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Travels 'N' Trails

Puerto Vallarta – an Escape to the Sunshine!

in Travel on 09/06/16

Tips for a relaxing Puerto Vallarta vacation. Advice on how to visit Puerto Vallarta Mexico and avoid the all-inclusive resorts. Try an Airbnb right on the water and have the perfect beach vacation! Check out this post for our favorite restaurants and where to get the best margaritas!

Back in March, J and I escaped the dreary Seattle winter and headed down to Puerto Vallarta for a few days of sunshine! It was a pretty short trip – Thursday morning through Sunday night, but it was the perfect amount of time for us to get away and relax by the ocean. There are tons of all-inclusive resorts in Puerto Vallarta, but we opted for an Airbnb place right on the water, so that we could have a little more space to ourselves and be able to explore on our own a little more.

After finding our condo, we took a walk along the beach to get a feel for the area. It didn’t take long for us to find a place to stop and get some guacamole and margaritas!

 

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It was pretty cloudy that first afternoon and evening, but it was still so relaxing to just sit and listen to the waves.

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We wandered into The Blue Shrimp, a place near our condo, for some more margaritas after dinner. They were honestly the best margaritas I’ve ever had in my life! They brought these glasses out to us with the margarita mix in the center, then poured tequila on top until they were full. This is one of my favorite pictures of the trip – J laughing and wondering what we’d gotten ourselves into 🙂

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The next morning we woke up to this gorgeous view from our balcony!

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We walked along the beach to find the perfect spot to sit and relax for the day.

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Eventually we wandered over to another beach-side restaurant for – you guessed it – more margaritas.

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The sun was able to peek through the clouds a little bit for the sunset.

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We loved the margaritas at The Blue Shrimp so much that we decided to head back there for dinner – and the shrimp was incredible! Definitely check this place out if you’re visiting Puerto Vallarta, we loved it!

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On Saturday we woke up to clear blue skies and lots of sunshine! I loved this Airbnb condo that we stayed at – it was the perfect location for us!

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My happy place 🙂

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Saturday’s activities were mostly the same as Friday’s – relaxing on the beach, drinking margaritas, and watching the sunset.

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Sunday morning we woke up to another beautiful day. Luckily we didn’t have to leave for the airport until about 1pm, so we still had a lot of time to relax on the beach. J loved swimming in the ocean and riding the waves!

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On last look out the balcony window before we headed home.

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We loved visiting Puerto Vallarta because it’s such an easy flight from the West Coast. We had a direct flight from Seattle, which made it possible to leave mid-afternoon and still be home by 8pm! We also loved being surrounded by mountains while at the beach. I just realized most of my photos are looking straight out at the ocean, but Puerto Vallarta actually has a lot of mountains too! We’d love to come back someday and do some hiking and other activities too. This trip was the perfect length for a quick getaway to the sunshine in the middle of winter, and just the right amount of time to relax and do nothing at the beach. Hoping we can make this a tradition!

Where are your favorite winter getaways?

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