Puerto Vallarta News and Events
From Raymond Resendes' About.com Article:
Over 2 million tourists visit Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, annually - making this resort town the second most visited destination in Mexico. Although Puerto Vallarta is best known for its beaches, it offers an extremely wide variety of other attractions. The town has a pleasant climate, great scenic beauty, world class accommodations to suit every budget, numerous quality restaurants, excellent shopping, a vibrant nightlife and many opportunities to engage in several watersports activities and sightseeing excursions. Perhaps no other destination in Mexico offers the diversity of activities that Puerto Vallarta does. Further, the town itself has the look and charm of a colonial Mexican village with its picturesque buildings and cobblestone streets. There is never a dull moment in this famous resort town.
Birding Mexico article: A Paradise For Birders
With more than 300 species of birds, Puerto Vallarta is called El Paraiso or Paradise.
The most compelling feature of the area is the huge bay, the Bahia de Banderas or Bay of Flags, cut like a semicircle out of the Pacific Coast of Mexico. The coastline of the bay is relatively featureless, except for a few small inlets at the mouths of rivers, such as at Yelapa, Boca de Tomatlan, and Mismaloya. In the mouth of the bay is a small cluster of rocky islands, the Marietas or Islas Marietas where some sea birds nest in season.
High mountains come down to the waters edge generally extending from San Blas, Nayarit to the north, and southward to the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. The Bahia de Banderas, is carved out of these mountains and the cut extends inward in a northeasterly direction as a valley, the Valle de Banderas, or Valley of Flags. The high mountains surround the edge of the valley forming an area isolated from other sea level valleys to the north and south.
The mountainside surrounding the bay and valley are coated with vegetation distinctly different from that of the valley, namely the tropical deciduous forest. Locally, this type of terrain is called "the jungle", but is quite different from true jungle vegetation of more southern parts of the continent.
The Rio Ameca is the major river in the valley and has had a major influence on the valley floor it comes out of the mountains to the east, through a steep-walled rocky gorge, having arisen in the vicinity of Guadalajara. A constant wash of sand occurs from out of the mountain gorge of the river. This is constantly being removed as a major construction material in the area, and after each rainy season when the river is at its peak, a new supply of sand seems to have been deposited.
Family of the Month - The HERONS and EGRETS: family Ardeidae Las GARZAS y afines
The birds in this family of long-necked, long-billed waders feed largely on fish, amphibians, and aquatic invertebrates. They primarily inhabit swamps, marshes, streams, wet pastures or any other similar wetland habitats. It is a family of about sixty-one species in the world of which 22 or 23 are found in North and Central America.