Chacala
Encyclopedia
Chacalahttp://www.chacala.ca is a picturesque beach-town set in small cove on the Pacific coast of Mexico in the State of Nayarit. It is located about 100 kilometres (62.1 mi) north of Puerto Vallarta. The name means "where there are shrimp" in Náhuatl
, and is part of the coastline known as the Riviera Nayarita
. The population consists of approximately 300 full time residents, but can swell to over 1000 during Mexico's most popular vacation periods such as Semana Santa, (Easter Week) and Christmas. Chacala is known for its physical beauty, unhurried lifestyle, and for the efforts of a small group of "socially conscious" and "proactive" Americans to change the lifestyle of the residents.
and Jalisco
was originally home to the Texcoxquin (Teqectequi) indigenous culture millennia before the European conquest
. The Altavista petroglyphs, not far from Chacala, are believed to date from 2300 BCE. This extensive group of rock carvings is still used today for ceremonial religious purposes by the native Huichol.
reached here in 1524. Although Chacala was never as historically significant a port as San Blas
to the north or Puerto Vallarta
to the south, the sheltered bay saw a visit from Portuguese explorer Sebastian Rodriguez Cermeño, sailing out of Manila, who stopped in Chacala on January 07, 1596 en route to Alta California. The notable but idiosyncratic Jesuit missionary Father Eusebio Francisco Kuhn, commonly known as 'Padre Kino', and his party departed from Chacala on his Atondo expedition in May of 1683. Many members of the expedition abandoned him after he proposed that his ship be pushed across the Sonoran Desert
.
plantation, Mexican doctor Laura del Valle's arrival in 1980 spurred a period of change which, in a relatively brief 15 years, transformed the town into one of Mexico's more distinctive destinations. Del Valle first built simple accommodations at Chacala's south end, where dense virgin first-growth rainforest teeming with wildlife, including ocelot
, margay
and jaguarundi
, grows down the flanks of a small collapsed volcano and plunges into the Pacific. She built the lodge to house visiting American medical students volunteering at the local health clinic she founded to serve the Mexican poor. Today it has evolved into a Retreat & Wellness Center called Mar de Jade that still supports and runs a variety of non-profit projects for the local community and the neighboring impoverished farming town of Las Varas.
A Zen
Buddhist with a strong commitment to helping the less-fortunate, the word of del Valle's work soon spread, and Chacala started attracting others with similar ideals, along with 'eco-tourists' looking for a tranquil, unspoiled and little-visited beach-town 'off the beaten path'.
Another distinctive establishment is the Hotel Majahua whose owners, Carmen and José Enrique work to develop a socially responsible tourism industry, working with the local fishing community. Over the next decade-and-a-half others looking for an environ where efforts to help a local populace resulted in changes which could be seen and felt, or those just looking for an idyllic charming beach-town found their way to Chacala. Two events in the mid 90's would change the area dramatically. Chacalilla, the small cove just north of Chacala and the surrounding land was purchasd by a developer to build a gated complex with luxury homes ranging from approximately $550,000 to $1,800,000 USD. To provide access to the construction site and town, a paved road from Highway 200 to the beach replaced the often-flooded poor-quality circuitous dirt road which had previously kept all but the most-dedicated from visiting Chacala.
. Nayarit encompasses 27620 square kilometres (10,664.1 sq mi), which makes it a little larger than the state of Maryland in the U.S.A. It has 289 kilometres (179.6 mi) of Pacific coastline. Nayarit is bordered by the states of Sinaloa
, Zacatecas
and Durango
to the north, and by Jalisco
to the east and south. The town is 11 kilometres (6.8 mi) off Highway 200 and is situated on the Pacific coastal plain. The coastal plain is the strip of land that runs along most of the west coast of Mexico between the Pacific Ocean and the foothills and mountains.
, thus it is located in the true Tropics
, and its climate is Tropical - hot and humid. The actual classification is 'warm subhumid tropical'. Nayarit is characterized by its high rainfall - the fifth highest in the country, averaging 1000-1500mm (40-60 in.) per annum.
Some parts of the state receive up to 2640mm (104 in.) of rainfall a year. The rains are concentrated in periods of brief intense thunderstorms, often occurring in the afternoons, most during the summer wet season between May and October, although a lesser but significant winter wet season exists as well. The wet seasons are separated by spring and fall dry seasons. Chacala received moderate to severe damage from Hurricane Kenna
in October 2002.
, Margay
, Jaguar
, Jaguarundi
and Puma along with deer, wild boar, coati mundi, skunk, badger, coyote, wild rabbit, armadillo, various snakes, lizards, and frogs.
Nahuatl
Nahuatl is thought to mean "a good, clear sound" This language name has several spellings, among them náhuatl , Naoatl, Nauatl, Nahuatl, Nawatl. In a back formation from the name of the language, the ethnic group of Nahuatl speakers are called Nahua...
, and is part of the coastline known as the Riviera Nayarita
Riviera Nayarita
The Riviera Nayarit is a stretch of coastline between the port of San Blas in the Mexican state of Nayarit southward to where the Río Ameca or Ameca River empties into Banderas Bay...
. The population consists of approximately 300 full time residents, but can swell to over 1000 during Mexico's most popular vacation periods such as Semana Santa, (Easter Week) and Christmas. Chacala is known for its physical beauty, unhurried lifestyle, and for the efforts of a small group of "socially conscious" and "proactive" Americans to change the lifestyle of the residents.
Pre-Columbian era
The region encompassing NayaritNayarit
Nayarit officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Nayarit is one of the 31 states which, with the Federal District, comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided in 20 municipalities and its capital city is Tepic.It is located in Western Mexico...
and Jalisco
Jalisco
Jalisco officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Jalisco is one of the 31 states which, with the Federal District, comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is located in Western Mexico and divided in 125 municipalities and its capital city is Guadalajara.It is one of the more important states...
was originally home to the Texcoxquin (Teqectequi) indigenous culture millennia before the European conquest
Spanish conquest of Mexico
The Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire was one of the most important campaigns in the Spanish colonization of the Americas. The invasion began in February 1519 and was acclaimed victorious on August 13, 1521, by a coalition army of Spanish conquistadors and Tlaxcalan warriors led by Hernán Cortés...
. The Altavista petroglyphs, not far from Chacala, are believed to date from 2300 BCE. This extensive group of rock carvings is still used today for ceremonial religious purposes by the native Huichol.
Colonial era
The bay was first seen by Europeans when the Spaniard Francisco Cortés de Buena Ventura, a nephew of Hernán CortésHernán Cortés
Hernán Cortés de Monroy y Pizarro, 1st Marquis of the Valley of Oaxaca was a Spanish Conquistador who led an expedition that caused the fall of the Aztec Empire and brought large portions of mainland Mexico under the rule of the King of Castile in the early 16th century...
reached here in 1524. Although Chacala was never as historically significant a port as San Blas
San Blas, Nayarit
San Blas is both a municipality and municipal seat located on the Pacific coast of Mexico in the state of Nayarit.-City:San Blas is a port and a popular tourist destination, located about 100 miles north of Puerto Vallarta, and 40 miles west of the state capital Tepic. The town has a population of...
to the north or Puerto Vallarta
Puerto Vallarta
Puerto Vallarta is a Mexican balneario resort city situated on the Pacific Ocean's Bahía de Banderas.The 2010 census reported Puerto Vallarta's population as 255,725 making it the sixth-largest city in the state of Jalisco...
to the south, the sheltered bay saw a visit from Portuguese explorer Sebastian Rodriguez Cermeño, sailing out of Manila, who stopped in Chacala on January 07, 1596 en route to Alta California. The notable but idiosyncratic Jesuit missionary Father Eusebio Francisco Kuhn, commonly known as 'Padre Kino', and his party departed from Chacala on his Atondo expedition in May of 1683. Many members of the expedition abandoned him after he proposed that his ship be pushed across the Sonoran Desert
Sonoran Desert
The Sonoran Desert is a North American desert which straddles part of the United States-Mexico border and covers large parts of the U.S. states of Arizona and California and the northwest Mexican states of Sonora, Baja California, and Baja California Sur. It is one of the largest and hottest...
.
Modern era
After slumbering for decades as a small fishing village and coconutCoconut
The coconut palm, Cocos nucifera, is a member of the family Arecaceae . It is the only accepted species in the genus Cocos. The term coconut can refer to the entire coconut palm, the seed, or the fruit, which is not a botanical nut. The spelling cocoanut is an old-fashioned form of the word...
plantation, Mexican doctor Laura del Valle's arrival in 1980 spurred a period of change which, in a relatively brief 15 years, transformed the town into one of Mexico's more distinctive destinations. Del Valle first built simple accommodations at Chacala's south end, where dense virgin first-growth rainforest teeming with wildlife, including ocelot
Ocelot
The ocelot , pronounced /ˈɒsəˌlɒt/, also known as the dwarf leopard or McKenney's wildcat is a wild cat distributed over South and Central America and Mexico, but has been reported as far north as Texas and in Trinidad, in the Caribbean...
, margay
Margay
The Margay is a spotted cat native to Middle and South America. Named for Prince Maximilian of Wied-Neuwied, it is a solitary and nocturnal animal that prefers remote sections of the rainforest. Although it was once believed to be vulnerable to extinction, the IUCN now lists it as "Near Threatened"...
and jaguarundi
Jaguarundi
The jaguarundi is a small-sized wild cat native to Central and South America. In 2002, the IUCN classified the jaguarundi as Least Concern as it is likely that no conservation units, with the probable exception of the mega-reserves of the Amazon basin could sustain long-term viable populations. It...
, grows down the flanks of a small collapsed volcano and plunges into the Pacific. She built the lodge to house visiting American medical students volunteering at the local health clinic she founded to serve the Mexican poor. Today it has evolved into a Retreat & Wellness Center called Mar de Jade that still supports and runs a variety of non-profit projects for the local community and the neighboring impoverished farming town of Las Varas.
A Zen
Zen
Zen is a school of Mahāyāna Buddhism founded by the Buddhist monk Bodhidharma. The word Zen is from the Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese word Chán , which in turn is derived from the Sanskrit word dhyāna, which can be approximately translated as "meditation" or "meditative state."Zen...
Buddhist with a strong commitment to helping the less-fortunate, the word of del Valle's work soon spread, and Chacala started attracting others with similar ideals, along with 'eco-tourists' looking for a tranquil, unspoiled and little-visited beach-town 'off the beaten path'.
Another distinctive establishment is the Hotel Majahua whose owners, Carmen and José Enrique work to develop a socially responsible tourism industry, working with the local fishing community. Over the next decade-and-a-half others looking for an environ where efforts to help a local populace resulted in changes which could be seen and felt, or those just looking for an idyllic charming beach-town found their way to Chacala. Two events in the mid 90's would change the area dramatically. Chacalilla, the small cove just north of Chacala and the surrounding land was purchasd by a developer to build a gated complex with luxury homes ranging from approximately $550,000 to $1,800,000 USD. To provide access to the construction site and town, a paved road from Highway 200 to the beach replaced the often-flooded poor-quality circuitous dirt road which had previously kept all but the most-dedicated from visiting Chacala.
Location
Chacala is located on the south west portion the Nayarit coast, which itself is located about mid-way on the Mexican Pacific CoastGeography of Mexico
The geography of Mexico entails the physical and human geography of Mexico, a country situated in the Americas. Mexico is located at about 23° N and 102° W in the southern portion of North America. It is also located in a region known as Middle America. From its farthest land points, Mexico is a...
. Nayarit encompasses 27620 square kilometres (10,664.1 sq mi), which makes it a little larger than the state of Maryland in the U.S.A. It has 289 kilometres (179.6 mi) of Pacific coastline. Nayarit is bordered by the states of Sinaloa
Sinaloa
Sinaloa officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Sinaloa is one of the 31 states which, with the Federal District, comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided in 18 municipalities and its capital city is Culiacán Rosales....
, Zacatecas
Zacatecas
Zacatecas officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Zacatecas is one of the 31 states which, with the Federal District, comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided in 58 municipalities and its capital city is Zacatecas....
and Durango
Durango
Durango officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Durango is one of the 31 states which, with the Federal District, comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. The state is located in Northwest Mexico. With a population of 1,632,934, it has Mexico's second-lowest population density, after Baja...
to the north, and by Jalisco
Jalisco
Jalisco officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Jalisco is one of the 31 states which, with the Federal District, comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is located in Western Mexico and divided in 125 municipalities and its capital city is Guadalajara.It is one of the more important states...
to the east and south. The town is 11 kilometres (6.8 mi) off Highway 200 and is situated on the Pacific coastal plain. The coastal plain is the strip of land that runs along most of the west coast of Mexico between the Pacific Ocean and the foothills and mountains.
Climate
Chacala (and all of Nayarit) lies south of the Tropic of CancerTropic of Cancer
The Tropic of Cancer, also referred to as the Northern tropic, is the circle of latitude on the Earth that marks the most northerly position at which the Sun may appear directly overhead at its zenith...
, thus it is located in the true Tropics
Tropics
The tropics is a region of the Earth surrounding the Equator. It is limited in latitude by the Tropic of Cancer in the northern hemisphere at approximately N and the Tropic of Capricorn in the southern hemisphere at S; these latitudes correspond to the axial tilt of the Earth...
, and its climate is Tropical - hot and humid. The actual classification is 'warm subhumid tropical'. Nayarit is characterized by its high rainfall - the fifth highest in the country, averaging 1000-1500mm (40-60 in.) per annum.
Some parts of the state receive up to 2640mm (104 in.) of rainfall a year. The rains are concentrated in periods of brief intense thunderstorms, often occurring in the afternoons, most during the summer wet season between May and October, although a lesser but significant winter wet season exists as well. The wet seasons are separated by spring and fall dry seasons. Chacala received moderate to severe damage from Hurricane Kenna
Hurricane Kenna
Hurricane Kenna was the second-most intense Pacific hurricane to strike the west coast of Mexico in recorded history. Kenna was the sixteenth tropical depression, thirteenth tropical storm, seventh hurricane, sixth major hurricane, and third Category 5 hurricane of the 2002 Pacific hurricane season...
in October 2002.
Flora
Nayarit'shttp://www.rivieranayaritmexico.com natural floral habitat consists of tropical coastal savannah, tropical deciduous forest, tropical semi-deciduous forest and riparian wetland. The region also includes large and small tracts of cultivated land. The lush Nayarit jungle is home to over 300 species of orchids alone. The biodiverse tropical deciduous forests of Mexico, such as those of Nayarit's foothills and mountains, contain up to 40% of Mexico's flora and fauna diversity. Parts of the tropical deciduous forest on the Pacific Coast near Nayarit have been found to be among the top 10 most species-rich floral habitats on earth.Fauna
The fertile coastal plain and lush jungle of the foothills and mountains of the Sierra Madre Occidental support a wide variety of fauna, including over 400 bird species, and a rich diversity of mammals, reptiles, amphibians, and other animal species. Some of the significant birds include the Amazon Parrot, Tropical Kingbird, Great Kiskadee, Hooded Oriole, and the Blue-footed Booby. Mammals include an incredibly wide range of 'big cats' such as OcelotOcelot
The ocelot , pronounced /ˈɒsəˌlɒt/, also known as the dwarf leopard or McKenney's wildcat is a wild cat distributed over South and Central America and Mexico, but has been reported as far north as Texas and in Trinidad, in the Caribbean...
, Margay
Margay
The Margay is a spotted cat native to Middle and South America. Named for Prince Maximilian of Wied-Neuwied, it is a solitary and nocturnal animal that prefers remote sections of the rainforest. Although it was once believed to be vulnerable to extinction, the IUCN now lists it as "Near Threatened"...
, Jaguar
Jaguar
The jaguar is a big cat, a feline in the Panthera genus, and is the only Panthera species found in the Americas. The jaguar is the third-largest feline after the tiger and the lion, and the largest in the Western Hemisphere. The jaguar's present range extends from Southern United States and Mexico...
, Jaguarundi
Jaguarundi
The jaguarundi is a small-sized wild cat native to Central and South America. In 2002, the IUCN classified the jaguarundi as Least Concern as it is likely that no conservation units, with the probable exception of the mega-reserves of the Amazon basin could sustain long-term viable populations. It...
and Puma along with deer, wild boar, coati mundi, skunk, badger, coyote, wild rabbit, armadillo, various snakes, lizards, and frogs.
External links
- Reynolds, Christopher, Playa Chacala: Sun, sand and something more Los Angeles Times, February 24, 2007