Trip Report: Sayulita
Posted on Monday, November 19th, 2007
The so-called “mud season” and the various strategies for avoiding it are as much a part of life in mountain towns as jam bands and part-time jobs.
Mud hasn’t characterized this season in Jackson so much as a distinct and worrying absence of snow. Whatever. Casting those concerns aside, I chose a time-honored technique for making the most of the ‘tweener season and hopped a flight to Mexico to spend a week surfing and drinking in a little town called Sayulita.
Sayulita is like a ski town but with fewer clothes. Sitting just outside the northern end of Banderas Bay, there’s a decent beach break right in front of it and several point and reef breaks within a short drive or boat ride.
I rented a casita for $350 for the week and just bounced around town hanging out and playing with whomever I ran into.
There was a group of kids from Jackson and Montana who rented a big house on the beach, a small group of Boulderites, several different Jackson locals and a random assortment of other gringos. The mix made for a bunch of fun activities and gave the town a cool, local feeling. Each morning I’d walk down the hill and hit one of the breakfast spots. I’d inevitably see someone I knew and after a few mugs of strong coffee, a plan would surface and off we’d go.
One day I rented a panga (the ubiquitous fishing boats) with a few of the kids from Jackson and some surfers from interior British Columbia and blasted out to a break called The Cove. We pulled up as another group was leaving, dropped anchor and paddled into the break. The BC crew and one guy from Jackson were catching most of the waves but the rest of us caught some rides over the course of the afternoon and got some good instruction from guys who knew what they were doing. We had the break to ourselves and the only issue was not having enough beer to last the day.
I surfed a couple other breaks over the next day or two and started to get comfortable catching chest-high waves but the surf was on its way down with nothing much in the forecast until after the trip was over.
Surfing and skiing mirror each other like that – there’s a lot of discussion of conditions, which breaks are going off and the familiar speculation about the forecast and when the next bumps are going to show up.
Another highlight was taking the same panga out to a couple islands called The Marietas to go snorkeling. There’s a chain of islands off Punta Mita, some of which are fully underwater where the locals do most of their fishing and the Marietas are the first two in the chain. Word is they are a protected national park of some sort. The snorkeling was pretty sweet; we swam through a cave to a beach on the interior of one of the islands. After some big cliff jumping, we watched a killer sunset (we didn’t make the same mistake with the beer this time) complete with a ton of rays (sting? manta?) jumping out of the water all around us and then motored back to town in the dark. That night we went out to a big dinner, drank too much, danced until midnight to the local Cuban band’s tunes, and finished it off with a semi-clothed swim in the warm water.
Mud season can certainly drag on in a ski town, but next year I’m going to park it in Sayulita until I get the definitive word from a trusted source that Teton Pass is going off.
Tim, hows your new place?? sweet post by the way. still waiting for the invite for your housewarming party
anyone who likes the sound of Sayulita should also try Todos Santos/Pescadero on the southern tip of Baja peninsula. The surf can get real big in winter and accommodations are reasonable.