We
are staying in the Marina area of Puerto Vallarta
which is about 5 miles from downtown. These are some
pictures around this area. This is a very upscale area
with million dollar homes, golf courses and a marina
that is home to some really expensive yachts!
The
area, in fact all of Puerto Vallarta is really
safe. The only real complaint so far are the buses.
They are quite inexpensive, 5.5 pesos or about 45
cents CDN, they are really school buses, with very
hard seats and drivers that are on a schedule which
they intend to meet regardless of traffic and road
conditions. I recommend that you never sit at the
back of the bus unless you really like roller coasters.
There are lots of taxis, however I feel safer in
the buses. The buses have these huge bumpers that
will win any collision with a taxi!
We
have found that many tourists are from Canada this
year while overall tourism is down due to the recession.
There are many bars and restaurants in the Marina.
Chappy's Bar is featured here in these pictures.
Not only good music for dancing, but also a fish
tank with an unusual fish that likes to kiss you
through the tank glass!
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This
is a tropical environment with a mix of palm trees
and flowers everywhere. We even saw our first banana
tree in the picture on the right.
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There
is a Marriott hotel next door to our condo building.
The pictures below are a few we took of the property.
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The
picture on the left is representative of many condo's
in this area with lots of flowers on the balconies.
These balconies are large and are really an additional
room to the condo that people use all year round.
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The
marina is full of "white gold" as well
as pelicans. There are many restaurants in the area.
We found an excellent Mexican restaurant called el
Coleguita. For $238 pesos(about $20CDN) we had 2
beers, 4 shots of tequila, soup, a salmon and shrimp
dish each with rice and salad, desert and Kaluha
on the rocks! Fabulous meal which we could not finish.
We went to this same restaurant a second time with
friends of ours and added margaritas!
The
picture on the right is Victors, also on the marina,
with a shot of Victor himself. For 15 peso's you
get a beer plus a shot of Tequila, about a $1.25.
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A few shots of the marina are shown below.
Lots of white gold in this marina!
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