Coco loco

So Katy and I went on 5 day beach break to the beautiful Sayulita, an hour north of Puerto Vallarta. Katy ate a typhoid taco on our second night, and spent the rest of the trip in bed. Thus the majority of this blog post is about me having a nice time, sans my other half.

Our journey there, we travelled by bus first to Puerto Vallarta (watched 2 ½ films, nothing happened in any of them; free cheese and ham sandwich, more plastic than cheese though really, but I’m not complaining, honest). We only visited the tourist centre of Puerto Vallarta, for a quick lunch, but it seemed very Americanised, fake, rich and horrible. So we skeddadled outta there pretty sharpish and made our way by bus to Sayulita (bus driver playing Banda music, my favourite is called ‘Very Good’, where they say ‘very good’ repeatedly in a strong Mexican accent).

Sayulita is an interesting place, it is a big surfing spot (I never saw any big waves, but the sea was lovely, quite warm sometimes, and some little waves), and there are a lot of Americans, which meant food wasn’t as cheap as we’ve been used to. But this also meant we could find some good non-Mexican or mixture food (breakfasts especially). The beach is bright white sand, dotted with huge palm trees. Our first full day (Katy’s only day) we walked far, far, far down the beach to escape everyone, which was perfect. That is, until we were hungry, we then realised we were very far away from everything; who’d’ve seen that coming?! There was a great little fruit stall on the beach, selling coconut water in a coconut and other fruit cups. The fruit and veg is so tasty (especially the avocados, not sure if they count as a fruit or vegetable?), I think Sayulita has something like 360 days of sun a year. After having finished the coconut water, they break it open for you and scoop out all the jelly for you to chow down on.

Margaritas are big business in Sayulita, what with all the local tequila production, so we thought it only apt to drink a fair few. One night, an American friend had a large Margarita, I think it had 7 shots in it, and the glass was bigger than his head. He fell off his chair a few times after drinking that.

We stayed in a really nice hostel, met an interesting bunch of people, some nice people from Colorado and from India. Met a man from Canada, who seemed to be an exaggeration of himself, he was so overly cheerful! None of us dealt too well with his insane enthusiasm and loud voice. He was just so damn happy!

The best morning was the snorkelling trip. Two guys from the hostel, a Mexican and I went early in the morning to Punta Mita, and got a boat from there 20 minutes into the ocean to two islands called Las Islas Marietas. These are bird sanctuaries, and fiercely protected, there are birds there (blue- and yellow-footed boobies) that live only there and in the Galapagos! Because we were early, no one else was there either. We got kicked off the boat with our snorkels and flippers, made our way through a cold, dark cave and found a little beach. The fish were incredible, and not scared of us, but also not expecting food, they were just hanging out having a nice time (as was I). Then we went to the second island, to the most beautiful beach I’ve ever seen, the water was completely clear, and there were all these caves I crawled around in (pretending I was alone, on a deserted island, because I’m mature like that) full of hermit crabs. My chest genuinely hurt, it was so beautiful, I just wish Katy could’ve been there too (awww). On our journey home (I tried very hard pretending I couldn’t see it was time to leave) we noticed a whale watching boat. What ho, let’s go see what they’re looking at… WHALES!!! There was a mummy and a baby, and they did the water spout thing, and then tail in the air to dive, and it was the most incredible thing. They really are gentle giants.

And that’s about it, I swam around in the sea (and cut my legs on rocks because I’m stubborn and didn’t want to swim where all the other people were, and hence where the rocks weren’t), ate a lot of fruit and vegetables and guacamole, and drank strawberry margaritas. Oh, and made friends with a man who plays guitar, who then wouldn’t leave Katy and I alone, and kept declaring his undying love.

E