Barra de la Cruz - The Beach

On the far side of town, sits a little guard shack with a raiseable bar across a little dirt road. One has to stop here and pay 20 pesos to gain entrance to the beach road. The road and beach are maintained by the town and the money goes for the upkeep. As a result, the beach and area along the road are very clean. I spotted no garbage at all. Add to that the fact that this beach is frequented mostly by surfers, who are very conscious about clean beaches, and it is a very pleasant place.

About a mile down the dirt road you top a hill and this is what you see. Your first real glimpse of the beach and waves.





At the base of the hill is the parking lot, with shade if you can find a spot! I was amazed at some of the license plates. Mostly from around Mexico but quite a few from New Zealand and California also. There are also (not very clean) bathrooms adjacent to the parking area. An outdoor shower too.



There is a huge palapa in front of the parking lot. Surfers string hammocks under it and just chill out when not surfing. Despite the breeze, the smell of chill out material is strong under this palapa, if you get my meaning!




Looking back at the palapa from the path to the beach.





And what a walk it is! You have to follow that trail over on the right to get to the sandy area. That area of water in the front is stagnant spill over water. Not very sanitary looking.

A right hand view of the beach area.

And to the left. Notice all the spray coming off the waves.

Sprinkled along the beach you find various types of shelters set up against the relentless sun. There is no natural shade available on this beach. This was a group of surfers taking videos that day.

Isn't this great! It reminded me of the old surfer movies of the 1960's. I bet Frankie and Annette were nearby, singing their hearts out.

I stepped around those rocks, to the next beach over, fully expecting to hear Jan and Dean, but was met only with this stretch of sand.

This beach became famous to the surfer world in the mid 1990's. Word got out about its' near perfect right point waves and it was game on! The Rip Curl Search event of the Men's World Tour was held here in 2006 and it has become a very popular spot for surfers worldwide now.

As you can tell from the above photos, this is not a swimmers beach. The most you can do is play around in the surf NEAR to shore. Which is fun in its' right. But the attraction here is the surfers. Never a boring moment as they take to the waves and sometimes, to the air!

This beach is surrounded by the ever fascinating Pacific coast rocks. I never tire of looking at them. The beach is always changing its' look also as the waves come in and make playful patterns with the black sand.

Some more rocks. I saw faces somewhere in all of these rocks. Gobs of cheap entertainment! Do you see them?

Here's a twofer. Two faces in one rock!

Even though we had a great time at this beach, it is not someplace that I would return to frequently. Mostly for its' lack of swimmabilty. And even for someone like me, who grew up in the Midwest in the midst of the surfer craze of the early 1960's, it tends to get boring after awhile. Plus there is no shade and any food and beverage you want has to be carried in a long ways. And the garbage hauled out with you.

Still, if you enjoy watching surfers and/or getting a second hand high from all the smoke around you, it is definitely worth a look see.