Best for Honeymooners
Base camp: Sayulita
Just as drug wars were forcing already cheap Mexico to slash prices to keep tourists, swine flu hit. To fill empty beaches, hotels and airlines are piling on deals, even to the area near Puerto Vallarta known as Riviera Nayarit ($300 flights from L.A.). A surfer’s mecca and fishing village, Sayulita dead-ends at a white beach with two breaks — the Right is slow and steady, good for longboarders and beginners, while the Left rolls fast and high for shortboarders — and the bottom is all sand. For the best fish tacos outside of Baja, try Sayulita Fish Taco Restaurant, which also boasts more than 300 rare tequilas ($2; sayulitafishtaco.com). Stay in a private ocean-view villa with your own staff and pool ($100; sayulitalife.com), or drive 15 minutes to Punta de Mita, where many luxury resorts are throwing in a third night free ($279; starwoodhotels .com/stregis). Come from June to February, when volunteers free thousands of olive ridley and leatherback turtle hatchlings from their nests (project-tortuga.org).
Excursion 1: The waters off Nayarit offer amazing blue-water spear and deep-sea fishing ($980 for four nights; puntamitaexpeditions.com).
Excursion 2: Sierra Madre
Mountain biking this jungle’s singletrack reveals rare birds, deserted beaches, even jaguars ($50;wildmex.com).
Can’t Get It at Home: Intricate, handmade silver jewelry, sold by weight ($14 per ounce).
Read Before You Go: Gringos in Paradise by Barry Golson
http://www.mensjournal.com/half-mexico
