Call it midnight blue, even at mid-day. Somehow the water on the Pacific coast of Mexico seems to come in darker hues than on Mexico’s more familiar Caribbean Gulf coasts. And as we head into ports, the white sand of the shores softens the blues to shimmering sapphires and turquoise.
There are more opportunities than ever to sail the Mexican Riviera as ships are being shifted from Asia to home ports in California and ships that do Alaska or Antarctic exploration reposition to more balmy climes. Almost all visit the established tourist ports of Cabo San Lucas, Acapulco and Puerto Vallarta, but there are growing options to explore quieter and more authentic ports.
The most comprehensive looks at the Mexican Riviera all is a two-week cruise aboard American Queen Voyages’ new Ocean Victory. We’re visiting the familiar, but also quieter and more off the cruise map ports for inclusive tours in historic places on the Baja Peninsula and the states of Colima, Oaxaca, and Chiapas. It’s an eye-opening panorama that proves just how varied the Mexican coast really is. Let’s explore:
Peaceful La Paz
The first stop on the cruise was Cabo, the crowd pleaser, and an included tour takes us from the bustling beach and party scene around the bay to an extensive tour of the surrounding historic communities and of course, time for shopping. An optional tour features backroads dune 4X4 riding through the cactus-covered landscapes.
But the next day we’re around the corner in La Paz, a town on a quiet bay in the Gulf of California fringed by a seemingly endless sandy beach. The best known stretch, Balandra, has held the title of Mexico’s best beach in several polls.
The La Paz tour from Ocean Victory follows the promenade path along the laid-back town that’s focused on a marine biology university. We’re treated to a home-made ice cream at a beachfront café before settling in to catch a few quiet rays of the perpetual sunshine. But there’s also an optional tour to snorkel among the hundreds of curious sea lions that live along the protected coast here. Those who took the plunge came back with stunning shots of the big critters swimming alongside, as curious about the divers as they are of them.
Many faces of Manzanillo
Yes, we spend a day at Puerto Vallarta the city made famous by the movie Night of the Iguana and we get an included walking tour that ends with a visit to a tequila distiller for copious samples of the local specialty drinks.
But the next day we’re in the more laid back Manzanillo, which has a busy commercial port but is much less frequented by cruises. Manzanillo bills itself the shellfish capital of the world and is also a prime place for sport fishing and an optional fishing trip produced some selfies of big ones that didn’t get away. It was all catch and release, to give future anglers a chance to reel in a prize fighter as well.
It’s fortunate that the boats used for tours are a lot more modern and sturdy than the photogenic local fleet of home-made skiffs bobbing along the downtown shoreline. You could say they’re artisanal, but the rough and ready rowboats are definitely only made for calm seas, which they fortunately seem to have most days along this coast.
There was time to browse in the downtown markets full of carvings that are still locally hand made and pottery that’s still hand painted in an age where everything seems to be churned out in factories. You can feel like a local. The vendors don’t pester you to buy and in fact at one seaside flea market the shopkeeper stayed happily curled up in a hammock while we browsed in a seemingly endless sea of colorful clothes, jewelry, leather goods and rope hammocks.
An optional tour is to a sea turtle hatchery for a chance to take hatchlings to the beach and give them their first swim in the ocean. We wish them a long life as they head out to sea. Getting there is a back road adventure through coconut groves and past sleepy lagoons patrolled by tall, stately white egrets.
Ocean Victory is the only ship in Huatulco today–Photo by Wallace Immen
High life in Huatulco
The town that is about to celebrate its 500th anniversary is named for a Nahuatl native name that translates as “the place where trees are worshipped.” And it’s hard to ignore the soaring flamboyantly flowering objects of worship decorating its hilly coast.
Ocean Victory is the first ship of the season to dock in the port and a mariachi band and dancers in embroidered skirts did lively twirls of their skirts as the mayor presented a plaque to the captain. The city’s full time population is only about 7,500, but it’s obvious it grows substantially and restaurants bloom during the winter tourist season. Our included tour takes us on a walk with shopping opportunities in the downtown known as La Crucecita, which has a profusion of vendors selling handicrafts and souvenirs.
Others opt to go by bicycle on a circuit long the coast featuring nine bays with over 30 beaches that have yet to be built up with resorts.
Everywhere around the bay there are scenic lookouts to the sea framed by stately trees or soaring cactuses. We stop for flautas and beer in a restaurant around the town square and get invited into the local “museum” which is a euphemism for a handicraft emporium.
No thanks. I take a walk around the town square instead and visit a local church that was only consecrated in 2000. The weather is so warm year-round here that the church doesn’t have windows, although some parishioners have donated to install a couple of stained glass panels, including one that features an angel with a striking resemblance to the action hero Wonder Woman.
Checking out Puerto Chiapas
For something completely different, a day in western Mexico’s southernmost and least-known province, near the border with Guatemala. Chiapas is so lush that mangoes and star fruit hang heavy from trees everywhere, vast banana and mango plantations produce much of the produce shipped to America and Canada and its cacao plantations make it a significant producer of chocolate and cocoa.
To expand its economy, the province recently opened what has to be one of the world’s most beautiful cruise ports, with lush landscaping, a thatched-roof welcome center and row of flags of the world. We’re welcomed with songs and dances and a morning tour walks around Tapachula, a surprisingly busy colonial city that’s the main entry to Mexico from Guatemala and the rest of Central America.
In the afternoon, most of the guests take an optional tour to the site of Izapa, a still mostly un-excavated city that dates back as long ago as 1500 B.C. that blended influences of the Olmec and Maya civilizations.
An hour’s drive almost to the border of Guatemala the tour bus struggles to climb up an incredibly steep hill to a plain surrounded by mounds that have already been found to cover stepped pyramids, carved stelae, alters and thrones. The hard-to-decipher carved slabs on display in the fields have scenes that we’re told represent the sky, the earth and the sea, or underworld.
We’re treated to a smoke healing ritual by a dancer in ritual mask that very much resembles the raven beak carvings in Alaskan totems. We only wish there were more time to explore the extensive site further.
Why do they call it the Pacific Riviera?
The Riviera of Mexico” was used in reference to Acapulco Beach in the 1945 Walt Disney film, The Three Caballeros and Princess Cruises has used in its promotions of west coast cruises. The government started promoting resort development along the west coast fishing ports and it’s led to a boom that has made places like Cabo San Lucas and Mazatlan and into magnets for snow-birding Americans and Canadians. You can spend a week at one of them, but it’s fun to day trip in a variety of ports on a cruise.
Who goes there?
American Queen Voyages’ new Ocean Victory is planning a return to the Mexican Riviera in April on her way to a 2023 Alaska season sailing from Sitka.
Other newcomers include Costa Firenze, due to start sailing as a Carnival Cruise from Long Beach in 2024. Celebrity Solstice, which was scheduled to sail in Asia in the fall of 2022 and winter of 2023 is doing week long cruises from Long Beach instead. Holland America Line is sailing Koningsdam from San Diego. Royal Caribbean cruises visit Manzanillo.
Princess Cruises, which pioneered Mexican Riviera cruises with its ships featured on the original Love Boat TV series now has five of its ships doing cruises from five to 20 days from California ports whose itineraries also visit several southern Mexican Riviera ports. Norwegian Cruise Line itineraries include Huatulco and a Disney Cruise Line itinerary visits Mazatlan.
Story by Wallace Immen, executive editor, The Cruisington Times
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