4102 miles, Walmart, Dancing, Dinners, Fireworks, 7 Pools, Swim up bars and a few crazy taxis later we are finally back home. We had a wonderful time in Nuevo/Puerto Vallarta (PV/NV from now on). If you just want to see pictures/video and skip the long read, go here.
We left Portland around 6am on our flight to LAX and from LAX to PV. Overall the flight was very nice. We bought first class tickets on the way down, so that made it much more enjoyable. I don't know why the food in first class seems to taste so much better, but it does. It's nothing special. I guess when you are used to getting a 1oz. bag of pretzels and half a glass of ginger ale during a 3 hour flight and suddenly you get a chicken sandwich and real utensils it just makes it better. Kind of like when you go camping and for some reason a cut up potato, ground beef, onions and carrots thrown into tin foil makes 'the best dinner ever' and then you try it at home and it tastes like prison food.
It was very pretty coming into PV. It was very lush and green with the mountains and jungles all around.
Once we landed and got of the plane we had to go through customs. No big deal, they take your form and stamp your passport. Then you come up to this podium that has a big red button on it. When you press the button one of two panes of glass light up. If it lights up GREEN then you're good to go. If it lights up RED then you're toast and you have to get screened and your bags get picked apart my the Mexican government. Some poor sucker three people ahead of us got the red light so I figured our chances were good. I think Missy pushed the button and a good press it was - GREEN!!
Now that we made it past strip-search roulette it was time to run the gauntlet of time share phsyco's. For anyone who has never been to Mexico, and I'm sure it's like this in many other countries too, time shares are a very big thing. Signing people up to go to time share presentations is a way that a lot of locals make a living. As soon as we passed the security checkpoints there were at least 60-100 people lined up trying to get your attention. They would say anything to get you to make eye contact or get you to stop. Some were just shouting American "sounding" name's like Brad! Mike! Joe! Scott! hoping that they would have someone stop. It's crazy, but when you know what to expect it's rather funny. We made it out unscathed and jumped in a taxi (but the poor suckers who got the RED light were not so lucky). Once we were in the back I saw this note in the little divider thingy and had to snap a pic on my phone:
$20 is good? Really? Lol
Once we arrived at the resort we quickly checked in. We got a very nice room, facing the pool/beach/ocean. It was a one bedroom with a nice bathroom and a big tub in the bedroom. We had a nice balcony off the room with a soaking pool, a little mini pool out on the deck!
The room also had a cook top stove and dishes so we planned on making at least breakfast and some lunches here every day. So we headed for the local WalMart!! Yup, they had a WalMart and it was not all that different from one in the states. Some of the stuff was a little hard to find, like salt and pepper. When you're staring at a wall of spices and they all have names you do not know, picking out salt and pepper can be pretty hard. I'm still not 100% we got pepper, but I think we did! We got lots of stuff to make breakfast and some lunch stuff. They had just about everything you could think of and I don't think we went back to the room with anything missing off our list. Yeah!
I swear that beer, chips and Fruit Loops were not the only thing on our list
We were so tired by the time we got back from wally world that we decided just to order room service and relax in the balcony pool. It was actually the only time we ever used it.
The next morning we woke up ready to hit the pool and see the resort!! This is the 'rainy' season so it's not very busy. It's typically 85+ degrees and sunny during the day and 80+ degrees and rains during the night. This makes it VERY humid, almost too humid. The good part of that is you have the perfect excuse to stay within 10 feet of the pool at all times!!! Man did they have the pools. There was what I would call the 'main' pool that was 3 pools all connected together. Then there was the 'bar/activity' pool that had the swim up bar and where all the daily activities took place like Tequila volleyball or some other crazy game of the day.
Then there was also a lazy river that went all around the resort. It ran quick enough to easily pull you along. They had tubes for you to float on if you wished or you could just swim/float along. There were waterfalls, rock walls, bridges and palm trees everywhere. This was pry our favorite thing to do!! We absolutely loved the lazy river!
They also had a whole area for kids to play in the water. They basically had a kids jungle gym in the middle of this big shallow pool. On top of that they also had TWO big wave pools that were split by a water slide!! Good times were had at the water slide!! You had to climb up this pyramid waterfall thing to get to the slide then down you go!!
We really did not make it out to the beach except for two times. PV is on the Pacific side and the water is not clear and blue like on the Gulf of Mexico side. It is really warm and the waves were decent but when you have so many swimming options, walking 5 minutes down to the beach to get sandy and what not just does not seem all that exciting. If it was a busy time of the year then I could see seeking some space at the beach but for us on this trip that was not needed.
The second night we were there we had planned a dinner cruise/tour called Rhythms of the Night. They took you on this big boat and went about an hour or so south of NV to this nice beach/hillside area. The beach was all lit up with torches and they lead you to this theater arena area. There they performed this cool ceremony that had something to do with marriage I think. We did not understand it exactly but it had really cool dancing/acrobatics and fire twirling/dancing. After that they lead you down to the beach area and you have this big buffet of steak, chicken, fish, potatoes, rice, etc. All the food was wonderful. After giving you time to wander about a bit they took us back to NV. On the way back they had to "button up" the boat because it was raining so much but the crew was great in getting everyone to have a good time in spite of the bad weather on the way back. It was a great time and well worth the money. ** Sorry, We did not really get any good pictures because they where not allowed. Mostly due to the fact that they of course wanted to sell you pictures and videos of the show and stuff. **
The next day we planned on going into down town PV. We read about all there is to do with the great food and shopping right along the beach. Around lunch time we took a cab to one of the 'must eat' places in PV - PiPi's! They are famous for the table side guacamole that they make, and for good reason, it was amazing. We also shared the combo fajitas for two that came with shrimp, chicken, steak and with home made tortillas. It was very, very good. Add to that the live mariachi band plus a mega margarita and it was everything people said it was. After lunch we wandered through the cobble stone streets and local shops. It was really nice out and all of it was right off the beach. After buying a few things to take home we jumped back in a taxi and went back to the resort.
One of the other days we were at the resort we decided to paint some pottery to take back. Not sure why we thought spending 2+ hours painting in 90 degree heat with 90% humidity was a good idea but none the less they did turn out rather well.
Overall we had a wonderful time and a great vacation. We missed the little man terribly and were very glad to be home. On the flight back we were able to upgrade to first class *teehee* so that was unexpected but nice. Here are a couple more pics of random fun.
*Some video of the resort will be posted later*
Pool, sweet pool
Posts
