Jump to content
Chapala.com Webboard

beach for 3 days from Chapala


johs

Recommended Posts

Manzanillo is our nearest beach. Four hour drive, give or take. Start with tripadvisor.

;-)

Patti

Manzanillo is now a 3-hour drive or so due to major road improvements over the past two years. Manzanillo has shut down one of its three horribly polluting coal and oil-fueled power plants. Two of them still billow toxic crap 24 hours a day. And why would you and your friend want an all-inclusive resort when you could go to a real Mexican fishing village and rent a house for less money and a lot more fun. Try La Manzanilla del Mar out on-line, for example. My wife and I own a home there and live there 6+ months a year. The rest of the time we live on Lake Chapala. Google or just go to visitlamanzanilla.com for pics and much more info. La Manzanilla is now a 4-hour drive from Ajijic. We made it a few days ago from there to here in under 3:45 but I drive pretty fast. Once you get there you will find that it is on a beautiful bay (Tenacatita), with great restaurants, good music, a wonderful beach, humpback whale watching right now, and a small laid-back town with one main street and the beach. What more could you ask for? Think small!
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Manzanillo is now a 3-hour drive or so due to major road improvements over the past two years. Manzanillo has shut down one of its three horribly polluting coal and oil-fueled power plants. Two of them still billow toxic crap 24 hours a day. And why would you and your friend want an all-inclusive resort when you could go to a real Mexican fishing village and rent a house for less money and a lot more fun. Try La Manzanilla del Mar out on-line, for example. My wife and I own a home there and live there 6+ months a year. The rest of the time we live on Lake Chapala. Google or just go to visitlamanzanilla.com for pics and much more info. La Manzanilla is now a 4-hour drive from Ajijic. We made it a few days ago from there to here in under 3:45 but I drive pretty fast. Once you get there you will find that it is on a beautiful bay (Tenacatita), with great restaurants, good music, a wonderful beach, humpback whale watching right now, and a small laid-back town with one main street and the beach. What more could you ask for? Think small!

You are out of date, all the oil fuel powered plants have shut down!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi I have a friend visiting for 2 weeks and she wants to go to the beach for a few days. Does anyone have a recommendation? Probably an all-inclusive. thanks a lot

If you want to have a look at Manzanillo and what to do there, you can check out my photo-journal blog of a visit we made there a while back. Personally, I enjoyed the fact that it is not just a tourist bubble resort, but also a busy port with lots of ship traffic in and out. You can take a stroll through their attractive Centro area and along the malecon. Very entertaining. This doesn't mean you can't find a quiet stretch of beach, just that there are other things going on too. A bit down the cost is the sea turtle reserve, and you can catch a very inexpensive boat tour of the lagoon behind the beach with all its birds and other wildlife. It's an easy drive, and almost all of it can be done on a high speed cuota with beautiful scenery all the way down.

Here is the link: http://cookjmex.blogspot.mx/2009/02/manzanillo-part-1-beautiful-bay.html

When you get to the bottom of the page, click on "Newer post" and you'll go to Part 2 of the series, and so forth.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just returned from three days Melaque. Too hot and humid! No whales spotted except the white people kind.

It takes five hours each way doing the speed limits. Cuotas about 400 pesos each way.

I have stayed at LaPosada in Manzanillo. Right on the private beach. Watch the ships come in. There are many choices of where to stay. Just pull it up online. High season and high costs now.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Barra de Navidad and Melaque, side-by-each, are quiet and attractive places with your choice of strong and low surf; lots of interesting seafood places on the water, and a variety of inexpensive yet clean hotels.

For all-inclusives, most people don't know that a travel agency (like Viajes Ajijic) can book you cut-rate consecutive nights in a variety of places, almost anytime. Manzanillo, 45 minutes closer to us than Barra and Melaque, has the biggest selection, and there are more just north of Melaque.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It depends on what one wants when they are going to the beach. The beach at Manzanillo is not very good, steep and no surf. Same problem with much of Melaque. Some good beach in Barra de Navidad. Much of the beach in Santiago is pretty good, particularly the large public beach on the north side of it.

If you aren't an ocean swimmer/surfer/snorkeler, consider Cuyutlan. 2.5 hours away and one toll shorter. Pounding surf and huge, pristine beaches for walking. Very reasonably priced ocean front accomodations. Roberto has a very nice guest house there, would be great for a short stay.

Our favorite is La Manzanilla for the great beach, body surfing and snorkeling. Quaint town and decent restaurants.

Oh, and we can confirm that all the dirty power plants are shut down in Manzanillo now. The air was quite good just 3 weeks ago.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

We have a beachfront condo on Playa Azul which is on Manzanillo bay. Some areas of this bay are very swimmable. You also have a couple of miles of almost deserted beach, very walkable, ship watching and whale watching. Several beachfront hotels. Karmina Palace as mentioned above have a nice location to the activities and amenities just not a great swimming place. A better choice might be Audencia bay on the Santiago peninsula. Then there are several beach areas in Santiago just to the north. These areas have mild waves and you can easily walk out 50-100 ft from shore in places. Snorkelling, scuba etc. Try the Tesoro hotel all inc. At Audencia ( movie "10" shot there ) or Festival hotel , also all inc. on Santiago beach.

Overall you will find Manzanillo beaches far less crowded than the small towns north.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Mainecoons, I think you have the beaches reversed... Barra, in the central part, has lost much of its beach, and there it is quite steep, but as you walk north it gets much better: flatter and wider. In the steep middle, the surf can be quite exhilerating due to the sudden rise in the sand.

Melaque is always fully beached and usually pretty low key in terms of surf.

The beach at the north end of Manzanillo is where the surfers go in that area, and I find that's where the majority of tourists hang, too. Lots of beach umbrellas. And a number of the hotels/resorts have little bays that are good for swimming, although there are often days with jellyfish warnings.

The only time the beaches in Barra or Melaque are crowded are during high Mexican holidays, like Easter and Christmas.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Karmina Palace all-inc. Manzanillo. Takes me 3 hours on cuota road.

Karmina Palace has beautiful pools and grounds but I did not like staying there because it does not have a good beach. I liked the pink posada better because of the beach and the fact that I needed to explore Manzanillo, including its restaurants.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Mainecoons, I think you have the beaches reversed... Barra, in the central part, has lost much of its beach, and there it is quite steep, but as you walk north it gets much better: flatter and wider. In the steep middle, the surf can be quite exhilerating due to the sudden rise in the sand.

Melaque is always fully beached and usually pretty low key in terms of surf.

The beach at the north end of Manzanillo is where the surfers go in that area, and I find that's where the majority of tourists hang, too. Lots of beach umbrellas. And a number of the hotels/resorts have little bays that are good for swimming, although there are often days with jellyfish warnings.

The only time the beaches in Barra or Melaque are crowded are during high Mexican holidays, like Easter and Christmas.

OK, haven't been to Barra lately, not aware the beach hasn't recovered there. But I suspect you are talking about the beach on the north end of Santiago Bay, the next bay north of Manzanillo. A lot of people think this is part of Manzanillo but actually it is a separate jurisdiction. We spent many hours body surfing off that beach on our last trip.

The Pink Posada is prettty basic but it has a front row seat to watch the ships come and go. There are several other hotels nearby it that look a little fancier.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Did you notice that there is no beach at high tide in your last photo?

Definitely much flatter than on the south end, though. How old is that second picture? I see the crud still pouring from the smoke stack of the power plant in it.

Nice photo of paddle boarders in that third one. May have to try this.

Nice pictures thanks for posting them. But the Santiago beach still beats this one handily. Much better surf. And La Manzanilla beats the pants off of both of them IMO.

However, if someone only has three days, Manzanillo is probably the best choice for ocean swimmers and Cuyutlan is great for listening to pounding surf and walking the beach.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

For a different experience you could try Rincón de Guayabitos. This little town on Jaltemba Bay is about an hour and a half north of PV and about a 4 to 4 1/2 drive from Ajijic. The protected bay keeps the water pretty calm and clear. The white sand beach is very wide and flat and has many palapa covered restaurants. Lots of Americans and Canadians are renting and buying there. There are also some large all-inclusive bungalows in this little Mexican village.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've heard of this place but I wonder how fast you are driving to get there in 4.5 hours. :)

Guayabitos is about an hour and a half north of PV and perhaps an hour down Hwy 200 after exiting the mini-cuota off the GDL-Tepic hwy. We've made it in 4 1/2 but if the traffic gods were with us we could have made it quicker.

There's no need to speed while driving in Mexico. We're retired and have nothing but time, right?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The map might say under four hours, but the traffic will dictate the actual time. :) Once you make the turn towards Compostela, it is 2 lanes all the way to the beach! Sometimes there is a lot of slow moving vehicles, other times not so much.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...