Visiting Puerto Vallarta, Mexico

Puerto Vallarta Culture & Nightlife Puerto Vallarta Luxury Hotel Puerto Vallarta Activities Water & Beach Activities Whale Watching Fishing Snorkeling & Scuba Diving Golf Dolphin Encounters Horseback Riding Canopy Tours Beaches

Bordered by the Sierra Madre Mountains and Pacific Ocean, Puerto Vallarta is a spectacular destination with white sand beaches, pristine coastline, gorgeous landscapes and diverse natural areas for adventure.

From cobblestone streets to beautiful marinas and golf courses, Puerto Vallarta is a vacation playground of exhilaration, tranquility and activity.

On Puerto Vallarta's Malecon (boardwalk) you can shop, sightsee, and watch golden sunsets. Relax in cafés or restaurants overlooking the emerald waters of Banderas Bay, enjoy nightly performances at Los Arcos, and enjoy the beautiful sculptures and landmarks.

Downtown Puerto Vallarta Culture & Nightlife. Puerto Vallarta’s vibrant downtown offers a myriad of cultural activities, including a lively nightlife, wonderful restaurants, beach bars and unique art galleries that reflect the spirit of Mexico’s Pacific Coast. Puerto Vallarta is also known as an artists' mecca with its world-class galleries and evening art walks. There is always something exciting happening in this lovely tropical city.  [Top]

Puerto Vallarta, Mexico Activities. For those seeking active pursuits, Puerto Vallarta offers an abundance of outdoor activities, such as ocean excursions, scuba diving expeditions, snorkeling, kayaking, floating parties, romantic dinner cruises, hiking, mountain biking, eco-tours, swimming with dolphins, whale watching, and 4-wheeling. Experience the natural beauty of Puerto Vallarta by exploring pristine sand beaches, parachuting over Banderas Bay, deep sea fishing, playing golf, horseback riding, scuba diving, and indulging in plane rides over secluded mountain villages. Tee off at the Marina Vallarta and Vista Vallarta golf courses –15 minutes from the Grand Velas.

• Water & Beach Sports in in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico - With 25 miles of coastline and golden beaches, Banderas Bay and Vallarta presents limitless activities. From secluded, pristine, white sandy beaches to rocky cliffs that end at the sea or tropical forests with palm trees that reach the shoreline, the beaches of Puerto Vallarta offer a diversity of activity and scenery. Ride a jet ski over the waves, paddle a sea kayak or try wind surfing and parasailing. The hotel can arrange activities, including waterskiing, wind surfing, deep sea and fly fishing, sailing, scuba diving, snorkeling, surfing, kayaking, regattas, and catamaran and yacht excursions.  [Top]
• Whale Watching  in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico – Vallarta is one of the top places in the world to view humpback whales in their natural habitat. Catch a glimpse of the humpback whales as they make their annual migration through Banderas Bay December through March. See these amazing mammals display grace, power and beauty through their playful behavior. From November to March, humpback whales migrate to the warm waters of Banderas Bay. Several guided tours leave every morning to take visitors to see and learn about these huge mammals.  [Top]
• Fishing  in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico – Puerto Vallarta offers some of the best sport fishing in the world, and anglers from around the globe see if they can beat last year's big catch. Spend a blissful day out on the deep blue waters of Banderas Bay and fish with an experienced captain. Join a deep sea fishing charter and cast your lines for marlin, tuna, mahi mahi, dorado, sailfish, rooster tail and red snapper. Numerous charters are available on small pangas to large trawlers with fly bridges. Bass and other freshwater fishing is also available at lakes in the Puerto Vallarta area.  [Top]
• Snorkeling & Scuba Diving in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico  – With beautiful coral reefs and natural beauty, Banderas Bay offers many underwater adventures. Enjoy snorkeling and scuba diving off the islands of Los Arcos, Las Marietas and Las Caletas, where you can experience tropical fish, mantas, dolphins, and turtles. Explore the rock formations of Los Arcos National Marine Park's underwater caves and canyons, secluded beaches with shallows teeming with tropical fish, or discover the wildlife reserves and marine ecosystem of the Marietas Islands with its deep caverns and rugged rock architecture. Tours vary from short trips to all-day excursions, and night dives can be arranged for experienced divers.  [Top]
• Puerto Vallarta, Mexico Golf - Golf is a way of life in Puerto Vallarta, which offers seven spectacular golf courses, including Marina Vallarta Golf Club, El Tigre Golf Club, Flamingos Golf Club, Four Seasons Golf Club, Mayan Palace Country Club and the two spectacular Vista Vallarta courses. Tee off in the tropical breezes of Banderas Bay on courses lined with palm trees and vibrant tropical flowers. Beautiful clubhouses offer open-air dining and views of the greens and some state-of-the-art courses offer an optional 19th hole on an island. The Nicklaus course at Vista Vallarta has garnered worldwide recognition since hosting the 2002 EMC World Cup Championship.  [Top]
• Dolphin Encounters in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico – Swim with Pacific bottlenose dolphins and learn about these enchanting, gentle creatures at the Nuevo Vallarta Dolphin Center.  [Top]
• Horseback Riding in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico – With gorgeous scenery, hillsides and valleys, Puerto Vallarta is a fantastic place to enjoy horseback riding. Visitors can take to the hills, rivers, villages and jungle by horseback, exploring the countryside with bilingual tour guides learning the history of the area and experiencing Vallarta in a more natural way. Ride a quarter horse, thoroughbred or mestizo (mixed breed), exploring a jungle trail with orchids or catching the refreshing overspray of a waterfall. You can also ride alongside a picturesque river or high in the verdant foothills of the Sierra Madre Mountains, where the panoramic views of the bay are breathtaking. In nearby Bucerias, you can trot along the beach.  [Top]
• Puerto Vallarta, Mexico Canopy Tours - Exhilarating and educational, Canopy Tours are an eco-activity that guides you into Puerto Vallarta’s lush tropical rain forest and gets your adrenaline flowing. With Vallarta Adventures (www.vallarta-adventures.com), you can enjoy a Canopy Adventure, soaring along seven zip lines – one of them PV’s highest at 250 feet – crossing hanging bridges and rappelling to the forest floor, or the Outdoor Adventure - the canopy tour plus ride a mule, splash through streams and learn wilderness techniques. With Canopy Tours de Los Veranos (www.canopytours-vallarta.com), you speed over a river gorge along 14 cables while spotting exotic orchids, play on water slides or meet fawns, monkeys, pythons and tarantulas. The tour ends at a palapa bar with 80 brands of tequila and a riverside restaurant that offers food for every mood – from burgers to lobster.  [Top]
• Beaches in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico – Situated on Banderas Bay, which boasts 34 miles of coastline and 26 miles of sandy beach - Puerto Vallarta is a playground of spectacular beaches for sunning, swimming, surfing, boogie boarding, fishing and playing on the golden sands. Those to the north in Nayarit on the Costa Vallarta are longer and wider, the foothills of the Sierra Madre further back from the sea than in Jalisco, giving them a unique character. South of PV, where the mountains tumble into the sea, there are small coves and intimate sandy stretches. Puerto Vallarta’s beautiful, pristine beaches include: San Francisco/San Pancho, Sayulita, Punta de Mita, El Anclote, Bucerías, Nuevo Vallarta, Destiladeras, Boca de Tomates, Marina Vallarta, Hotel Zone, Los Muertos, Garza Blanca, Gemelas, Mismaloya, and Boca de Tomatlán.  [Top]

Photos by Mark Callanan http://www.callananphoto.com