November 21st, 2014
From Mazatlán I took an overnight bus to Puerto
Vallarta. I was in PV back in 2003 at
the start of a two week paragliding vacation and I was interested in checking
out Yelapa, a beach we had flown at, for the possibility of being a winter
tandem paragliding spot.
I stayed at a hostel right in the middle of downtown, just a
few blocks from the beach. It wasn't a
bad hostel but the church next door surely was noisy, ringing bells at all
hours of the night and day.
The dorm:
The outside lounge area:
The beautiful, yet noisy church:
The view from the hostel:
The first day was pretty mellow, I spent most of the
afternoon on a restaurant patio, writing while watching the world go by. The next day I took the local bus out to Boca
Rotan beach and then got a boat taxi out to Yelapa. Even though it’s on the continent, there are
no easy roads to get to Yelapa so taking a boat is the best option, plus I
always like a boat ride.
A nice restaurant on the first night:
If only it was that easy...
Some dancers on my way home from dinner:
The secluded beach looked familiar and apart from a few new
buildings it hadn’t changed much. I
first walked on the path that takes you into the main part of town, if you can
even call it that, it’s really more just a collection of houses, the odd little
shop and the occasional restaurant. I
decided to hike up to the launch and was happy that I could easily find the
trail up. It’s a decent little hike,
only about 15-20 minutes but uphill all the way. At the takeoff there was an older, shirtless
man sitting on a chair looking out at the bay below. I walked up and introduced myself and thought
he looked familiar, and sure enough he was. I had met Alan, a retired air traffic controller from Canada, back in
2003 when we flew at Yelapa. After the
flight he had us over to his beach shack which reminded me of the Swiss Family
Robinson abode from that old TV show of a stranded family on a deserted island. He poured us some kind of high test moonshine
as we sat down on his little patio area with a nice view of the beach. So he’s still here! We chatted for half an hour or so before he
decided that the conditions weren’t going to get any better so he took off with
his solo glider for a quick sled ride down to the beach where I met up with him
after for a nice fish sandwich for lunch.
Boca Rotan Beach:
Yelapa:
Walking into the village:
Alan setting up:
A selfie:
And he's off:
The river by the beach:
Lunch:
On the boat back:
I like pelicans...funny lookin' birds:
Beautiful Puerto Vallarta:
Sunset back in PV:
And a beauty it was:
From our discussions it doesn’t look like Yelapa would be a
very viable place for me to try and set up tandem paragliding operations as the
flying season is fairly short and not too many tourists visit Yelapa. Oh well, it was a nice afternoon out. It’s time to head off to the massive metropolis
of Mexico City.
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