In Puerto Vallarta, Sayulita and San Pancho are excellent places to take a day trip. These two beautiful beach towns in the Riviera Nayarit offer old-school culture and new-wave hipster vibes with amazing waves perfect for surfing or a hefty dose of culture for hanging out.
The two towns are very close and can be visited on the same day as I did. What you’ll find there that you won’t find in Puerto Vallarta are more bespoke shops and restaurants and thousands of surfers from all over the world who visit these destinations all year long.
I visited these towns on a guided tour with several other people. Sometimes, I prefer to pay a guide and join a group instead of doing it myself; this was one occasion.
My guide, Adam, picked me up at 8 am in a big van and we continued to a few other stops until we had eight people total before making the 45-minute drive to San Pancho. Along the way, we passed about 20 street vendors selling fruits and roadside tacos. We stopped at a fruit stand where I discovered Jackfruit and bought a pineapple, coconut, and bananas. The stands also sell many types of Mexican candies and trinkets.
Fun Fact: A Jackfruit is a big football-shaped melon with a thick, bumpy rind. Inside are yellow pods of fruit that you pull apart like monkey bread. Each pod has a seed the size of a thumb. You peel the stringy flesh away and eat it.
Everyone said something different, but to me, it was rubbery, sweet and like a cantaloupe (other people said mango, pineapple and banana!). Many say it’s also an excellent meat substitute.
San Pancho, Puerto Vallarta
San Pancho is a small surf town with a few main streets, a beach and an intriguing history. As Adam explained, several past Mexican presidents had invested in infrastructure in the city and developed business opportunities, only to have their efforts fail later.
We walked around browsing the little stands and shops lined the road and watched the surfers on the small white sand beach. The waves swell bigger here than in Puerto Vallarta, so there is a surf vibe, which means more vegetarian food options, yoga and fit white dudes walking around sans shirt and shoes.
As we walked, Adam showed the old government projects, now abandoned, including a large, covered, open-air fish market that was never used, an abandoned milk factory, an abandoned flower greenhouse, and a small unused church. The government even bought houses for some families to encourage them to stay and further develop the community. But, according to Adam, the people sold the homes and land and only a few still exist.
Many of the homes now are Airbnbs and rental properties. If you visit San Pancho, these homes would be great places to rent for an overnight stay.
It was hard to understand why many things in this charming beach town were abandoned. You’d think with the investments in businesses, infrastructure, and even housing the government provided, the community should have been able to flourish, but as soon as the investment stopped, everything failed. Now, the economy is mainly tourism.
Sayulita, Puerto Vallarta
We stopped for lunch at the Mi Chaparrita resort in Sayulita. The place is a popular bed and breakfast, horse ranch and restaurant. They host many tours and also make craft tequila. It’s a one-stop wonder. My group sat around a square table filled with colorful sombreros and Mexican blankets as décor. A high-spirited Mexican man gave us samples of four different tequilas and three kinds of liqueur.
You already know this, but tequila is a significant thing in Mexico. Everywhere you go, someone is trying to sell you tequila alongside a beaded bracelet and a handwoven blanket so cheap you can’t believe you heard right. Unfortunately, the cost of checking an airline bag will cost you more than the blankets if you want to take them home.
Craft tequila is said to be excellent, but I’m not much of a drinker anymore. Still, I drank my tequila shots and stumbled through the inventive Spanish toasts our server led us through before we swallowed. I choked on each one, but at least I gave the rest of the group a good laugh. Everyone said the tequila was top notch.
Fun Fact: It can only be called tequila if it is made from 100 percent Blue Agave and produced in Jalisco, Mexico. If it’s not made in Mexico, it’s not real tequila!
Sayulita Shopping
In Sayulita, Adam dropped us off in the main square, and with seven shots of alcohol fueling me, I started exploring.
Hipsters and surfers filled the streets alongside shops, bars, restaurants, and vendors. It was magnificent and a little bit wild. The place was crowded, and the vendors and shop managers pestered you relentlessly or ignored you entirely.
Hand-crafted clothes, especially bathing suits and lightweight dresses were sold everywhere. There are handmade stuffed animals and dolls and so much jewelry your head will spin. The shops had handblown glassware, pottery and enough surf equipment to stock the entire country. I walked around for a long time browsing the wares and found many, many things worth buying. Of course, as a minimalist traveling with only a backpack, I bought nothing, but I still like to look.
It was much better shopping than in Puerto Vallarta, where the shopping scene comprises hundreds of flea-market-level shops selling the same cheap imports. But in Sayulita, the buildings were colorful plaster with thatch roofs and murals, making it a bright, artistic place.
People in Sayulita
The people in Sayulita versus Puerto Vallarta were much younger, more American and English speaking. The food was different, too, more vegetarian, and featured offerings like quinoa and Acai bowls, which I didn’t see in Puerto Vallarta. Here, there were little coffee shops, yoga studios and meditation places. There were surf lessons on the beach and a free-wheeling vibe much different from Puerto Vallarta.
In Sayulita, the women walked around in bathing suits, and the young surfer dudes wore only shorts, no shoes. It was hot and hip, and they seemed to stop caring long ago about any sense of decency that may have existed as far as clothing went. The main parts were covered, and everyone seemed to settle for that being good enough.
Sayulita Beach
American that I am, I walked toward the beach with a fresh coconut ice cream cone in one hand and an iced coffee in the other. Only, I couldn’t see the water.
The beach was packed. Hundreds of people jammed into the small area on chairs and blankets lined up in rows across the beach. There were lounge chairs, umbrellas, and little tables as far as the eye could see. Dozens more people swam body to body while nearby; many others surfed. The beach stretches for miles, so getting to the outskirts of downtown will offer more space.
I found a chair and watched as the sun sank lower in the sky, the music grew louder and the beach babes grew bolder. Then it was time to go. Maybe next time I’ll stay to see Sayulita after dark. I bet it’s a whole new dimension – one worth exploring.
See 10 things to do in Puerto Vallarta here.
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