crowded most of the time. They’d wander off to the next exhibit and we’d follow after them. I think it would be pretty neat to live in a place like this village. Nice people, quiet, lots of places to visit and things to do. There was even a horse rental place nearby. They had a route up into the hills to get a great view of the ocean and a waterfall above the village.

The agave plantation is above the village up in the hills but we had places to go and people to see so we didn’t take the hike up there.

Lots of cool folk art being sold here but I didn’t see anything I needed. Ain’t much of a shopper.

There’s this neat rope bride across the stream with some public art nearby. Even in this small of a village, there’s still public art. Across the stream is some kind of condo setup. Has a high wall all around it with a very large central plaza. Right next to that was the horse rental place. Poor horses looked a little run down and one of them had a cold or something. Not very attractive situation for them.

What a great tour of a traditional Mexican village. The brunch we had was excellent. I really like Mexican cooking.

So, after that visit, we head up to the main highway and catch the city bus as it passes. About two miles later we jump off and visit Stacy’s apartment.

I’ve been in several of these buildings in Mexico and they do seem to be kind of slapped together. Different height steps, odd setups for rooms, steep stairways, inadequate plumbing, and the like. But, it doesn’t seem to bother them, so why should it bother me?

Note the construction of that wall. Really looks like it’ll disintegrate during an earthquake doesn’t it?

Even with the clouds, it was still very pleasant. Shirtsleeve and shorts weather. Never did rain.

After visiting her place, off we head to the local beach. Again, I can’t recall the name but it’s a popular spot for many tourists from PV. It’s listed in most of the touristy brochures I ran across. It’s also at a small village that by the look of it has been there for a century or two. Has a nice big stream running through it, very large beach, a seawall with plenty of fishing and tour boats.

Not the kind of village I’d want to try to get my RV into. Pretty steep roads.

We picked up a friend of Stacy’s at her apartment. He is an expat and lives in PV year round in the same apartments. This restaurant is about 50 yards from the sea.

This village is in an ocean cove and there were apartments for rent all around the area. There’s also a tour to an even more distant beach south of here that we decided to take later. Meanwhile we had fun talking and drinking and enjoying the weather. Stacy knows all the servers so they tended to congregate around our table.

While we were enjoying our brews and the sea, these guys showed up and started work on a new (or perhaps replacement) palapa. Interesting to watch. Seemed as the whole family (males anyway) joined in to get it done quickly. They were around 3/4 done with it when they knocked off at 5:30.

While we were sitting 50 yards from the ocean, I spotted this crab traveling across the sand in the general direction of the ocean. He must have come from the stream behind us. If you’d try to get to close, he’d disappear into his shell. I followed him his entire trip, mostly. Kind of surprising that no seagulls spotted the little guy.

A few minutes later and he’s submerging into the sea.

They did need to come back the next day to finish up trimming and such. So, less then a day and you have yourself a new shelter.

So, that’s one of our excursions here in PV. More next time.