To those who once followed my overseas travels by this blog, I apologize for going 7 years between entries! I assure you it was not for lack of aspiration to go global jet-setting! However, once I left expat life in Korea in 2017 my ability to thrust myself to new countries dwindled dramatically. Upon returning to the US, I was saddled with a months-long job search. Then upon moving to Seattle and settling in, my wife became pregnant and had no interest in a “baby moon”. And then once you have kids, of course, everything changes. The cost of traveling skyrockets, the amount of gear you need to carry mushrooms, and the ability to control your itinerary and maintain your sanity both plummet. Throw in a global pandemic and travel bans everywhere in the middle of having kids … and you can see why I didn’t travel blog for 7 years!!
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| Luckily they didn't fight over the mango |
My old passport, which is still active, has become very lonely sitting in a drawer for most of that period. I did manage to travel with my wife to BC Canada (no stamps), to Geneva Switzerland (on business), and twice on family trips to Vietnam (visits #17 and #18 for me), but none of those trips felt blog-worthy, nor did any of my USA travels (which, frankly, weren’t a lot).
Flash forward to winter 2024, I’m at home during the “Big Dark” of Seattle winter with my wife and two girls, now ages 5 and 3, and we are starved for some warm sunshine. My wife calls it “winter blue”. She now has her own US passport (yay naturalization!) and we convinced ourselves that our little rug rats could survive a 4.5-hour flight to reach the warm sandy paradise of Puerto Vallarta (yay direct flights!). For me, it had been an embarrassingly long time since I visited Mexico – not since college – and my wife was also keen to add a new country to her list. So, PV was a logical fit for a late-winter excursion.
By the time departure day arrived I was more than ready for a vacation. After what felt like a never-ending streak of 47-degree rainy days in Seattle, I could feel the accumulated burden of winter in my chest and knew it was time to get away. I slept restlessly the night before departing.
Day 1 - DEPARTURE DAY
I had read several blogs before traveling, all of which said something along the lines of “Uber will be way cheaper than taxis” and provided instructions for how to get to Uber as the cars aren’t allowed to pick up at the airport. We exited the “shark tank” after immigration, walked past the hordes queuing for taxis and shuttles, up the pedestrian bridge over the highway, and down to the pickup point near the bus stop. Then – getting an Uber was a total DISASTER. The Uber app quoted me $298 pesos, cheap by American standards, but the app just kept spinning as no driver accepted my ride. I canceled and tried multiple times, to no avail. So, we ended up eating a corn dessert and 2 ice cream bars from a street vendor, then getting a taxi for about the same price ($300 pesos) to our hotel in the “Romantic Zone”. If we could do it over, I would have just entered the taxi line at the airport arrivals area and bargained for the rate. We might have paid less for the taxi by the Uber pickup spot than at the arrivals area of the airport, but I’ll never know for sure. The airport was a zoo, and this wasn’t my only disappointing Uber experience in PV. I was very glad I had ordered some pesos from my bank before the trip!!
With the windows open in the taxi from the airport, I was finally able to relax. The mild breeze felt wonderful! Truly sublime. We arrived in Centro at sunset, which I could watch over the ocean. Life was good!
Dinner was at a taco restaurant walking distance from our hotel called Tacos Revolucion. There were many delicious salsas, and my kids were hungry!
Day 2 – SO MUCH FOR STAYING ON SEATTLE TIME
We wandered downstairs. Though the restaurant hadn’t opened yet at the Hotel Tropicana, we did see a line of seniors queueing with towels to get to the beach. Apparently, you could snag beach chairs at the 8am opening time, leave towels on the chairs, and lay claim to them for the day. “There’s blood,” one senior stated in describing the daily fight for beach turf. Thankfully this lady had been around long enough to know the best breakfast in the Zona Romántica, at Coco’s Kitchen. And although our desayuno wasn’t cheap, the portions were large and delicious. I had my first taste of the traditional Mexican breakfast, chilaquiles, which I will forever remember as “nachos for breakfast”. Not quite the same, but close! My wife and I shared her shrimp omelet, and our girls surprisingly did not enjoy the very yummy French toast.
We then walked to the Parque Lazaro Cardenas, which has a bustling Saturday market. We didn’t wait in the endless queue for cinnamon buns (“the best in PV”) but the girls did enjoy some ice cream while we sat in the small amphitheater zone and watched live music. I noticed tons of American and Canadian retirees in attendance, which along with the gay male community seemed to dominate the Zona Romántica. There weren’t many families with kids like ours.
Parque Lazaro Cardenas amphitheater
From there, we walked along the beach path back to our hotel and found the one umbrella with 2 beach chairs unclaimed by the mass 8:00am land grab. My wife flagged down a vendor to buy some kids beach toys, and our girls played very happily in the sand. Our beach was claimed for those with hotel wristbands, but open to the many vendors trying to sell all sorts of wares – bracelets, jewelry, sombreros, fish and shrimp on a stick, mango, oysters. I kept saying “No gracias” to the beach vendors and my younger daughter started repeating me! Some of the vendors smiled. Good Spanish lesson for her!
DAY 3 – SIGHTSEEING
We woke up again at sunrise, and my wife wanted to see the Malecón boardwalk before the midday sun started beating down. My 3-year-old, however, wanted to go straight to the beach and threw a tantrum when she saw we were heading to the street and not the direction of the beach. My wife calmed her down (sort of) by telling her we were heading to a different beach … which was sort of true. We walked parallel to the ocean, across the small bridge next to the Isla Cuale, and found a street vendor at the base of the Malecón selling delicious warm pastries, both sweet and savory. So that was breakfast. We continued walking north in the morning shade past the Los Arcos, the various bronze statues, and the Puerto Vallarta block letter sign. It was a nice quiet stroll on another beautiful morning. Did I mention the Puerto Vallarta weather in late February is sublime?! In the upper 60s at sunrise and the low-to-mid 80s in the afternoon, and partly to mostly sunny. It was hot under the sun during midday but great weather to be under an umbrella. And the ocean was reasonably mild as well.
The Malecón boardwalk
At the end of the boardwalk, we found coffee and paid American prices for espresso drinks and frappes. This continued the pattern we experienced our whole trip in PV… some purchases were great bargains (e.g., pastries, street tacos, taxis) and others felt like American prices, or worse! I couldn’t believe what I was charged for Pantene shampoo at the convenience store near my hotel, and sunscreen was expensive too. Exchange rates were all over the place as well … I withdrew pesos from a reputable-looking bank ATM near the Parque Lazaro Cardenas and got a terrible exchange rate … almost as bad as the rate offered by my hotel, and worse than the rate for the pesos I had delivered to my door by Wells Fargo in the US! Many shops and restaurants offered their own rate for US Dollars, and I saw anywhere from 14 to 17.5 pesos per dollar.
The surf was big, so we couldn’t swim in the ocean, but my kids were content with late afternoons in the pool. They were completely exhausted after and slept in our arms while we waited in the long line to enter Café de Olla for more tacos and sopes.
DAY 4 – THE BIG CLIMB
Puerto Vallarta is very hilly, and several blogs had advised to climb to the Cerro de la Cruz for the best view in the city. Mindful of my 3-year-old’s tantrum to walk to the Malecón the day before, we booked an Uber to take us on a short drive to where I figured would be the base of the hill to climb to the lookout. But type “Cerro de la Cruz” into Uber and you get dropped off on a skinny dead-end road with no clear indication of where to go. Thankfully Google Maps helped us find the way. Just as we about to turn the corner to get to the path, we saw a snowbird lady walking down, sweating from the hike up and making her way back to Centro. My wife asked her, “Which way to the lookout point?”. This lady took one look at our kids and stated bluntly, “It’s around the corner. But there’s no way you’ll ever make it up there. Look and you’ll see.” That sounded like a dare to me!
We saw the slope up and indeed it was quite steep. At this point my 5-year-old gave up and said, “Daddy, carry me!” Not ideal, but thankfully she is quite skinny, so I had enough strength to carry her up slowly. My 3-year-old eagerly ascended with my wife, who quickly became winded. The steep slope became a series of winding and not-too-safe steps with a small railing on one side. The steps were up to my 3-year-old’s knee, but she still wobbled up, to the amazement of all the adults coming down. We saw no other kids up there. My 5-year-old rode in my arms as I slowly ascended, desperate not to lose my balance. My wife moaned and moved deliberately. About 80% of the way up and my 3-year-old finally tired… she was a champ! Thankfully my fresh 5-year-old was willing to go up on her own legs the rest of the way to the top … there’s no way I could have carried 2 of them on those steep stairs! When we made it to the top, the view was quite impressive. It was probably a 100-meter climb. We could see the whole bay and even a couple whales jumping off in the distance
After getting our morning exercise in, it was back to the hotel for lazy beach time. Scanning my phone, I saw that it had snowed north of Seattle that morning. I was so glad to get away! The girls played in the sand all afternoon and we dipped our feet in the ocean after the intense sun passed. We changed clothes and walked onto the busy Los Muertos beach pier at sunset, then wandered the streets of Zona Romántica… 2 hungry souls walking past packed restaurant after packed restaurant, carrying 2 sleeping preschoolers. We finally settled for street tacos, which were inexpensive and were quite tasty, actually.
DAY 5 – FROM ROMANTIC ZONE TO HOTEL ZONE
My sister and her husband were planning to arrive in the evening and stay at the Marriott in the Marina Vallarta near the airport, so to be closer to them we had arranged to leave our Zona Romántica hotel to stay in the Zona Hotelera. We were ready for a change as the Hotel Tropicana is a bit dilapidated and we wanted to see another side of the city. We had a lazy day. Breakfast at the hotel (neither high quality nor so expensive), time in the pool for the kids until the sun came out of the shadows, shower, then walking along the beach to the Restaurant Canto del Mar for seafood lunch. They had a nice sandy beach for my 5-year-old to play in, and the “ceviche” was fine but much more finely chopped than what I remembered from when I first tried in Peru.
We walked back to our hotel in the midday sun, grabbed our luggage, then an Uber to our new hotel, the Krystal Vallarta. In fact, we were staying in a private condo we found on Airbnb but located at the resort and with full access to the pools and beach. The distance was not so far, about 7km, but we were stuck in fierce mid-afternoon traffic. Good time for a slow car ride as both my daughters were asleep in the back of the car.
The Hotel Zone has a very different feel from the Romantic Zone … not historical and with a suburban feel, not very walkable. The highlight appeared to be an Outback Steakhouse on the other side of a busy throughfare. We might as well have been in Anytown USA. Seemed like we were stuck eating at the hotel. The grounds of the property were far larger than anything in the Romantic Zone and our new hotel had multiple swimming pools, although almost everything looked dated. At least our condo was recently renovated, and quite comfortable. Our room had 2 twin beds and 2 pullouts … a bed for everyone! We ate dinner at the mediocre hotel buffet, where I discovered my girls enjoy horchata, took a walk, and slept soundly.
DAY 6 – RENDEZVOUS WITH MY SISTER
We planned the trip such that we could get a little time with my sister and my brother-in-law. They spent several days eating and drinking in Mexico City and then took the short domestic flight to PV. As my brother-in-law had some work calls to take, we met them at the Marriott, where they were staying.
Immediately it was apparent that resorts like the Marriott cater to a different clientele than the Zona Romántica. The typical persona appeared to be middle-aged businessperson with Marriott Bonvoy status (like my brother-in-law) eager to spend down points earned from the life as a road warrior on a quiet getaway. The resort was almost dull. Yes, it felt luxurious to just wade up to the poolside bar, order a piña colada and charge it to the room, then after time in the sun, find an umbrella and order some fish and chips. But all the activity was around the pool and beach. You couldn’t walk anywhere from the resort, so most travelers were content to be trapped there. The resort was nicer than the hotels we had chosen, justifying its price tag, but I was happy to only be there for a day. Before embarking on our trip, I openly questioned whether at this point in my life, with two small kids, whether I would prefer the all-inclusive experience where most of my vacation was spent at the resort and not the place to which I had traveled. Certainly, I still value being in a vibrant neighborhood over being tucked away in a resort.
We did convince my sister and her husband to take a taxi back to the Malecón to see some of the sights down there. We had dinner at Melissa’s, a tasty and reasonably priced seafood restaurant in Centro. The other clientele consisted of gringo seniors who enjoyed ogling at my girls. I guess we ran up a decent bill as we finished our meal with a round of local tequila on the house. It was solid.
DAY 7 – WHALE WATCHING
I had read that late February was prime whale-watching season in Puerto Vallarta, so I knew we needed to book a boat tour in the Bay of Banderas. There are many tours which you can book online through sites like Vallarta Adventures or Viator, but we found better pricing on the ground when we negotiated with local tour agents. We were able to find our tour for $60 USD per adult, with the “babies” free!
Hard to see the whale from the photo, but it's there!
The tour departed 9am from the Puerto Mágico. The whales we were told are more active in the morning. Thankfully the girls were very prompt to wake up and get ready! Our boat was mostly empty, served a big breakfast of chilaquiles, eggs, and pineapple, and offered free cocktails throughout. It wasn’t long on the boat before we saw our first whales surfacing and the big sea beasts are really something! My sea stomach is quite solid, but my wife and kids all had seasickness and were miserable. About 40 minutes in, my 3-year-old was asking to go back to our hotel, my 5-year-old was keeled over and my wife stared with a pained look towards the sea.
Hence, I couldn’t wander around the boat to get the best view of the whales. But there was such an abundance of the whales that they were hard to miss, even from my seat. We eventually made it to a spot in the water where a mother was escorting her baby whale as the baby was playfully jumping out of the water! What a spectacle!
We spent our last full afternoon in PV at the beach of the Krystal Vallarta. It wasn’t as mobbed as the Playa Los Muertos but there were some vendors and my girls devoured a $50 peso mango on a stick. We wrapped the day with dinner at La Matona Tacos, halfway back towards Centro.
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We had booked a late flight home to save some $$$, departing around 6:00pm, which led to the awkward figuring out how we were going to kill time during the afternoon. No point getting to the airport early (more on that later!) and we weren’t going to go to the beach or pool as we had no place to shower afterwards. So, we checked out of our Airbnb mid-morning and taxied over to the Marriott to get a couple more hours with my sister.
At the Marriott we cashed in her complimentary drink tickets near the pool, and of course my girls kept asking why they couldn’t change into their swimsuits, not understanding the constraints we were working under! My sister and brother-in-law left midday with BIG hugs from my girls, and fortunately we were also able to cash in my sister’s complimentary 1-hour kiddie room credit at the Marriott. My girls hadn’t colored for a week and had clearly missed crayons!
My wife was unimpressed with the Marriott’s food menu, and as no one was super hungry we decided to roll the dice by postponing lunch until we reached the airport … BIG mistake! (more on that later) When my kids finally grew bored of the Marriott lobby area we collected our luggage and headed for the airport. Uber quoted $146 pesos but the taxi waiting at the Marriott was only $100 pesos… I was thoroughly unimpressed with Uber in Puerto Vallarta. The taxis are plentiful in the tourist areas, have nicer cars than the Ubers and quoted reasonable rates. I think the Uber app offers a nice way to calibrate what taxi rides (which are unmetered) should cost in PV, but for the most part I think I would stick mostly with taxis if I returned to PV.
The airport road was busy but thankfully the security line was short. Beyond security, after walking through the first mega duty-free zone there is a mediocre small food court. Our kids are picky eaters and we found a dismal Sbarro with lukewarm pizzas under heat lamps. The prices weren’t shown on the display as the staff claimed “their electricity wasn’t working”, so I handed my wife our last $500 peso bill assuming she could get more than enough lunch for our family with it, because hey, it’s Sbarro. I then grabbed our carry-ons and herded my kids to look for a table in the very limited seating area. Then my wife called back to me. She needed more money?! I walked to the Sbarro register to figure out what was going on. They had quoted my wife $810 pesos for 3 slices of pizza, a salad, and a calzone. A slice of pizza alone was $159 pesos, about $10 USD per slice!! My kids were starved for pizza, so I told them I would only pay for 2 slices of the pizza and the calzone, then my $500 peso bill evaporated … poof! I was so upset. We should have eaten at the Marriott before coming to the airport.
By our late-afternoon departure my kids, who had been relatively well-behaved on the trip, were starting to come unwound from tiredness, and I knew we had an adventure ahead of us to journey back to our beds at home. With a full flight back to Seattle, we just had 4 seats across in 1 aisle on the plane, and my kids immediately fought over the window seat. Thankfully my little one gave in, and big sister sat at the window contentedly with her Fire tablet for the whole flight. I took middle seat and my 3-year-old had aisle, with my wife across. I helped my 3-year-old to read stories and play games on her tablet, until she fell asleep sitting up and leaning on my shoulder. Her first upright plane nap! And she was out for over an hour, much to my relief, but then she woke up super fussy and slapped me in the face. Ouch!
The flight was thankfully calm until we landed at SeaTac at 9:00pm, or 11:00pm Mexico time. So my girls were going to be exhausted, and they showed it! First my 3-year-old cried through one of the biggest tantrums of her life getting off the plane, as I needed to carry our luggage and couldn’t also carry her. She screamed hysterically all the way from the jet bridge until just before immigration … thankfully she held it together in front of the CBP officer. Things calmed down briefly as we exited the airport into the cold, clammy Seattle night and waited for the off-site parking bus. When we finally arrived at our car, it was my 5-year-old’s turn to have her own mega-tantrum about the temperature of the car (which really felt like it had been shivering outside for a week), her sister’s singing, and goodness knows what else. But after 5 more minutes of screaming in the car the two of them suddenly fell asleep on the highway, and it was one of the most enjoyable quiet late night car rides ever! I carried both the girls straight to their beds at home and they slept in their clothes from the long travel day.
REFLECTION
In reflecting, I felt nothing but smiles. Puerto Vallarta had been a really good trip! What amazing weather we had, and I was able to set my mind at ease while experiencing a place quite different from my day-to-day. Traveling with small kids had its challenges and compromises, but their enthusiasm for the place made their parents lives just a bit easier. The city felt quite safe and accessible, even with my limited Spanish.
Although the tourist area around Centro was quite practical and enjoyable for a first trip to PV, if I were to return, I would like to be more ambitious and escape the city. One place I would like to see is the Botanical Garden, which I’ve read is a lush jungle with great walking trails. I also would have liked to visit the Boca de Tomatlan fishing village and hike along the coast to Las Animas. I would have walked the Jorullo Bridge, taken the boat tour to the Marietas Islands, and maybe also experienced the waterfall at Yelapa. I may have rented a car to check out Sayulita, maybe stay a couple nights there.
Inexpensive & delicious oysters delivered on the beach
But when you have small kids, who really just want pool-eat-beach…REPEAT, you stay on a budget, and you don’t stretch yourself too ambitiously. You celebrate small victories, like climbing the Cerro de la Cruz, and you enjoy the restful time together as a family. I look forward to our next adventure!!
