I’ve wanted to go to Mexico for years. My dad & Caryl (my stepmom) got married in Zihuat when I was a high school senior. Caryl’s side of the family has been going to Zihuat for decades, and Dad & Caryl have all kinds of Mexican stuff in the house. I lived in LaFeria, Texas for a year, right near the border at Brownsville, but I never crossed over.
I remember a lot of Mrs. Dickinson’s Spanish lessons from high school, just enough to get myself into trouble. I can listen to conversations, and maybe catch 30-50% of what’s going on. (Forget the Spanish shows on TV, though - they talk too dang fast.)
So, for our second trip, we headed south of the border. Coincidentally, the easiest place for us to spend a few days was Ixtapa & Zihuatanejo, the very place my folks got married. Zihuat is an old Mexican village on the sea, about ten miles south of Ixtapa, a gorgeous beachfront tourist megaplex with bazillion-dollar-hotels and miles of white sand. If you want the typical American style vacation, you stay in Ixtapa for $250 a night and get pampered. If you want the Mexican experience, you stay in Zihuat for $50 a night and see the real Mexico. I wanted the latter.
As soon as we touched down, I knew I’d love it. The airport is a tiny affair with lots of palm trees. I love Mexican customs - you push a button, and this traffic light randomly chooses red or green. Red, your stuff gets searched - green, you’re in. I was mesmerized, and I gotta say, this is the best system I’ve ever seen. No discrimination here. True to life, I got a green light, and Erika got a red one. The officials were friendly and quick, too.
Then came the big boo-boo - I used an ATM machine. I’m used to the Chase ones in the States, where they give you your card back as soon as you put it in. They hold on to the card just long enough to read it, and then give it back to you. Makes sense, it’s not like it needs your card for anything else. Anyway, I withdrew $20, which of course was 20 pesos. Pretty useless. So I withdrew a lot more, and then satisfied that I had enough cash to get through the day, left the ATM machine.
With my card in it.
We headed into town, to the Hotel Susie. Perfectly situated a block from the Zihuat beach (not a swimming beach, but a fishing one) and all its restaurants, this place fulfilled everything we wanted in a Mexican hotel. I wanted someplace genuinely Mexican, not a tourist joint with an ice machine in the hallway. This place was it: no air conditioning, concrete walls and floors, lots of lush landscaping, and a really friendly feel. If you want to experience Mexico, this is how you do it - and the price, around $40 per night, wasn’t bad either.
Anyway, it was during check-in that I realized I’d left my ATM card in the machine. I was horrified. Talk about trial by fire - we had to learn how to call the States from a pay phone. When we finally got in touch with Chase, they informed me that somebody had taken out an additional $200, but then I’d hit the daily limit on overseas ATM withdrawals, so they cut the card off. Thank God.
The rest of the vacation was a blast. We ate some of the best food I’ve ever had the pleasure of eating. In Zihuat, I highly recommend La Sirena Gorda (The Fat Siren). They specialize in cheeseburgers, oddly, but they serve fantastic food.
We spent a day on the beach in Ixtapa, alternating between hours lying on beach chairs under an umbrella watching the parasailers, and taking on the ocean surf. I had my first real coconut (not that flaky stuff from the store) complete with milk, and it was a little sweet for me.
In the Zihuat markets, we picked up some neat trinkets, including a chess set for my collection and a bracelet for her. They do a lot of beautiful silver work down there, and some colorful hand-painted ceramics too. The prices were unreal: we both fell in love with a sculpture of a baby sleeping on a crescent moon, and our mouths fell open when we heard the price of around $13. We should have gotten two of them.
I can see why Caryl’s family goes back to the same area, year after year. After seeing this place, I really don’t have any intention of seeing anywhere else in Mexico, except maybe Acupulco. When I imagine retiring south of the border, Zihuat is exactly what I’ve got in mind.
