Puerto Vallarta

June 13 - 18:
It was a stressful drive from Mazatlan to Puerto Vallarta taking about 8 hrs. The first half of the drive was on straight roads through agricultural lands, but the second half was tough. From Tepic to Puerto Vallarta the drive is not long, but it is on a slow downhill, curvy road that drops out of the Sierra Madres on to the plains of Puerto Vallarta. The drive took us through steep mountainous terrain covered in grasslands, and dense shrub covered hillsides. Just as we were getting tired, we rounded a curve and instantly we were dropped into a large verdant valley covered in palm trees and pastures. To the west we see La Bahia de Banderas (Bay of Flags) with it’s water glistening in the late afternoon sun, and in the distance, tucked away in the southern part of the valley right up against the mountains, is the famous city of Puerto Vallarta. As we reach Bucerias the traffic increases and so does the exhaust fumes, so that by time we reach Vallarta Sharon is breathing through her handkerchief. Unfortunately, the over-bearing exhaust fumes is the worst part of Vallarta. The offshore winds keep the exhaust fumes from the beach and the resorts, so these places are great, but walk the Malecon, or shop the markets and the fumes become overpowering.

We spent most of our time at our resort, Canto del Sol, sleeping in, reading, and playing in the pool. The weather has been sunny and hot, with moderate humidity, but every afternoon thunder clouds build over the surrounding mountains and spill over the valley, cooling things off.. It won’t be long before the summer rains begin. I hope they hold out until we get to Tenacatita, it’s hard driving in heavy rains with thunder and lightning.

While in Vallarta we accomplished a bunch of other necessary things that can only be done in the larger cities of Mexico. In Vallarta there is a Costco, Home Depot, Walmart, and government offices. We had to update our FM3s, Mexican Passports, which is always an ordeal. To smooth out the process this year we hired a lawyer, which cost us $300. In this way we didn’t have to go to the government office, the lawyer will do it all and send our passports down to Tenacatita later on when he is all done. We decided to do it our self next year now that we understand the process. The passports are the process we use to get our Mexican citizenship, which comes after 10 years (it used to be 5 years) when we will have dual citizenship. In this way we can own our Mexican property outright without having to use a presta nombre (borrowed name), which is a very unusual process that I won’t get into here.

We also did our laundry, which is a small ordeal: We use unscented detergent and no dryer sheets, but in Mexico they use only scented products, so all their washing machines and dryers have an intense toxic smell to them. So whenever we wash our clothes in their machines they come back smelling awful. Lucky for us, we found a self-service Laundromat 20 minutes drive from Vallarta in a small shopping center at Paradise Village in Nuevo Vallarta. Interestingly, self-service Laundromats are uncommon in Mexico because most Laundromats are family run businesses where you bring your clothes in for washing.

I spoke with Arturo, our builder, and he seems to believe the house will be done when we get there, although it sounds like nothing was done since leaving in March. No surprise! No less, we look forward to and are excited about getting to Tenacatita and moving into our house.