Driving down from Mazatlan to Lo de Marcos late last month, we actually overshot Chacala. We lived there for 11 months a few years back, so returning for a visit was a must.
Amazingly, half the town is a palm fringed beachfront campground—an old coconut plantation that was a holdover from the Spanish. Locals manage it collectively and the proceeds are reinvested back into the community. That’s my understanding, at least.
The site is just about as ideal of a location for an RV as it gets. But it’s dry camping. This time of year, we’ve decided we can do two nights before hankering for hookups again. A/C, reliable internet (work), showers.
I, for one, don’t need more than two nights in Chacala. Not with the very ideal situation we’ve got going in Lo de Marcos at the moment.
On the surface, Chacala is an idyllic and tight knit fishing community with a beautiful stretch of beach (and an excellent private primary school). But scratch the surface a bit and there’s a lot of BS and drama that quite frankly, we don’t miss.
For example, the town’s been essentially taken over by outside interests from Compostela and Guadalajara. These days, there seem to be more Guadalajarans in Chacala at any given time than native Huichol or long-time area residents.
It’s one of the few places in this area of the country with 5-story block hotels (particularly striking in this otherwise rustic village of 300)—and more are going up all the time.
All of which makes Chacala a party town—hedonistic playground (and often dumping ground) for Guadalajara’s privileged elite. It shouldn’t be this way, but it is.
I’m curious to see what’s changed—if anything—and what’s stayed the same. And we’re all excited to catch up with old friends and neighbors.
The turnoff to Chacala from Highway 200. From here, it’s another 20 minutes on a narrow, winding road. I must have made this turn a hundred times when we lived here. It seems completely surreal to be back here two years later in a motorhome. Didn’t see that one coming.
Most of the roads in Chacala are pretty gnarly. That hasn’t changed. Thankfully, the campground is near the entrance to town, though they now make you do this weird one way loop into town then back out to get down there.
Knowing Chacala, we moved mountains to make sure we were here midweek. The campground is absolutely ridiculous on the weekends—something none of us want to deal with. Midweek, we remember things being relatively chill—unless it’s a holiday or something.
That’s partly why we made the decision to initially bypass Chacala and come back a week later. The other part was that the boys’ old schoolmates were going to be out of town on a camping trip earlier in the week.
We rolled into the campground, drove past the three car campers at the front to the back of the property near a large shade tree adjacent to the beach, oriented the rig to take advantage of the ocean breeze, and shut ‘er off. Not much more to do than that when you’re dry camping in an RV.
Red flags were up and the sea state was pretty unpleasant, so we opted to head into town and check things out.
We knew that a walk from end to end of town and back takes all of one hour—strolling at a snails pace. So, we beelined it to an old beachfront favorite—Las Brisas—for one of their excellent set menus.
Apparently, they no longer offer the set menu and the place was PACKED (mind you, this is Monday in May). So…we moseyed on down the beach to Chac Muul, which has undergone a facelift since our last visit.
We had some time before the school got out, so we proceeded up the main drag to the highway to do the Chacala loop. Old, loud, dirty construction projects finally completed, and many more stalled or underway. Certainly don’t miss that aspect of living here.
The old house. One of them at least. This was our second house in Chacala and the one that holds the best memories. Noe was very excited to return to see the “Big White House.”
Two hellish construction projects on both sides forced us out of our first house. We certainly didn’t need a house this size in Chacala, but there was literally nothing else available. The irony of Chacala is that for all the construction going on, there’s virtually no long-term housing available for a family to rent.
The road we walked the boys every day to and from school, passing roosters, fishermen mending their nets, and a dozen Mexican skiffs of varying degrees of seaworthiness in the off season.
We swung by the boys’ old school, but their former teacher had to leave early. We did get to catch up with half the town—from good friends and acquaintances to classmates and neighbors.
If you want to get caught up on all the latest in Chacala, there’s no better time and place than school pickup.
We’ve had an absolutely gorgeous string of days in Nayarit since we’ve been back. Of course, the afternoon we rolled into Chacala, it was completely overcast and chilly with rough seas.
But the sun eventually did break through in the hour just before sunset. Just in time for beach time.
It was nice to see a handful of sailboats anchored in the bay. Not the best anchorage for monohulls (particularly on a rolly day like today). But fun to see some action here in May.
The night was fairly uneventful and what you might expect from dry camping on the beach perpendicular to the ocean breeze—hot and muggy for the first half, cool and damp for the second.
At 6am the next morning, I awoke to some unusual commotion right outside the RV. I peeked out the window and noticed Lori had made some new friends, or at least that’s what it looked like at first.
Lori had setup on a log under a shade tree on the edge of the beach a few steps away from the RV to take an early morning call for work. Not long after sunrise, a large group of middle-aged women (presumably from Guadalajara based on their dress and Jalisco license plates) rolled up right next to the RV and unloaded a large table and chairs, multiple coolers, a portable stereo—and endless assortment of additional accoutrements—and proceeded to start some sort of raucous soirée on the beach.
Mind you, there was 100 meters of deserted beach on either side of us. But apparently, they wanted this space at 6am on a Tuesday right next to our RV where Lori was trying to have a video meeting with colleagues in Europe.
No buenos dias, no con permiso, no acknowledgement whatsoever. They simply acted like Lori wasn’t even there, running into her, nudging her, and brushing up against her.
Lori was absolutely beside herself and completely flabbergasted. She eventually relocated because it simply got too awkward and distracting to continue the call.
This all would have surprised me if we hadn’t spent a year living in Chacala having interactions along these lines with other Tapatios. I’m not sure what it is about Guadalajaran holidaymakers in Chacala, specifically, but the superiority complex, entitlement, and condescension (directed towards to local residents AND people like us) is like nothing we’ve experienced in any other part of the world (or elsewhere in Mexico, for that matter).
There was no shortage of other places to park our RV, so we eventually decided it wasn’t worth it to stay in this particular spot and moved 50 meters farther down the beach.
And it was a good thing we did. They remained in that very spot for the next 15 hours until well after sunset when they eventually packed up and left.
It was a bit cooler and overcast this morning, so we opted to finish our stroll around town. The first stop was checking on the progress of the two construction projects that terrorized us for the first seven months we lived here. We left town two years ago and assumed at least one of the two would be finished by now.
But then we remembered we were in Chacala.
That’s a hotel on the left and condos on the right. When we first moved in in September 2021, they had just broken ground on the condos.
We were initially led to believe it was a single-family residence going up, but quickly learned it was a four-story condo building.
In mid-2022, we learned that the owner decided to add two more stories (against code here in town, but builders seem to easily skirt that). When we left town in July of that year, they were getting ready to pour the ceiling of the fourth level. Nearly two years later, here we are.
Our old road. Certainly don’t miss maneuvering the Montero between the two sites just to get in and out of our home.
The boys, of course, miss the pool. It’s the only time we’ve ever had a pool in a rental, and it was definitely a huge plus. But not worth the noise and agony.
We continued our walk up into the forest behind the house where they’ve been ripping out jungle to build more vacation homes for people from Guadalajara, Compostela, and Tepic.
Along the way, we ran into our former neighbor walking her dog. She found herself in a similar situation being terrorized by never-ending construction adjacent to her home. However, she owns her place and is currently trying to unload it.
“You guys made the right choice leaving!!!” she told us emphatically as we continued on back down the hill.
Heading back to the beach, we agreed it was time for food. There was only one place we all wanted to go this morning—Lalaxtli Bakery. Superb food set amidst the ruins of a 500-year-old Spanish armory with one of the best perches in town overlooking the small fishermen’s cove.
We’ve spent a lot of time over many months doing exactly this. Noe missed this place perhaps most of all and was one happy kiddo.
In true Chacala spirit, we couldn’t just have a meal of course. The friendly owner, Edgar, spotted us and came over to chat and catch up.
Even after nine months of living in Sayulita and numerous visits back since, we rarely run into people we know. Chacala’s a whole other story.
No need to organize a dozen get-togethers. We’ve managed to catch-up with nearly everyone over the course of just two laps around town. A third lap around town and we’ll be old news, I reckon.
After breakfast, it seemed like a good time to make our way up to the village volcano.
Sure, Sayulita has a lot more beach hikes, but there are few hikes in Mexico that offer more bang for your buck than this one. Two miles round trip, 800 feet of elevation gain, and spectacular views, starting from the town center.
We’re deep in dry season and the town below is experiencing water shortages. But up here, there seems to be an abundance of water for the Guanabana (Soursop) orchards from somewhere.
Same stunning Pacific views, but the flock of sheep and palapa are new [to us] additions to the rim of the volcano.
Still hard to imagine sometimes that we lived in a place like this once. Up here, it’s easy to forget all the reasons we decided to move on—if only for a moment.
Following yet another successful ascent of the mighty volcan, we made our way back down to Noe and Riley’s old school to see their beloved former teacher, Maestra Gaby.
When we returned to the campground, no less than four large coach buses had arrived since we’d left in the morning. Mind you, this is a random Tuesday in early May. I haven’t seen a single tour bus in the entire town of Lo de Marcos since we arrived there 10 days ago.
Every evening, just before sunset, one of the teachers at the school leads a free outdoor club for kids on the beach. Word on the street was that two of Noe and Riley’s good friends were going to be there.
There was some initial confusion as the group briefly met on the beach, then quickly disappeared. Noe thought he’d seen one of the kids heading off in the direction of the volcano. Given that the four of us had just climbed the volcano a couple hours prior, we weren’t in a mood to follow in hot pursuit.
Ninety minutes later, the group of kids re-emerged from the jungle. Noe and Riley caught up and followed them to the plaza where they got to hang out for a bit before everyone eventually peeled off to their respective houses among the village.
Life in Chacala.
There aren’t a ton of dining options in Chacala after 6pm. So, it was back to Chac Muul for Raicilla and a bite to eat. When they brought the Raicilla out, Noe was stunned. “Wow, that’s the prettiest water I’ve ever seen! But, why didn’t they give you more?”
Next door, Tuesday night drum circle in the plaza. Nice to see some things don’t change.
Riley couldn’t help but getting in on the action.
Wednesday morning and wha-do-ya-know? The sun decided to grace us with its presence. We’re rolling out of here in an hour.
Only fitting that our visit to Chacala would be overcast and blustery with red flag conditions the first two days, only for conditions to improve in our last few hours.
Fortunately, we’re heading back down the coast to Lo de Marcos, where its been like this for the better part of two weeks.
We all agreed, it’s been really nice to catch-up with friends and neighbors and retrace old steps. And Chacala is a nice place to visit, no doubt.
But we were also reminded plenty why we made the choice to leave two years ago. There are plenty of other beach towns in Mexico that aren’t being choked to death by unchecked overdevelopment and bus loads of self-entitled tourists.
Until next time, Chacala!
