Starting 2010 in Puerto Vallarta

We arrived in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico January 1st, 2010. The first night was hard to find a place because almost all the hotels were booked so all five of us had to stay in one room in "La Rosita" hotel, which is where the movie {en:The Night of the Iguana} was filmed. The rest of the nights we stayed at the "Los Arcos" hotel in "Viejo" Vallarta. Old Vallarta seems to be a mix of margaritaville and gayborhood, it's really cool. The crowd that hangs around this area tends to be much older (40+).

During the morning (waking up at 7am) I would go scuba diving with PV Scuba. I did a total of a little under 6 hours of bottom time with the max depth at 105ft. The temperature was warm (70s F) and I only used a 5mm wet suit. The spots that I dive where:

• Los Arcos (twice in two days) -- Named after its two arches Los Arcos is a protected National Marine Park with crystal clear water and lots of tropical fish. The wall sections are 5m (15 ft) in height and are covered with hard corals, sponges and fan corals. On the sandy areas the diver can find turtles, groupers and stingrays. The arches shelter schools of fish, moray eels and many Crustaceans.Close to these rocks, by the rock that looks like a turtle, is a submarine drop popularly known as The Devil's Canyon (Cañon del Diablo) for the deep impression of its silent abyss. I'm not sure, but one of the dive master said the abyss is a 1,5000 meter drop. That seemed like an exaggeration so I did a little bit of research and found that it is about 500 meters (1,640 feet). However, I also found that it can go as deep as 600 meters (1,968 feet) and then extend another 800 KILOMETERS (497 MILES) to the continental plate


• Majahuitas -- Majahuitas is a coved area that can only be access by boat, with a gradual slope and is populated by schools of tropical fish. The dive shop online dive site list says it's populated by schools of friendly tropical fish, but one little fish bit me after jumping in reverse from the boat so I'll take that with a grain of salt :P. The site also says the max depth is 120 ft (36.7 meters), but I went down to 105 ft (32 m) to check to see if I could see the bottom and didn't see the bottom and visibility was more than 20 ft (6m) so I think it's a little deeper than stated.On this dive site, the two lads from Montreal stated they saw a Manta Ray for a few seconds, but I didn't get to see it since my face was 3 inches from the floor looking at the small fish. The dive master didn't see it either.


• Las Marietas Islands -- A group of islands that entry to the Bay of Banderas. With a steep rocky surface, nobody would guess these islands hide precious underwater treasures – coral reefs, tropical fish, manta rays, dolphins, turtles and octopuses. I got to see very large schools of Yellow Goatfish (Mulloidichthys martinicus) and also how they use their whiskers to look for food. I have never seen them before and their whiskers caught me off guard because they don't look like a fish that would have whiskers.I also noticed that the island smelled like ammonia so I'm guessing is it due to all the bird feces on the island.On the way to the Marieta Islands we saw two {en:Humpback Whales}. On the way back from the islands, we saw a few more Humpback whales, baby humpback whales, and dolphins playing with the boat and also with the whales. I even got to see two dolphins jump about 10 to 15 feet in the air next to a whale, one on either side of the whale. It looked like some water shown out in the ocean. I managed to take a picture of it.

During the night, we would go out to the clubs and bars. Night life in Puerto Vallarta ends at 7am, but we only stayed as late as 3am because I had to wake up early the following day to go diving. The places we went to where:

• La Vaquita


• Mandala


• De Santos


• Andale

During our visit in Vallarta, we mainly met people from Guadalajara, Mexico or from Canada. There were a few Mexicans from D.F. and Americans from Wisconsin and Seattle, but the majority were either from somewhere in Canada (Toronto, Montreal, Quebec, Alberta) or from Guadalajara metro area.

Here are the pictures:

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