Grab your shades, wax your board, and check out our tropical—paradise smackdown, in which we scour the Aloha State’s sweetest shorelines, lushest mountains, coolest adventures, choicest chow, and hippest nightlife—then we let you decide which island is the big kahuna of beach-bound delight.


By Amy Linn


By Kent Black


By Ethan Watters


By Joe Kane


By Alex Heard


By Daniel Duane

Getting There: Major carriers offer nonstop flights from Los Angeles and San Francisco to Honolulu, Oahu, Kahului, Maui, and Lihue, Kauai—home to Hawaii’s largest airports—for sometimes as low as $370 round-trip. Hawaiian (800-367-5320, ) and Aloha (800-367-5250, ) airlines serve many smaller cities along the West Coast—including Portland, Seattle, Oakland, Orange County, and San Diego—and fly nonstop routes to the Honolulu, Kahului, and Big Island’s Kona airport, starting at about $400. Once you’re there, Island Air (800-323-3345, ) offers shuttle service between the six major islands, from $86 one way.

Resources: Visit for a photographic catalog of many of the islands’ best beaches; check out , the Web site of Hawaii’s tourism board. For the best maps, pick up a copy of Atlas of Hawaii (University of Hawaii Press, $50).

Wild Thing

Give in to temptation and go feral

SHORTLY AFTER LANDING IN KAUAI—the island air like a balm, the route north flanked by soft beaches, the impossibly green mountains poking through the mist—I can’t help but notice all the chickens crossing the road. Cattle egrets, red-footed boobies, and a lot of surfer dudes, I expected. But chickens?

“They’re everywhere, man,” says the smoothie maker at Banana Joe’s Fruit Stand, near Kilauea, as he hands over a to-die-for blend of locally grown papayas, bananas, and pineapples. “Chickens, goats, cows, pigs—they all went wild here.”

What he didn’t add was this: “Everything does.” It’s Kauai’s mojo, it’s the cosmic undertow, it’s the bizarre unseen force here that somehow invades your synapses and returns you to a state of primordial bliss. Centuries ago, Polynesians introduced moa (chickens) to the Garden Island, as Kauai is called, and now the cluckers are everywhere, bold and cocky in the sheer delight of shedding their domesticity.

For me, the shedding takes about a day. By the time I wake up to aloha music in the sweet oceanfront condo at the Hanalei Colony Resort, in Haena—just up the road from Hanalei, the north shore’s epicenter of surfing, biking, kayaking, coffeehouses, and barefoot locals—I’ve already lost it.

How else to explain the sudden urge to get in a helicopter, when in normal life I can barely sit on a swing without Dramamine?

“Loook at zee waterfalls!” croons Maurice, the Brazilian-born chopper pilot for Heli USA, after liftoff from the tiny Princeville airport, a few miles east of Hanalei. “Zo many, you can’t count!” We buzz deep into the untouched interior—about 90 percent of Kauai is inaccessible by road—where clouds snag on volcanic cliffs and rivers spout spontaneously above the rainforest.

We ride the spine of Mount Waialeale, one of the soggiest places on the planet, which divides the island’s arid west from its moist, lush north. We hover over the Alakai Swamp, a rainforest that’s home to wild boar and some of the world’s rarest plants. We swoop into 12-mile-long, 3,567-foot-deep Waimea Canyon (the “Grand Canyon of the Pacific”), and then head north to the sublime Na Pali Coast. Jungly 3,000-foot spires rise like buttresses on an earthly cathedral, and the 11-mile Kalalau Trail—famed for its Pacific views—hugs the cliffs above the pounding surf. Nothing could be mo’ betta—until it is. A rainbow circles us: not just an arch but an entire, brilliant ring of color. Is this even possible?

On Kauai, the answer is yes—and then some. It’s the oldest of Hawaii’s main islands (dating back about six million years), so crashing waves have had time to create more than 50 miles of beaches—more sand per mile of coastline than on any island in the state. And with less than half as many visitors as Maui and none of the massive condo clots, traffic jams, and high-rises, a low-crowd shoreline is a fact of life.

I drive to Secret Beach, a lovely half-mile-long haven of white sand near the Kilauea Lighthouse, and Anini Beach, where the exposed reef draws summer snorkelers. I check out Hanalei Bay, a rapturous crescent of coastline framed by the cliffs of Mount Makana. I swim at Tunnels Beach and Kee Beach, and each new strand tempts me to explore another. There’s no question that this is as good as Hawaii gets.

Even when it rains.

On a stormy north-shore day, I take the coast road to the sunny south, music blaring from the radio like the soundtrack to the greatest movie I’ve ever seen—which happens to be my life at the moment. In bustling, resort-filled Poipu, I snorkel with sea turtles at Hoai Beach, then it’s onward to the 1920s-era Waimea Plantation Cottages, a banyan-treed beachfront oasis in the tiny outpost of Waimea. It’s not easy to leave after a lomi lomi massage at the resort’s spa, a mai tai at its brewpub (to the tunes of Ambrose, the seventy-something ukulele player), and an ono taco at the Shrimp Station, in town, but there’s more exploring to be done.

A long, jolting drive down a rutted road brings me to Polihale Beach, 15 spectacular miles of sand on the far western edge of the Na Pali cliffs, with only ten other people in sight. When I park near the dunes, I hear what sounds like a goat bleating beyond the vast surrounding sugarcane fields, which can’t be right—there’s no farm in sight. And then I remember: It’s wild.

Access & Resources
Hole Up: Hanalei Colony Resort’s spacious condo living, on the North Shore, is the closest lodging to the Na Pali Coast. It’s totally unplugged (no TV or phone) and right on the beach. Two-bedroom condos from $210; 808-826-6235, » Whaler’s Cove, in Poipu, offers oceanfront luxury with its glass, marble, and private-terrace condos. Hot tubs and full kitchens (complete with blenders) round out the swank. Doubles from $349; 800-225-2683, » The gorgeously restored 1920s-era Waimea Plantation Cottages sit amid banyan trees and coco palms on a black-sand beach on Kauai’s remote western side. Hawaiian-style massages ($80 and up; 808-338-2240, ) at the on-site spa are amazing. Doubles from $195; 800-992-4632,

Dine: For a quick and delicious breakfast, try the Hanalei Wake-Up Cafe, the north-coast locals’ hole-in-the-wall favorite. It closes at 11 a.m. so employees can go surfing. 808-826-5551 » Sit under the thatched veranda at Hanalei Bay Resort’s Bali Hai restaurant, overlooking the water and Mount Makana. 808-826-6522, » When you’re ready to splurge, the torchlit, tiki-chic Plantation Gardens, in the Kiahuna Plantation Resort, in Poipu, is famous for dishes made with locally grown produce. 808-742-2216,

Get Out: Hike the steep and strenuous, sometimes muddy, and always gorgeous Kalalau Trail, on the Na Pali Coast. Camping permits are available from the Division of State Parks. 808-274-3444, » Rent a kayak or take a guided tour of Hanalei Bay with Kayak Kauai, in Hanalei. From $28; 800-437-3507, » Head out on horseback across 400-acre Silver Falls Ranch, in Kilauea, to a waterfall pool where you can take a dip and eat a picnic lunch. $100; 808-828-6718, » On the south shore, swim and lounge at Mahaulepu Beach, three miles east of the Hyatt Regency in Poipu. The draw? Two miles of unspoiled dunes and golden sand.

Shop: Check out Aunty Lilikoi’s award-winning passion-fruit sauces in Waimea. 866-545-4564,

Hot Spot

With volcanic rivers of free-flowing lava, this island’s on fire

Big Island

Kilauea Volcano, on the Big Island’s southeast coast, active since 1983

MY FIRST THOUGHT UPON SEEING the torch-bearing shapes of Ka huakai o ka po (“Night Marchers”)—ghosts of past Hawaiian warriors—was that they were hallucinations caused by staring too long at the 2,000-degree flow of fiery red lava from the Puu Oo vent, on Kilauea. I’d driven to the end of Chain of Craters Road and hiked a couple hours over sneaker-shredding aa, or lava rock, to witness the spectacle. A couple dozen hikers and I stood half a mile away from where the ominously glowing molten river hit the ocean in an explosion of steam and rock. It was like watching the beating heart of the Big Island: land so new it’s still in the process of creation. Indeed, Kilauea has been erupting continuously since 1983.

Earlier that day, I’d sat on the cliffs overlooking the rocky shore at South Point, the southernmost spot in the United States and thought to be the place where the first Polynesians landed on the Hawaiian chain, about 1,600 years ago. I tried to imagine how those first settlers, after a 2,300-mile voyage from the Marquesas, saw the island: its green- and black-sand beaches, fuming volcanoes, dense, highland forests, snow-covered mountaintops, and lush, windward valleys.

Since the Big Island is the original Hawaiian homeland, it’s where many of the gods, goddesses, and demigods live and are revered even today. It seems there’s not an acre of land that doesn’t have a story and a hefty dose of mana, or spiritual power. I went horseback-riding in the Waipio Valley, on the northeast coast, where Uli, goddess of sorcery, and Nenewe, the evil shark-man, reside. I trekked to the top of 13,796-foot Mauna Kea, past Lake Waiau, where ancient Hawaiians brought the umbilical cords of their children to give them the strength of the mountains. I spent two days hiking a few of the 150-plus miles of trails in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, including a great six-and-a-half-mile hike to the steaming Halemaumau crater, home to Pele, goddess of fire and volcanoes.

Hawaiian myth holds that when the Big Island was being created, Pele and her lover, Kamapuaa (the pig god), quarreled, and in the split they divided the island. The pig god took the rainier windward side, while Pele got hot and dry Kona, on the west coast. But the fact that Mauna Loa and Kilauea are still active is evidence that Pele hasn’t gotten over the breakup. Fortunately, she can be bribed. Gifts of leis or bottles of booze are offered at Halemaumau, and locals around Puna will tell you in all earnestness that if you see an old lady hitchhiking near a volcano, give her a lift: She could be Pele in disguise.

While there are plenty of mana-free things to do on the Big Island—snorkeling and scuba diving in Kealakekua Bay, on the Kona coast; swimming with manta rays; sportfishing for marlin, swordfish, and tuna; whale watching off Kona; mountain-biking the upcountry ranch land outside of Waimea—I always find myself drawn to those places that connect the old Hawaii with the new.

Which brings me back to my dilemma on the aa path near the Kilauea flow. To show proper obeisance when encountering Night Marchers, it is customary to remove all clothes and lie facedown until they pass. Before I could oblige, however, they emerged from the mist: five Japanese teenagers in matching rock-tour T-shirts, armed with flashlights. Seeing my shocked expression, they giggled nervously and moved on. A few minutes later, I stumbled on the sharp rock and gashed my leg. As I limped in the dark, back to where I’d left my car, I began to wonder if those Japanese kids weren’t Night Marchers in disguise who’d cursed me for not showing the proper respect.

On the Big Island, you never know.

Access & Resources
Hole Up: Waianuhea, near the northeastern town of Honokaa, is a stunning five-room, off-the-grid B&B, 15 minutes inland from the Hamakua Coast. It’s the perfect base for exploring the Waipio Valley and the up-country ranch town of Waimea. Doubles from $190; 888-775-2577, » In Kona, on the island’s sunny west coast, is the Sheraton Keauhou Bay Resort & Spa, with 500-plus rooms on 22 oceanfront acres, plus meandering pools, grottoes, and water slides. Doubles from $169; 808-930-4900, » Just outside Hawaii Volcanoes National Park in the southeast, Volcano Rainforest Retreat has four cedar and redwood cottages and three hot tubs—perfect after a day spent wandering the lava flows and craters. In addition to boning up on volcanology, you can get an in-cottage shiatsu massage. Doubles from $125; 800-550-8696,

Dine: Tex Drive In, on Highway 19 in Honokaa, specializes in addictive fried pastries called malasadas—try the pineapple-and-papaya filling. 808-775-0598, » If Hawaiian doughnuts don’t cut it, the French-Asian Daniel Thiebaut Restaurant, in Waimea, is one of the top-rated eateries in the United States. Don’t miss the Asian crab–crusted mahi-mahi with sweet-chili butter sauce. 808-887-2200, » Kaaloa’s Super J’s take-out, on Highway 11 in Honaunau, serves true-blue Hawaiian dishes like kalua pig and lomi salmon. 808-328-9566

Get Out: Swim offshore with gentle manta rays and guide James Wing, the original manta man. Wing is known for his encyclopedic knowledge of manta behavior and for providing close encounters. From $75; 808-987-8660, » Captain Ron, of Kailua-Kona–based Coral Reef Divers, will run you up the coast to dive sites like Pyramid Pinnacle and Golden Arches. Two-tank dive, $95; 808-987-1584, » You’ll need at least two days to explore the Kilauea Caldera and the 150-plus miles of hiking trails in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park; call the eruption hotline for details on Kilauea’s lava flow. 808-985-6000, » Hawaii Forest & Trail leads driving excursions and guided hikes to the ever-changing lava flow. $145; 800-464-1993, » Ahalanui Beach Park—on the Puna coast, south of Hilo—features a 90-degree spring-fed geothermic pool. 808-961-8311 » At the bottom of a steep, switchbacking road on the northeast coast, lush Waipio Valley is perfect for hiking, riding horses, and exploring the black-sand beach. Ride the rim with Waipio Ridge Stables before venturing to a waterfall in the rainforest. $145; 877-757-1414,

Shop: Mid-Pacific Store, in Hilo, sells vintage aloha shirts, kimonos, and muumuus. 808-935-3822 » Coffee connoisseurs know that Kona coffee is a smooth, subtle, light-to-medium bean originally from Guatemala. Get your fix on a plantation tour at Kona Blue Sky Coffee, in Holualoa—it’s one of the few places that offer 100 percent Kona beans. 877-322-1700,

Luxe Outpost

Mellow never had it so good

Lanai

Going nowhere fast: fat-tire riding, Lanai

I WAS IN THE GARDEN OF THE GODS at twilight when the feeling first came over me. From Lanai’s only town, I had driven half an hour north on a single-lane dirt road to this otherworldly plateau of red dust, pinnacles, and encrusted lava. I turned off the engine of the jeep but left the radio blaring rock from a Big Island station. Walking away from the car—at just the point where the trade winds began to drown out the electric guitar—I felt suddenly and deliriously alone.

Like many city dwellers, I fantasize about being stranded on a Pacific island. I read Robinson Crusoe as a kid and saw Cast Away the day it opened, but I’d never experienced the exquisite ache of loneliness that a shipwreck survivor might feel until that moment, standing at the northern edge of Lanai and looking out at the darkening ocean. Of course, this was an illusion. When I turned around, my jeep was there, with the Stone Temple Pilots singing an anthem to modern-day alienation. But all was not lost: I was still on Lanai.

Shaped like a teardrop, 18 miles long, and only 13 miles across at its widest point, Lanai has retained a sense of splendid seclusion. No theme-park resorts here. In fact, since the island was once used for growing pineapples and cattle ranching—and 98 percent of it is owned by a single real estate holding—development has been kept to a minimum. Lanai City, with a population of just 3,000, is tightly contained in less than four square miles and still looks like the 1920s pineapple-plantation village it used to be. About half of the island’s coast is sheer cliff against ocean, and most of the land is arid—red dirt and low grass. There are less than three dozen miles of paved road, not a single mile of which runs along the coastline; nearly all shore access is by jeep trail, hiking, or rappelling. From almost any place on the island, I had to walk only 15 minutes and I could be deep in my thousands-of-miles-from-civilization reverie.

The illusion of utter isolation is a delicacy, but like ordering blowfish at a sushi bar, it’s one you want carefully served with the poison excised. Which is to say that the thrill of feeling stranded can sometimes lead to restlessness if you don’t have an ultra-luxe hotel to head back to at the end of the day.

Fortunately, Lanai has two such retreats. The low, Mediterranean-style buildings of the Manele Bay Hotel are terraced into a hillside next to the island’s nicest strand, Hulopoe Beach. The most decadent suites—outfitted with four-poster beds—come with butler service, so I wasn’t surprised to learn that, back in the early nineties, Bill Gates had rented the entire place for his wedding. Ten miles away, close to town, the Lodge at Koele, with its old-world hunting-estate decor, is an oddity in Hawaii. Because it’s situated at 1,700 feet in the island’s center, breezes are often cool enough to warrant use of the lobby’s wood-burning fireplace. Both resorts have golf courses that are so well manicured and cleverly designed, with ocean backdrops and island greens, that they look like the virtual landscapes in a golf video game.

What I like best about Lanai is that it manages a perfect balance between what there is to do and what there isn’t. Sure, you can hook up with scuba and fishing charters, sample world-class snorkeling off Shipwreck Beach (so named because a World War II Liberty Ship rusts on the reef), sea-kayak with pods of spinner dolphins in Kaunolu Bay, mountain-bike down the Munro Trail, and ride horses above Maunalei Gulch. But karaoke nightclubs and beachfront bacchanalias? If you use party as a verb, this is not your island.

In the end, your choices come down to a happily manageable handful: Should I play croquet or visit the sporting-clay facility to blow some plates out of the sky? Should I take a jeep down that dirt road or rent a mountain bike and go exploring? Should I get the alii banana-and-coconut scrub or the ki pola hoolu ti leaf wrap?

Still want more? Take your day planner and head for Maui.

Access & Resources
Hole Up: The 249-room, Mediterranean-style Manele Bay Hotel is the only resort on the water. Its spacious rooms open onto garden courtyards or overlook Hulopoe Beach, the island’s best. Doubles from $400; 800-450-3704, » If you’re into fetishizing the lifestyle of English lords and ladies, the 102-room Lodge at Koele, just north of Lanai City, is perfection. The largest wooden structure in the islands, it’s modeled after old English hunting lodges, with a full croquet course and pros to teach you the game. Doubles from $400; 800-450-3704, » The oldest and most low-key of the island’s accommodations is the 11-room Hotel Lanai, on the edge of Lanai City. Built by pineapple king James Dole in 1923 to house his execs, the plantation-style rooms have a warm charm. Doubles from $105; 877-665-2624,

Dine: The Blue Ginger Café; is a casual local favorite just across the street from Dole Park, in the center of Lanai City. Eat there two days in a row and you’re likely to see the same friendly faces. 808-565-6363 » Henry Clay’s Rotisserie, in the Hotel Lanai, serves hearty New Orleans fare at moderate prices. The small bar here is one of the few places where locals and visitors mingle. 877-665-2624

Get Out: Trilogy Ocean Sports Lanai is the catchall guiding service on the island. It leads catamaran-supported scuba dives to the walls and reefs below Lanai’s rocky shores, rents jeeps to explore the island’s mostly dirt roads, and arranges guided four-wheel-drive expeditions if you don’t want to go it alone. Prices vary; 888-628-4800, » Thanks to the cliffs that cover nearly half of Lanai’s 47-mile coastline, access to many beaches requires a hike or four-wheel drive. There is one notable exception: Hulopoe Beach, at the south end of Route 440, is not only car-accessible; it’s continually rated as one of the most beautiful beaches in the world. On the west end of the beach, the Manele Bay Hotel keeps a stash of snorkel equipment in a kiosk for its guests. » Blast a couple of clay pigeons at the Lodge at Koele’s sport-shooting facility. $150 for 100 rounds; 808-559-4600,

Shop: The Heart of Lanai art gallery sells island paintings by local artists and custom-made ukuleles. 888-565-7815

Real Aloha

Your ticket to the land of big cliffs and big hearts

MOLOKAI IS THE WILDEST and most mysterious of the Hawaiian Islands—sparsely settled, sporadically visited, fiercely independent, and protected by the world’s highest sea cliffs. There are no stoplights here; in fact, with Big Pineapple long gone and Big Condo not quite arrived, there are hardly any lights at all. Viewed at night from nearby Maui, Molokai looms like a wary hulk guarding a secret. And it is—Molokai is the Hawaii that used to be.

Molokai’s only real town, Kaunakakai, is three blocks long. The shops’ floorboards creak with age, but the place has a funky charm—it’s where the Joads would have washed up if they’d put in to the Pacific and had better luck. My first night “downtown,” locals were gathered in front of the library, talking in pidgin and English and cheering wildly when guitarist Zack Helm and his daughter, Raiatea, lit up the night with traditional Hawaiian songs. I was the odd white face in a sea of Filipino, Japanese, and Polynesian blood, but people greeted me with smiles and nods.

Molokai is called the Friendly Isle, but that’s overly simplistic. Perhaps it’s more accurate to call it the most Hawaiian of the major islands—almost half its 7,000 inhabitants are natives, and the island is known for the virtue of ohana, or family. “If you want to make a lot of money, go to Oahu,” a Molokai resident named Joe Kalipi told me. “Here, you judge a man by his aloha spirit. You judge him by his heart.”

Wander into a homey little roadside cookhouse, lured by visions of guava-sauce ribs and a cold beer, only to discover that it doesn’t have an alcohol license? Not to worry. The waiter will likely offer you the last frosty Bud from his personal stash. And because there are far fewer people to crowd the beaches of Molokai, you won’t find any of the competitive surf vibes of the other islands. The day I boogie-boarded off Kepuhi Beach, a popular swimming and surfing spot on the west side, three young locals paddled over to warn me away from hidden rocks and suggested I’d get better rides if I moved up on my board.

All this packed into an island 38 miles long and ten wide. Though it’s the second smallest of the major Hawaiian islands, Molokai’s sheer wildness and diversity is unparalleled. The rainforest atop its steep northern shore receives nearly 160 inches of precipitation annually. Laau Point, a few miles west, gets fewer than ten inches. Try making that transition on a mountain bike: Start atop a 2,000-foot cliff that drops straight into the Pacific and finish by hurtling to the sea along red-desert singletrack so thrilling it explains why Molokai is called Mini-Moab.

For an offshore perspective, sea-kayak the south coast, which is protected by the state’s longest barrier reef, stretching almost the entire length of the island’s southern side. Stuff a picnic lunch and snorkeling gear into your pack and find a perfect white-sand beach, like three-mile Papohaku (the state’s longest), to call your own.

After all, you’ve come to Molokai to be alone. Up in the high country there are at least a dozen forested hiking trails you’ll almost surely have to yourself. (Beware, however, that some cross private property and can’t be accessed without a local guide.) All are dramatic, but my favorite is the cliff-face descent via 26 posted switchbacks into the leper colony at Kalaupapa, on the island’s north shore, a setting so spectacular—with a story of such tragedy and courage—that it inspired the likes of Robert Louis Stevenson and Jack London.

Spectacular, isolated, ignored, unique: This is Molokai. The island’s residents prefer it that way. They might mumble something about too many visitors, but the next thing you know, they’re inviting you home for dinner, giving you their last beer, or helping you catch a wave. Now that’s a friendly isle.

Access & Resources
Hole Up: Relaxed but lively, the Polynesian-style Hotel Molokai has 47 thatch-roofed rooms and an ocean-view restaurant and bar that attracts visitors and locals alike. Doubles from $90; 800-535-0085, » The Lodge at Molokai Ranch—the island’s only resort—is a gorgeous plantation-style estate with 22 rooms on 65,000 acres on the western third of the island. Doubles from $280; 888-627-8082,

Dine: Molokai isn’t known for haute cuisine, but you can eat cheaply and well; ribs and fresh fish are the island specialties. Good bets are Kualapuu Cookhouse (808-567-9655) and the Molokai Pizza Café; (808-553-3288), in Kaunakakai. » Stanley’s Coffee Shop, on Puali Street, in Kaunakakai, has Internet access and espresso. 808-553-9966 » The Neighborhood Store and Counter, on the Kamehameha Highway, will sell you a Japanese-style box lunch for a day trip to the remote eastern beaches. 808-558-8498

Get Out: Hook up with Damien Tours for the 3.1-mile trek down the treacherously steep Pali Trail to the Kalaupapa leper colony, a national historic site that’s still home to 35 people. At the bottom, board the bus driven by Richard Marks—a wry resident and a fierce advocate for the victims of the widely misunderstood disease. $40; 808-567-6171 » Mountain-bike with Activities Maunaloa on the world-class singletrack at the Lodge at Molokai Ranch. Head guide and native son Kawika Puaa leads half-day rides through the wildly varied terrain, from muddy rainforest to hardpack desert. $45; 808-552-0184 » For fishing, scuba diving, and one of the few available tours of the spectacular north shore (accessible only by boat), Walter Naki, of Molokai Action ���ϳԹ���s, is your man. $100; 808-558-8184

Shop: The Plantation Gallery, on Maunaloa’s main drag, has the best beads and trinkets on Molokai—and maybe in the whole state. Check out its sister shop, the Big Wind Kite Factory, next door. 808-552-2364, ,

Blue Diamond

North Shore surf plus Honolulu nightlife—proof that you can have it all

I GET IRRITATED WHEN PEOPLE disrespect Oahu—letting you know, smugly, that when they travel to Hawaii, all they do in Honolulu is catch a flight to one of the “other islands.” The rap is that Oahu is too urban, too touristy, too whatever. The great abomination is supposedly Waikiki, the 1.5-mile-long resort-and-beach strip just east of downtown Honolulu whose loud garishness represents everything modern island travelers think they ought to avoid.

These gripes miss a larger truth: Oahu’s many parts, both kitschy and genuine, come together to form a wonderful whole. There’s more than enough nature, outdoor sports, beaches, mountains, and solitude to please anyone, and Oahu’s urban life is a strength, not a weakness. Honolulu and Waikiki are a blast, home to classic luxury hotels (my wife, Susan, and I stayed at the fabulous Royal Hawaiian, called “the pink palace of the Pacific” for its Pepto-Bismol–colored stucco coat), rich history, beautiful public spaces, cool bars, and friendly people. Waikiki’s beachfront nightlife connects you to a magical past, when honeymooners wiggled toes in its sands and Hawaii Calls—a globally syndicated radio program broadcast from the Banyan Courtyard, at the Moana Hotel—sent out a musical aloha every Saturday night.

Today, Honolulu and Waikiki hum with Pacific Rim energy, and you can have plenty of fun just sunning, bodysurfing, strolling, shopping, and watching the limo-powered migrations of Japanese wedding parties. I especially liked the Ala Moana Center—a mall with an entire store devoted to ukuleles—and the huge, thrice-weekly flea market at Aloha Stadium. I bought used flippers; Susan picked up a few bushels of inexpensive jewelry and the first in her now alarmingly large collection of carved tikis. These weren’t mass-produced junk, either, but grimacing, two-foot-tall mini-masterpieces chipped out of monkey pod wood by local craftsmen.

Honolulu residents characterize a trip to the North Shore—where we spent several days at the spiff Turtle Bay Resort, an oceanfront golf-and-luxury spread near the island’s northernmost point—as going to the country. But you can get there in 45 minutes from downtown, so it’s more like going from San Francisco to Stinson Beach. We soon realized we could build busy days around my doing outdoor stuff in the morning, Susan going on urban adventures in the afternoon, and us doing something romantic together at night.

On a typical morning, I would surf (Turtle Bay’s resident pro, Hans Hedemann, taught me the basics), snorkel, or sea-kayak (in Kailua, you can paddle to a pair of offshore islands). Then I’d pick Susan up at lunchtime and we’d floor it to the nearest coconut stand. We’d either explore the North Shore—home to legendary beaches and surf spots like Waimea Bay and Pipeline, as well as Haleiwa, the main town for local hipsters—or we’d head back to the city, usually via the more scenic route on the island’s eastern shore. After a drink with a new pal like Lloyd Kandell—cofounder of Don Tiki, an Oahu-based band that specializes in the “exotica” sounds made popular in the fifties—we’d zoom north and stake out a hot tub at the resort. Our favorite offered a tiki-torch-framed view of Turtle Bay with a surf-powered blowhole going off in the foreground. The full moon came at no extra charge.

The last thing I did in Oahu wasn’t my usual scene: I signed up for a day of sportfishing out of Honolulu’s Kewalo Basin on a boat that, in its time, had landed a 939-pound blue marlin. This wasn’t one of those times, and by 9 a.m. I intuited that the adventure would be defined by eight hours of smelling diesel exhaust and watching hooks drag through the water without result.

Luckily, this was Oahu, so one of the other clients was my kind of boat mate: a spirited, chain-smoking divorcé;e from Los Angeles who made it clear with her friendly chatter that she was determined to have fun. Before long she noticed me sitting in the fighting chair looking glum.

“Were you wanting a beer or anything?” she offered.

I checked the time: 9:30. Yes.

“Kinda. But I didn’t bring any, so—”

“Hey, man,” she rasped, “I brought two six-packs and a bottle of Mr. Boston rum. And I’m not planning on taking any of it back.”

I saw her differently then. She was a sweet goddess, offering the rarest of island nectars. What could I say but mahalo?

Access & Resources
Hole Up: The 387-room Marriott Ihilani Resort and Spa, at Ko Olina, in Kapolei, dominates a cliff-backed spit of sand on Oahu’s west coast. In a full day here, you can snorkel the private lagoon, play 18 holes of golf, and still have time for a spa treatment. Doubles from $370; 808-679-0079, » With five miles of prime North Shore beach, 443 rooms, and two 18-hole golf courses, Turtle Bay Resort offers luxury on a grand scale. Snorkel the bay or take surf lessons with Hans Hedemann, then hit 21 Degrees North for martinis. Doubles from $400; 808-447-6508, » If you yearn for the quiet comforts of life on a Hawaiian beach, try one of the B&Bs available across the island—including the hotel-free eastern side—through Affordable Paradise. Studios from $55; 808-261-1693,

Dine: Chai’s Island Bistro, in downtown Honolulu, has upscale seafood, perfectly mixed cocktails, and a crack waitstaff in an unpretentious environment. 808-585-0011, » North Shore locals swear by Giovanni’s shrimp truck, with its $11 garlic-laden scampis. It’s always parked on the Kamehameha Highway in Kahuku. 808-293-1839 » For the Waikiki experience, try the Mai Tai Bar, at the Royal Hawaiian. Tiki torches, Hawaiian music, and hula dancers complete the vibe. 808-923-7311,

Get Out: Even novice sea kayakers will enjoy the reef-protected islands near Kailua Beach Park. Guide Steve Haumschild, of Kailua Sailboards & Kayaks, will lead you to some good snorkeling and teach you how to boat-surf waves along the way. From $39; 808-262-2555 » Wild Side Specialty Tours provides uncrowded (no more than 16 guests) dolphin- and whale-watching and swimming tours from a 42-foot catamaran off the west coast. From $95; 808-306-7273, » Wake up early and hike a mile and three-quarters to the top of 760-foot Diamond Head volcanic crater for the best view of sunrise over Honolulu and Waikiki. » At Mokuleia’s Dillingham Airfield, Honolulu Soaring offers 15-minute to hourlong rides in an aerobatic glider. You can’t beat the cockpit view, riding updrafts above the North Shore surf. $129–$228; 808-677-3404, » Or try a tandem jump with Skydive Hawaii. $225; 808-637-9700,

Shop: Seek out the talented (and hilariously grumpy) Tongan tiki carver Kini at the International Marketplace on Kalakaua Ave, Waikiki’s main drag. 808-971-2080,

A-List Island

Surfing superstars, media magnates, Hollywood glitterati—and you

Maui

Maui’s bright side

Maui

Just press play: La Perouse Bay, Makena; opposite, Hotel Hana-Maui’s sea-ranch suites

SO HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO FEEL when the valet at the Hotel Hana-Maui (which must be the most understatedly elegant, eco-positive hotel on earth, in a genuine rural paradise) smiles and says, “You know, the surf’s so uncrowded around here that I’m usually trying to find people to go with me”? Especially when the guy’s eyes light up as he describes jet-ski trips to breaks so remote that you don’t see a single building, road, or human all day? Or when he freely gives me directions to a nearby beach break and those directions take me past the sleepy old Hasegawa General Store and out toward a barbecue stand with a hand-drawn sign reading LOCAL KIND GRIND?

And sure, I know that Carol Burnett, Jim Nabors, and George Harrison used to live out here in Hana, the easternmost point of the island, and that Kris Kristofferson still does. And I know that the town’s aflutter over Oprah’s recent purchase of more than a hundred acres of undeveloped Hana coast. But somehow the celebrity density only heightens my astonishment that on Maui, of all places, with its Gold Coast resorts and almost hourly jumbo jets, I can drift down a one-lane country road, past white egrets loitering in overgrown pastures among grazing Holsteins, and into a dazed state of tropical rapture.

I awoke yesterday morning in the baroque splendor of the Fairmont Kea Lani—65 miles away on the south shore, among Fantasy Island villas and talk of the Maui film festival and how it had drawn Adrien Brody and Greg Kinnear and Angela Bassett. Then I was whisked by helicopter along the slopes of 10,023-foot Haleakala to watch a 2,000-foot waterfall gush only yards beyond the windshield. I hiked 15 miles and 5,000 feet up into the famed Kaupo Gap, from prickly pear desert through sodden forest and alpine tundra beyond, then into the volcanic moonscape of the giant upper crater, an unearthly world of red ash and cinder cones, bizarre silversword plants, and solidified rivers of black magma.

Cresting a high ridge, I looked down the long, sweeping slopes to funky Paia town, where I’d dawn-patrolled clean-point surf the day before and watched gorgeous, half-naked fitness fanatics drink wheatgrass juice outside Mana Foods, chatting about their late-morning wave sail at windsurfing’s sweetest spot on earth, Hookipa. And those alpha dogs I saw at Anthony’s Coffee Shop? That was Laird Hamilton himself, with his pal Dave Kalama, who together had pioneered tow-in big-wave surfing on the 50-footers right down the road at Jaws—and who were among the first to launch kiteboarding as a sport, at the nearby strand known today as Kite Beach.

And now, not 24 hours later, I’m killing the engine at a red-sand beach with only three surfers in the warm water—two tanned adolescent boys and a teenage girl in a red bikini. Island kids, done with school for the day and frolicking in the world as they know it. There are finer pleasures to come—the full-body spirulina-and-kava spa treatment I’ve scheduled at the hotel and the nine-course tasting menu with wine pairings—but it’s right now, wading out for a sunset surf, that I realize why Maui is the only Hawaiian island named for a demigod. And not just any god, either: Maui was the greatest trickster in Polynesian culture, a sort of South Pacific Paul Bunyan/Odysseus hybrid who fished the Hawaiian islands up from the ocean floor, lifted the sky so people could walk upright, and lengthened the day by climbing to the top of Haleakala and lassoing the sun god.

There’s a genuine delight in this island and in the fact that—among all the high-dollar tourism and great yoga studios and world-famous surfing and movie-star real estate—there exists the paradoxical sense that you’ve finally found the place you’ve always dreamed about, the one beyond the end of the road, where you can leave it all behind and just stay.

Access & Resources
Hole Up: Set amid a 23,000-acre working pineapple plantation on Maui’s northwest shore is the 548-room Ritz-Carlton Kapalua, on white-sand D.T. Fleming Beach, near Honolua Bay, one of the world’s best right-hand surf breaks. Doubles from $365; 800-241-3333, » The Fairmont Kea Lani, on the sunny south side of the island, offers big-resort glam (suites are at least 840 square feet), exceptionally calm water, and a secluded beach. Doubles from $465; 800-257-7544, » Hotel Hana-Maui—47 cottages and 22 bungalow rooms overlooking the ocean—is the only hotel on the remote east coast. Doubles from $395; 800-321-4262,

Dine: The Paia Fish Market restaurant, in the heart of Paia, has your postworkout grilled mahi-mahi, fresh from the sea—just like you. 808-579-8030 » On the western edge of Lahaina and right on the water, Mala offers fresh and organic tapas—like mahi-mahi chermoula and crunchy calamari with aioli. 808-667-9394

Get Out: Latatudes and Attitudes does an all-day heli-hike, starting with whirlybird sightseeing over Haleakala and ending with a 15-mile catered hike from Kaupo Gap through the volcano’s crater (from $2,500). They also offer a four-hour guided waterfall hike in the West Maui Mountains ($75). 877-661-7720, » Visit Hana’s secluded Koki Beach for surfing and relaxing. » Sample Maui’s unrivaled watersports by ogling windsurfers at Hookipa, just beyond Kahalui’s airport, and tow-in surfers riding the monster waves at Jaws, 15 minutes east of Paia (turn left after the cemetery). Or learn to surf with the Nancy Emerson School of Surfing at the beginner-friendly Breakwall in Lahaina. $75 for two hours; 808-244-7873, » The road to Hana—600 curves and 54 one-lane bridges on about 30 miles of cliff- and jungle-edged road—is so unpopulated, you’ll find it hard to believe it’s on glitzy, golfer-inundated Maui. Gas up and take the long way back, along Haleakala’s leeward slope.

Shop: Drop by Hana’s Hasegawa General Store, for a Coke in a glass bottle—and trip out on a bygone world. 808-248-8231

The post Hawaii O-Five appeared first on ���ϳԹ��� Online.

The last time I visited Anza-Borrego—a forbidding wilderness extending from the Salton Sea west to the Laguna Mountains and from the Mexican border north to Riverside County—a friend and I mountain-biked up to the Carrizo Badlands Overlook for views of a 100,000-acre expanse of alkali desert and small ranges, where sunsets turn the jagged little mountains flame-red. Another favorite jaunt of mine is hiking two days through Coyote Canyon, with its riparian woodlands of willow, California fan palms, mesquite, and acacia, and spring-fed Coyote Creek.
SLEEP: Borrego Valley Inn has the two essential ingredients of a desert hideaway: seclusion and privacy. The 15-room inn, with two pools, is on ten acres in the town of Borrego Springs. The saltillo-tiled, earth-toned rooms all have private patios and are situated around a large courtyard with a garden and a finch-filled aviary. (Doubles, $120–$220 per night, breakfast included; 800-333-5810, )
PLAY: Get hiking maps at Anza-Borrego’s visitor center, a half-mile from the inn. Smoketree Arabian Ranch (760-767-5850, ), across the street from the inn, leads horseback day tours to the park ($200 per person).
EAT: Badlands Café and Market (760-767-4058), in Borrego Springs, makes great picnic lunches. Catch a grizzled desert rat crooning “Summer Wind” on karaoke night at Carlee’s Place (760-767-3262).

Arizona: Saguaro National Park

This two-part park to the east and west of Tucson is made for winter hiking. Head to the 66,621-acre Rincon Mountain District, in Saguaro National Park’s eastern section—15 miles east of the city—for more than 120 miles of trails threading pines, at higher elevations, and saguaros, on the desert floor.

The graceful saguaro is one of the world’s largest and slowest-growing cactuses, reaching up to 50 feet over the course of two centuries. Hiking among them is the quintessential desert experience—especially at dusk, when the giants are silhouetted against purple twilight.
SLEEP: Rancho de la Osa Guest Ranch, an elegant cross between a spa and a dude ranch, is set on 600 acres just north of the Mexican border near Sasabe, an hour southwest of the park. The 19 guest rooms, laid out in single-story adobe wings, are decorated with Mexican antiques. Take one of the ranch’s 50 horses on a trail ride, then visit the new fitness center and spa for treatments like Swedish or hot-stone massage. (Doubles, $360–$450, including meals and riding; 800-872-6240, )
PLAY: Sky Island Treks (520-622-6966, ) leads day hikes, or if you’re on your own, stop at the park’s visitor center.
EAT: The dinner show at Saguaro Corners (520-886-5424, ), a steakhouse across from the park entrance: javelinas, coyotes, or deer—seen through floor-to-ceiling windows—munching their supper as you eat yours.

New Mexico: White Sands National Monument

When perched atop a dune at White Sands National Monument, your first impression is that you’re standing in the world’s biggest sandbox. Your second impression—if you’re like me—is that you must run, roll, and dive among the dunes until you fall down, exhausted and sand-encrusted.

White gypsum sand, constantly rearranged by strong westerly winds, covers nearly 275 square miles. The best hike is the 4.6-mile trail to Alkali Flat. Camp anywhere off the trail, but leave some bread crumbs: It’s frighteningly easy to get lost.
SLEEP: Sierra Grande Lodge and Spa is in downtown Truth or Consequences—the only U.S. town named after a game show—a one-and-a-half-hour drive northwest of White Sands. Serge Raoul (famous for his SoHo bistro, Raoul’s) and his brother spent three years restoring the place. The 16 rooms have hardwood floors and handcrafted furniture, and an open-air tub pipes water in from the town’s hot springs. The spa menu includes salt scrubs and massages, which run $60 to $100. (Doubles, $95–$125; 505-894-6976, )
PLAY: Buy a plastic saucer ($9.75) at White Sands Concessions, behind the visitor center, and sled the dunes like a grammar-schooler on a snow day.
EAT: Sierra Grande’s restaurant features many of the signature dishes from Raoul’s, in New York, including steak au poivre.

Texas: Big Bend National Park

The most popular Big Bend attraction is floating the Rio Grande through some of the country’s most remote canyons, in the immense Chihuahuan Desert. Santa Elena Canyon, with its 1,500-foot limestone cliffs and Class III–IV rapids, is the most impressive and most frequently rafted, but some of the more isolated lower canyons are well worth seven- to ten-day trips.
SLEEP: Cibolo Creek Ranch began as three forts that cattleman Milton Faver built in 1857 to guard against Apache and Comanche attacks. Lodging is divided up among the forts, spread out on 32,000 acres: 22 rooms at El Cibolo, ten rooms at La Cienega, and a romantic cottage at La Morita. The guest rooms replicate 1880s style, with saltillo floors, cottonwood beams, and Mexican antiques. You’ll enjoy the overwhelming fantasy—especially when guides take you on a cattle drive—that you’re a very wealthy Texas rancher. (Doubles, $450, including meals; 432-229-3737, )�� PLAY: Rio Grande ���ϳԹ���s (800-343-1640, ) and Big Bend River Tours (800-545-4240, ) offer rafting trips in the park from about $125 per person for one day to $1,400–$1,500 for ten days.
EAT: Drive 90 minutes north from the park to Marfa, a burgeoning art community and West Texas cow town, for a margarita at Hotel Paisano’s 1930s-era bar (432-729-3669, ).

The post Four More Desert Playgrounds appeared first on ���ϳԹ��� Online.

TWELVE YEARS ago, I set out to write a book. Because I’m as easily distracted as a cat on a tuna boat, I needed a remote location, one so uninteresting and empty that I would be glued to my project. Fortuitously, I was offered a winter house-sit in Palm Springs. Perfect. What could be less distracting than the brown, lifeless monotony of this stretch of the northern Sonoran?

Hacienta de los Santos

Welcome refuge at Hacienta de los Santos, in Alamos, Mexico.

Hacienda de los Santos

Hacienda de los Santos

After two weeks of extreme productivity, I felt a bit itchy, so I hiked a canyon at the south end of town. That hourlong leg stretch turned into a five-hour exploration. Then I returned for a full day’s hike, and within a week I was doing overnights in 600,000-acre Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, some 44 miles south of Palm Springs. At first my interest was ecological: How did the giant Washingtonia palms survive the disappearance of the lakes and streams? Were the springs, creeks, and wildflowers anomalies? How did the deer and bighorn sheep thrive? How did anything thrive?

My interest turned into fascination as I explored the badlands, oases, and riparian canyons of Anza-Borrego, the largest desert state park in the United States. I learned to see beyond the monochrome. If you stop to look closely, the desert reveals a surprising diversity of animal life: Owls nest in hollow cactuses, coyotes and large lizards called chuckwallas roam, and all sorts of birds—from ravens and hawks to roadrunners and quail—emerge.

In the early morning and early evening, I stood on small promontories and watched as the light painted distant flatlands and mountains shades of red and gold. I discovered the desert night in a natural stone amphitheater several miles up Palm Springs’ Tahquitz Canyon, where I had the sensation that I was pressed against a sky crowded with stars. Everything about the desert was a revelation, even the way it smelled. When a brief shower sprinkled the land, each plant jumped to life. The sage and mesquite—and even the earth itself—released intense perfumes. I realized that survival in such extreme conditions gave everything a special quality, an intense beauty.

Not surprisingly, I fell in love, and a couple of years later I moved to the high desert of northern New Mexico. I’ve explored the great deserts of Mexico, California, Arizona, Nevada, Texas, and my own state, and I’ve uncovered a truth I would have scoffed at before: One desert ecosystem feels as different from another as, say, Maine does from Florida.

My latest sojourn bridged the Chihuahuan and Sonoran deserts in Mexico. I hiked in Copper Canyon—a 23,000-square-mile network of chasms so huge you could drop two Grand Canyons inside it. The three-day foray broke my big rule about desert hiking: Stick to winter and spring. Ignoring recommendations, I trekked in summer from the town of Guachochi, amid ponderosa pines at 7,000 feet, plunged through subtropics (ferns, palms, and military macaws) to the Chihuahuan Desert (blue-green agave, prickly pear, sotol cactuses, scrub oak, and manzanita) 3,000 feet below. After enduring 100-plus-degree heat at the bottom and a grueling, shadeless 4,000-foot ascent to the top of Sinforosa Canyon, I was more than ready for an oasis.

I FOUND ONE a day’s train ride away: the remote colonial town of Álamos, located on the southern edge of the Sonoran Desert and the northern edge of tropical deciduous forest. During the dry season, the region around the 320-year-old settlement looks like the desert; during the rainy season, it looks like the tropics. Álamos enjoyed immense mining wealth during the first two centuries of its existence, and its rich inhabitants built a cathedral and haciendas modeled after those in their native Andalusia. After drying up into a near ghost town during the Mexican Revolution, 90 years ago, Álamos has grown back to nearly 10,000 people, though it retains a small-town feel.

The past and present of Álamos blend seamlessly at seven-acre Hacienda de los Santos. The hotel is actually three Spanish colonial mansions—plus the town’s old sugar mill—which Americans Jim and Nancy Swickard connected with footbridges, tunnels, and brick passageways during a 15-year renovation.

The four pools, countless lounging areas, restaurant, and 75-seat theater, along with Zapata’s Cantina (508 varieties of tequila), all feel secluded. Credit that to some well-placed garden walls and shrubbery. The couple’s extensive Mexican folk-art collection—santos and retablos, Spanish colonial art, sombreros, and 150 pairs of antique spurs—adds to the magical ambience.

Quite wisely, the Swickards didn’t attempt to hack any standard-size hotel rooms out of the haciendas. Instead, they kept the room dimensions more or less intact. The Andalusians knew what to do in this intensely hot climate: The rooms have high ceilings, thick adobe walls, and huge windows that can be shuttered to pitch-black darkness. The idea is to open up the chambers to receive the cool air of the morning, then shutter them against the heat till evening.

There are elegant touches everywhere—from the brick domes that reflect the Andalusian builders’ Moorish influences to the small libraries in some guest rooms. On my first night, I pulled down a novel by mystery writer James Lee Burke. It was a signed first edition.

A telltale sign that you’ve arrived at a true oasis is when the employees gently but firmly take charge of you. The first day—as I hobbled about on hike-blistered feet and aching thighs, falling into one cool pool after another—a young, straight-backed hotel worker with a thin mustache approached me.

“You missed breakfast. Why?” he asked a bit imperiously.

“Well, uh, I’m still a bit sore.”

“Aha!” He steered me toward an ivy-covered wall behind a fountain, then turned into an almost hidden passage to a courtyard with a triangular pool, surrounded by a patio and several rooms. It was the spa. A young woman came out and, without much preamble, announced that she would begin preparing the hot stones for my Sonoran stone massage. Until she was ready, I should climb into the pool and relax.

I didn’t need to be told twice.

As I floated beneath the scorching Sonoran sun, blissful in my oasis within an oasis within an oasis, I wondered if I would ever get around to writing that damn book.

Access & Resources

SLEEP:: The 25 rooms at Hacienda de los Santos Resort & Spa (011-52-647-428-0222, ) range from simple doubles to suites with private patios ($225–$850 per night, with breakfast). The spa offers facials and massages, including Sonoran stone massage ($35–$65).

PLAY:: Conexion a la Aventura (011-52-614-413-7800, ) guides treks, rock climbing, and river rafting in Copper Canyon, as well as sandboarding (like snowboarding) on the huge dunes south of Juárez. Solipaso Excursions (011-52-647-42-80-466, ), in Álamos, runs birdwatching and hiking trips.

EAT:: Hacienda de los Santos and Casa de los Tesoros—housed in an old convent—are excellent upscale dining options in Álamos.

The post The Secrets Life of Deserts appeared first on ���ϳԹ��� Online.

There's only one real rule to remember when skiing down the face of an active volcano in Nicaragua: Don't fall.

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Flippers away: Reef-bound off Little Corn Island, in the Caribbean east of mainland Nicaragua

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With a couple of feet of snow, it'd be four turns down the 40-degree slope near the summit of Volcán Cerro Negro, a 2,215-foot smoldering mound that last erupted in 1999. On lava rocks, well, that's another story. Outfitter Pierre Gedeon, who lured me here, has would-be schussers sign a release in case the volcano blows them into space, but I was more leery of sharp little black rocks standing in for powder.

I launched from the top, soon picking up speed, and that's when I violated the rule. Because rock resists in a way snow doesn't, the proper turning technique involves planting and jumping. Instead, I tried to slide, caught my edges, and skidded down the volcano on my arms and chest. When I stopped, my forearms resembled carpaccio. I didn't need to look at my chest; the dozen red matchstick points on my shirt told that story.

Once I started turning correctly, though, the run was a blast. Gedeon, 37, a Frenchman who grew up skiing at Chamonix and carved his first turns on Cerro Negro in August 2001, did the last stretch in a straight line, lying back on his tails. Halfway down, I paused to look around. I could see four active volcanoes of the Cordillera Los Maribios stretching to the north, whitecaps on the ocean 20 miles west, and intensely green countryside rolling south to the horizon. Central America's largest country—49,579 square miles—has heaping helpings of what its neighbors offer: Caribbean islands to rival those in Honduras, cloudforests and fauna to equal Costa Rica's, impressively preserved Spanish colonial cities to match the ones in Guatemala, and enough secret surf spots along its 230-mile Pacific coast to put Panama to shame. It has 19 active volcanoes and dozens more that sit dormant. All this in a nation that hasn't felt the commercial scythe of Cancún-style development.

When we reached Cerro Negro's base, six armed men on horseback appeared. Twenty years ago, during the contra war, when U.S.-backed forces were fighting the leftist Sandinistas for control of the country, this might have been worrisome. Even today, many Americans think of Nicaragua as a war-torn nation. But political and criminal violence is rare now, after more than a decade of peace and with a stable government in place. And if the tourist infrastructure remains thin, it just means that visitors spend more time getting to know real Nicaraguans—and the expats who have gravitated to a country where their dollar goes further than anyplace between Mexico and Colombia.

The riders, it turned out, were deer hunters. We joked that we wanted to trade our skis for a horse. They laughed in a way that indulgent parents might, as if to say, “Yes, gringos are crazy. Some are dangerously crazy. But most, like these two carrying skis around a smoking volcano, are just harmless lunatics.”

During my two-week ramble last November—from the Cordillera Los Maribios to adventure base camps in colonial Granada and León, from San Juan del Sur on the Pacific to Little Corn Island in the Caribbean—I found the best things to do in Nicaragua. And not all of them are crazy.

Cycling and Skiing Among the Volcanoes

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A San Juan surfer

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Hotel Colonial Grenada

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Grenada's La Merced Church

CORDILLERA LOS MARIBIOS
Cycling and Skiing Among the Volcanoes

GEDEON TYPIFIES THE NEW CROP of outfitters that are setting up shop in Nicaragua. He migrated here from Costa Rica, where he had gone in 1996 hoping to carve a niche in ecotourism. “I was too late,” he says. “It was all developed.”

While visiting Nicaragua in late 1999, however, he found a fledgling tourism industry that had almost no sense of the country's adventure-sport potential. Gedeon relocated, launching conventional tours and spending his spare time scouting the Cordillera Los Maribios, a range that parallels the Pacific from the country's northwesternmost point down to the shores of Lago Xolotlan. After inaugurating Cerro Negro skiing, he worked out a mountain-bike route with help from a French expat volcanologist who has studied the Maribios for 30 years.

In 2002, Gedeon imported 30 French riders to participate in the first La Ruta des Volcáns, an eight-day jaunt that took them over six volcanoes on more than 100 miles of back roads and singletrack, with an optional ski run on Cerro Negro. They experienced everything from baking, barren lava fields to cool, tree-shrouded lanes that could have been plucked from the Tuscan countryside. At the end of each day, Gedeon took his weary mountain bikers to an overnight spot: a coffee plantation, a private beach, the capital city of Managua, or the colonial city of León, a former capital moved to its present site (20 miles west of Cerro Negro) in 1610 after the original was wiped out by a volcano.

After pedaling, skiing, or hiking on a day outing with Gedeon's Nicaragua ���ϳԹ���s—or replicating the whole La Ruta des Volcáns—the best way to rest tired muscles (and skinned elbows) is to take an outside table at El Sesteo, across from León's magnificent cathedral, constructed in 1747 and the largest in Central America. Order a Nica highball: a shot of 12-year-old Flor de Cana rum, a splash each of cola and soda water, and a squeeze of lime.

Gedeon and I ended our ski day there, and I asked him if a multi-day hike along the Ruta would be possible. He thought for a moment. “The problem is water, of course, but that could be cached. Yes, of course! It would be fantastic. That's the great thing about Nicaragua right now. It's all possible. You just have to imagine it.”
SEASON: July to August, November to April.
OUTFITTER: Managua-based Nicaragua ���ϳԹ���s (011-505-276-1125, ) leads custom mountain-biking, hiking, or skiing day trips. The eight-day La Ruta des Volcáns costs about $900, including lodging, food, and transportation. Gedeon supplies skis and boots for Cerro Negro; cyclists should bring their own supplies, including tools and tubes.
WHERE TO STAY: Hotel El Convento in León (doubles, $87, including breakfast; 011-505-311-7053, ) is a beautifully restored 300-year-old convent with gardens, colonial antiques, and monastic rooms.
WHERE TO EAT: León's best eatery is Taquezal, across from the theater, serving typical Nica dishes such as the strange-sounding but delicious cabbage-and-pork salad.
��

Wet ���ϳԹ���s with a Colonial Twist

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A canopy tour outside the city

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Colonial pleasures: Hotel Colonial Grenada's pool, the city's sweetest

GRANADA
Wet ���ϳԹ���s with a Colonial Twist

LED BY ANDY SNINSKY, a 55-year-old former California whitewater guide who works for the outfitter Mombotour, I kayaked past jungle through narrow channels in the Isletas de Granada, dozens of isles that range in size from a half-submerged boulder to an acre-plus. According to popular theory, rocks from the cone of Volcán Mombacho, which blew in the 1300s, formed the chain in Lago Cocibolca, also known as Lago Nicaragua. Sninsky shared this theory along with an impressive knowledge of birds (in two hours he spotted 40 species) and Granada nightclubs. He also freely dispensed good gossip about the ricos (rich people) who own some of the islands. That's what I call guiding.

Granada is among the oldest continuously inhabited colonial cities in the Western Hemisphere, founded in 1523. Another former capital of Nicaragua (Managua now claims that designation), Granada is the nexus for adventure tourism in much the same way Cuzco is in Peru. Within an hour of this southwestern city, you can kayak or fish for giant rainbow bass on Cocibolca, Central America's largest lake; take a canopy tour in the cloudforest of Volcán Mombacho; or hike the Puma Trail around Mombacho or the rim of the frighteningly active Volcán Masaya.

The best part of these pursuits is knowing that each night you'll return to a vibrant, architecturally rich city. You'll find a perfect perch overlooking Granada's plaza, such as the veranda of the Hotel Alhambra, and watch the easy rhythm of a city whose heart hasn't changed much in 400 years.
SEASON: Year-round, though April and May are brutally hot.
OUTFITTER: Granada-based Mombotour (011-505-552-4548, mombotur@ibw.com.ni) leads day trips of kayaking, Puma Trail hiking, the canopy course, or horseback riding ($15–$35). Bring a waterproof jacket in the rainy season, June to November.
WHERE TO STAY: Gigantic rooms surround a beautiful courtyard at Posada Don Alfredo ($27 per person, $6–$8 for breakfast; 011-505-552-4455, alfredpaulbaganz@hotmail.com). The breakfast is the biggest and best I've ever had—after six courses, owner Don Alfredo asks if you're ready for pancakes. Next to the plaza is the gracious Hotel Colonial Granada (doubles, $65; 011-505-552-7581, ), a two-story Euro-colonial favorite whose secluded pool is the city's best.
WHERE TO EAT: El Zaquan, behind the cathedral, is the place to go, with excellent grilled meat and fish starting at $6 a plate. Ask for guaote, the rainbow bass.

Surfing Capital of Nicaragua

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Granada's Central Park

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Isleta de de Granada

SAN JUAN DEL SUR
Surfing Capital of Nicaragua

IT HAD BEEN A REALLY TOUGH DAY. Dale Dagger, an ex–Maui soul surfer who has been scoping out Central American breaks since 1972, was piloting his 25-foot canopied lancha, the Veronica, north from the southwestern village of San Juan del Sur along the Pacific coast. During ten years in San Juan, Dagger has scouted and named nine excellent breaks within 90 minutes of the village by boat. Unfortunately, this particular morning, he was uttering words that reduce a grown surfer to tears. “It's strange,” he said. “It was great a couple days ago.”

So November isn't prime time for surf. As Dagger pointed out such favorite spots as Cowadunga (named after the sizable gifts cattle leave on the beach), with three separate peaks and rights and lefts that are consistently head-high, I was feeling like a chained-up mutt at a T-bone packing plant. It got worse when we cruised past his 32-foot surfing flagship, Masayita, which had dropped off eight surfers from New Hampshire at a place he calls Beach Break. Not to crowd them, we anchored a couple hundred yards south and dove in to bodysurf their leftovers.

Afterward, we headed a mile south to Dagger's favorite village, Gigante, a collection of palapas and concrete. At La Gaviota, one of two restaurants, the owner brought us each a pound of garlicky lobster tails, as well as rice, beans, salad, and beer. We gorged.

“Surfing in Nicaragua is all about access,” Dagger said between tails. “There isn't any. The beaches are public, but the land in back of them is all private, so it's extremely difficult to get to the best breaks. That's why going by boat is the answer—and if one place isn't going off, you can move on to the next.”

Dagger makes a practice of keeping spots secret and uses his own monikers: Cowadunga, the Left, the Reef Break, the Other Reef Break. “I think the majority of surfers would prefer not having places named,” he said as we finished, while Blanca, our hostess, prepared two large cots for siesta. “Because they want to discover a place before the hordes get there. And the hordes haven't reached Nicaragua. Yet.”

Our siesta ended when Blanca blasted the volume of her telenovela. We waddled out to the water and did our best to bodysurf off lunch. At sunset, we caught up with the New Englanders, sprawled on the deck of the Masayita, almost too trashed from seven hours of surfing to lift a beer. Almost.
SEASON: March to October (when the southern swells hit)
OUTFITTER: An eight-day tour aboard Dagger's Masayita, with hotel lodging, airport transfers, and breakfast, lunch, and beer daily, costs $960 per person. Dagger (011-505-458-2429, ddagger@ibw.com.ni) rents boards; bring your own stick and wax.
WHERE TO STAY: Most surfers stay three blocks from the ocean in San Juan at the 17-room Hotel Villa Isabella (singles or doubles, $65 per night; suites, $75, with breakfast; 011-505-458-2568, villaisabella@aol.com). A pool was set to open in March.
WHERE TO EAT: Piedras y Olas in San Juan would be three-star dining anywhere; go at lunch and swim in the café-side pool. In Gigante, La Gaviota—a.k.a. the Lobster Lounge—sells a one-pound lobster tail with two beers and a siesta for $6.

Diving the Old Caribbean

nicaragua

A kayak tour

nicaragua

The countryside north of San Juan

LITTLE CORN ISLAND
Diving the Old Caribbean

WHEN I NOTICED THE STRANGE brown shapes rolling a few feet offshore, I was sitting outside the Dive Little Corn shop talking with its managers, Waz Meredith and Elle Schneider, about the scuba diving around this 1.2-square-mile jewel 50 miles due east of the mainland. Little Corn is the Caribbean of a half-century ago. Everything is simple, distilled so you can look around and know you're in paradise. Meredith, a big, friendly Aussie, described how he and Schneider, his soft-spoken Israeli wife, had scouted the reefs for the best dive spots when they arrived two years earlier—she drove the boat and towed him on a glorified piece of wood. “It works just like an airplane; lean on the edge to angle down into the water and—zoom!—down you go.”

With its incredible underwater wildlife, remote Little Corn Island (a 30-minute panga ride from Big Corn Island) has emerged as a diving hot spot. Undamaged reefs harbor giant groupers, eagle rays, nurse sharks, and sea turtles. The diving is relatively shallow, around 30 feet, so divers have a lot of bottom time to explore the reef passageways and get their minds blown by the sheer volume of fish.

Personally, the only fish I wanted to see were the ones hooked to the business end of my fly rod. Another Aussie had described huge schools of bonefish that come from the north and end up in a little lagoon below some cliffs on the windward side of the island. He said they circled around in such a mass that when you dropped your fly in, you weren't sure whether you'd hooked one or the crush of fish was simply taking it away. I was contemplating this when I saw the boil.

“Oh, that,” said Waz. “They're tarpon. Right in front of the hotel, just like clockwork.”

Excusing myself none too gracefully, I ran to grab my rod. I got a few clumsy casts in before they disappeared. Still, it was a hell of an exciting 15 minutes.

I retired to the balcony of a hotel nearby to see whether the tarpon would return. An island man—whose ancestry, like that of a good number of the 900 or so other Little Corn Islanders, is English and African by way of the Caymans—approached and asked if he and his uncle could help me net some tarpon the next day.

“But I warn you,” he said, “tarpon are no good to eat.”

“I wasn't planning on eating one. I was going to catch and release one.”

“Then why you want to bother that fish for?” he asked, genuinely puzzled as to why anyone would waste their energy and the fish's time in such a pointless pursuit.

It was a good question. An indication I was in paradise—or damn close to it.
SEASON: January to May, September and October
OUTFITTER: Dive Little Corn () offers two dives for $78, a four-day PADI course for $315, and a seven-day Dive Master course for $675, all with gear. Bring your own rod and tackle, plus flies for tarpon, bonefish, and yellowtail.
WHERE TO STAY: The 11 guest rooms at Casa Iguana () are situated in breezy pastel casitas and priced from $25 per night, for an efficiency with shared bath, to $85, for the secluded Grand Casita. Casa Iguana has its own beach and an outdoor rainwater shower.
WHERE TO EAT: It takes 30 minutes to hike from town to Farm Peace and Love (farmpeacelove@hotmail.com), Paola Carminiani's home and restaurant (take a guide), but her three-course meal of fresh seafood pastas, thin-crust pizza, and dessert ($10) is worth the schlepp. A reservation is required.

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Fly-fishing truism number 307: It’s getting crowded out there. If crossing lines with kooks and getting your favorite hole hammered by beer-swamped driftboats is not your favorite way to commune with nature, it’s probably time to pack your rods and head for the backcountry. Luckily, more and more companies are crafting lightweight, highly packable fishing gear and accessories. Here’s some of the best.

A. The ingenious RIVERTRAIL GEAR MOUNTAIN BIKE FLY ROD RACK mounts on your front fork, secured by the wheel’s quick-release lever. The rack keeps your equipment at your fingertips in case you spy a promising rise while on a ride. ($30; 866-758-9830, )

B. WILLIAM JOSEPH‘s 1,800-cubic-inch DRIFTER will comfortably tote your waders, rods, and other gear for a day of bushwhacking along a tucked-away creek. ($125; 801-978-2207, )

C. The SAGE 583-4 DS2 rod shines on short to medium casts with small flies—a typical scenario on backcountry brooks and alpine lakes. The four-section, five-weight rod breaks down into a nicely portable package. ($265; 800-533-3004, )

D. Machined from a single piece of aircraft-grade aluminum and with a rosewood handle, the ABEL TR-2 fly reel, weighing 4.3 ounces, boasts a fully enclosed internal click-drag system for greater control of line resistance. ($235; 866-511-7444, )

E. The OOBE OTTER HAT will shade your face and neck from blazing rays, and if the cinch cord doesn’t keep it where it belongs when that monster takes your fly, rest easy: It floats. ($40; 800-955-6623, )

F. Polarized lenses on ACTION OPTICS’ BOCA sunglasses cut the blinding glare that bounces off the water so you can see where your fly lands. The hydrophobic coating causes spray thrown up by your mighty catch to roll right off. ($215; 800-654-6428, )

G. Before fussing with your leader, temporarily park your rod on your chest with the Velcro utility tab on EX OFFICIO‘s new BAJA LITE LS shirt. ($79; 800-644-7303, www.exofficio.com)

H.You’ll stay dry under PATAGONIA‘s 17-ounce DEEP WADING JACKET, thanks to its durable, water-repellent ripstop nylon. Clip your net to the D-ring on the back. ($185; 800-638-6464, )

I. Fishing without your favorite vest might be as unthinkable as leaving behind your lucky hat, but the minimalist ORVIS MINI CHESTPACK offers all the features you need. A little larger than a hero sandwich, it carries a box of flies, a tippet spool, and a pair of pliers. ($29; 800-548-9548, )

J. At just two pounds three ounces (size large), the GORE-TEX LIGHTWEIGHT WADERS from SIMMS are the lightest on the market. With reinforced lamination on the front of the legs, 3mm neoprene booties, and a flip-out bib pocket, the only thing missing is the bulk. ($199; 866-585-3575, )

K. What, no felt? Don’t fret—you’ll still stick to slimy riverbeds when wearing the new SIMMS AQUASTEALTH boots. The soles are covered with a water-friendly version of Stealth, the crag-grabbing rubber made by climbing-shoe company Five Ten. ($149; 866-585-3575, )

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There’s a swoosh of heaven that runs from Hawaii through Mexico to Central America and the Caribbean. Don’t let it bask in the sun by itself. Our 43 sweet spots are waiting—surrender and go.
By James Glave
By Meg Lukens Noonan
By Kevin Moeller
By Jeff Hull
By Kent Black

Trailing Off on Kauai

It was our first morning in paradise. The deserted white beach at our tent flap stretched a quarter-mile out to the breakers. The backdrop was a sheer-walled green valley—some oo aa birds flitting over ancient taro terraces thick with wild guava trees, orchids, and vines. Off to our left, nubile twentysomethings splashed naked under a beachside waterfall. It was almost too much to take.
So why were the neighbors packing up already?
Most who make the grueling, full-day 11-mile trek to the Kalalau Valley, an isolated outpost at the far eastern end of Kauai’s spectacular Na Pali Coast, rest on the sand for at least a day. Many take time to explore the lush highlands and visit with the dozen-odd “full-timers” who, dodging Hawaii State Parks regulations, have formed a tropical microsociety straight out of a certain Leo DiCaprio box-office flop.
But these two hikers were acting like they were late for work. We’d met them the day before on the hike in; now they were hoofing it in toward Red Hill, a steep, sun-scorched 360-foot slope that you must descend into the valley, fully aware of the work it will take to climb back up it on the way home.
“Wait, didn’t you just get here?” I asked.
The boyfriend came over and lowered his voice. “Don’t you know how it works here?” We didn’t.
“First they invite you in on a game of chess, right?” He looked around, fidgeting. “Next thing you know, the afternoon is gone, and someone’s offering you roast wild goat for dinner. And then you’re waking up the next morning and that—he motioned toward Red Hill—looks like a lot of work. So you hang around for another day. And play some more chess. And the day turns into a week . . .”
His girlfriend rolled her eyes. She clearly wasn’t buying his Aloha Moonies theory.
Neither were we. My wife, Elle, and I were savoring our first taste of wild Hawaii. Our mud-and-sweat adventure had begun after we crossed the Hanakapi’ai River—the Kalalau Trail’s two-mile mark and the mandatory turnaround point for day hikers. We ascended 5,000 feet, seesawing in and out of five valleys along the only hikeable stretch of the Na Pali Coast.
Protected by steep pali, or cliffs, the Kalalau Valley is the perfect hideout. It was here in this jungle in the 1880s that an ailing fugitive and his wife eluded authorities for years—Jack London immortalized them in his 1908 story “Koolau the Leper.” Taro farmers populated the valley until the early 20th century. The hippies came later.

We found much to like in this Eden, including a series of deserted waterfall pools deep in the forest. After leaving our beachside homestead, we blew hours goofing off, swimming, exploring, sticking our noses into wild lilies. Heading back, we met one of the residents, dragging a folding chaise lounge—how the heck did he get that in here?—along the sand.
“Jay” is a high school gym teacher who lives in Kalalau during the off-season. He’s terribly mellow and powerfully muscled, sporting a shark-tooth necklace and not much else.
How does he survive here? “I have friends all over the island who help me out,” Jay said, adding that he also pulls papio and moi fish from the surf and hunts goats in the backcountry. After a few minutes, the conversation wound down, and Elle and I headed off to explore the nearby sea caves.
Then Jay called after us. “Hey . . . do you play chess?”

The Ins and Outboards of the Exumas

Beached: solitude off the Exumas Cays

Cut your boat engine in the clear water of the Bahamas’ Exuma Cays and who knows what will appear: a five-foot lemon shark swimming slow S-curves under your hull, a pair of stealthy eagle rays, clumps of conch shells among purple barrel sponges, even a family of swimming pigs—yes, pigs—which, long abandoned by their owners, live quite well off their pink good looks and the Wheat Thins tossed overboard by boaters. This bountiful 100-mile strand of 365 narrow, mostly uninhabited islands, bounded by the cobalt depths of the Exuma Sound to the east and the aquamarine shallows of the Great Bahama Bank to the west, is amazingly only 40 miles from the Vegas-like excesses of Nassau. But when you drop anchor on one of the cays’ empty, wild, bisque-colored beaches, you might as well be on the other side of the big blue world.
A peripatetic island escape begins at quiet Staniel Cay in the center of the Exuma chain. Book one of the Staniel Cay Yacht Club’s snug pastel cottages—each comes with a 13-foot Boston Whaler powerboat—in advance. Then spend a week day-tripping your way around these narrow, close-together islands, some barely the size of a major league pitching mound, others large enough to support a fishing village, a beach resort, and a couple of open-air bars serving conch fritters and Kalik beer. Don’t worry about your sketchy navigational skills—these are nearly idiotproof cruising waters. You need only your eyes to figure out how to get to your next anchorage. A fairly reliable sense of how shallow is too shallow for your boat will help, too.
One day you might focus on fishing, working the shimmering bonefish flats of Harvey Cay and Pipe Creek, about three miles from Staniel Cay, or angling around Exuma Sound Ledge, a thousand-foot drop-off just a few hundred yards offshore. On another day, motor to Thunderball Grotto, a snorkel-through cave, swing by “Pig Beach” on Major Spot Island, and then visit Compass Cay, where you’ll be greeted by a group of creepily Pavlovian nurse sharks looking for handouts. Make the short walk to the bluff-backed crescent of sand on Compass Cay’s east side and spend the rest of the day prone. Or head south one morning to Bitter Guana Cay (no need to know how it got its name), where you’ll see iguanas prowling the beach, and stop on another island, Great Guana Cay (don’t ask), for cracked conch with the locals at Lorraine’s Cafe.
Plan on taking a couple of days to explore the pristine reefs and coves of the Exuma Land and Sea Park, a 176-square-mile, no-take preserve (no fishing, no collecting) overseen by the Bahamas National Trust, where you can also hike the four miles of trails near Warderick Wells. The park begins at Conch Cut, about five miles northwest of Staniel, and ends 22 miles north at Wax Cut Cay.
Most evenings, you’ll be content hanging out in the Staniel Cay Yacht Club’s dockfront bar, eavesdropping on the catch-drunk anglers and hypertanned nomadic yachties. Save one night, though, for dinner in the hilltop clubhouse at Fowl Cay, a swank new three-cottage resort about a mile and a half by boat from Staniel Cay. You should know, however, that this is one very classy place—shoes are mandatory.
THE DETAILS:
Flamingo Air flies from Nassau to Staniel Cay every day but Saturday for $70 one-way (242-377-0354, ); from Fort Lauderdale, many companies charter planes to Staniel Cay—try Island Air Charters ($900 for up to seven people; 800-444-9904, ), or from Nassau, Air Charter Bahamas ($590 for up to five people; 305-885-6665, ). Cottages at Staniel Cay Yacht Club (242-355-2024, ) start at $167 per person per night and include a 13-foot Boston Whaler. At Fowl Cay Resort (866-369-5229, ), cottages start at $4,750 per week for two people, including meals, beverages, and a 17-foot boat. For information on the Exuma Land and Sea Park, visit .

Off Belay on Culebra

Flamenco Beach: Culebra’s prized possession

When I took off for Culebra, a seven-mile-long island outpost east of Puerto Rico with a stash of oceanside face climbing, I had every intention of spending my time on the rocks. I was ready for the feel of sea spray on my back while working 5.10 friction moves. But then I discovered how the sleepy rhythms of an undeveloped island can get in the way of any serious ambition.
Like Vieques, its neighbor to the south, Culebra is part of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and has played host to Navy bombing practice, though things have quieted down since the 1970s, when locals protested to stop the ordnance rain. In fact, everything is quiet. There are no sprawling resorts or gaudy casinos, just one town, Dewey, and 1,542 Spanish-speaking islanders. There are opportunities for adventure—sea kayaking, sailing, diving, and of course climbing. You just have to fend off total lethargy to get to them.
Flamenco Beach is Culebra’s prize possession, with consistently clear water and a mile of silky white sand. To get there, visitors take a 20-minute flight from San Juan aboard a prop plane, which buzzes over scrubby dry-tropical forest before dropping with a gulp onto the lone landing strip; I walked, sandals flapping, the mile and a half to Flamenco Beach. Weekends can bring ferryloads of Puerto Rican families, but even then there’s little competition for sandy real estate. Find yourself a vacant acre, plop down under a palm . . . and erase those Jersey Shore memories of folks stacked around you like frankfurters on a Weber.
Restless beachgoers strap on masks to eyeball hogfish and schools of tang just offshore, or they boogie-board the shoulder-high breakers at the beach’s south end. A mile-long dirt path leads to neighboring Carlos Rosario beach, which borders the Luis Pe-a Marine Reserve—part of the island’s 1,568 acres of wildlife refuges—where snorkelers snoop the seagrass beds for conchs. In the deeper waters of the reserve, near Cayo Yerba, divers swim with stingrays among huge boulders festooned with yellow cup corals.

I eyed the trail to my intended destination, the Punta Molinas climbing area, an hour and a half of ridge hiking from the beach parking lot. The volcanic crag, riveted with bolts covered in sea salt, is a humble 30 feet or so high, but the routes are 5.9 to 5.10—and the views of the Caribbean while dangling from a flake are expansive. Most times you share them with no one. But the afternoon slipped by, so I pitched my tent at Flamenco’s campground—surf 20 feet away—and watched a spearfisherman amble along with a dive bag full of red snappers, conchs, and lobsters, all of it hunted in a single lagoon.
By the next day, I’d let island time have its way with me and simply abandoned my notions of climbing. Too much work. I prowled around Dewey, stopping in a restaurant, El Caobo, where the cook pulled me into the kitchen to taste her guisada (chopped pork stew), handing me a spoonful with a smile. I ate a helping with fried snapper. Instead of being pumped out, knuckles bleeding, I sat there with a full belly and a sweating glass of Coca-Cola, slightly sunburned and utterly content.

THe Breezes Of Belize

Destination wet: the distant allure of Goff Kay

Read Kerr steered our 38-foot catamaran through a quartering chop off the southern coast of Belize. “Gee, Read,” I said, “kind of a rough ride. Can’t you smooth it out a little?”
“I’m not in charge of the ocean,” replied ten-year-old Read. “I’m only in charge of the boat.”
That was the tone for this eight-day sailing sojourn among Belize’s southern cays, a smattering of islands—some inhabited, none larger than a square mile—sprinkled between the coastal village of Placencia and the Mesoamerican Reef, the largest barrier reef in the Western Hemisphere. The cluster of elkhorn and ivory bush corals, among others, stretches 450 miles from Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula to the Bay Islands of Honduras, and is 20 miles offshore here.
A few days earlier, my friend Onne van der Wal (a nautical photographer and seasoned sailor), his wife, their three children, and I had chartered a sailboat without a captain (a.k.a. a bareboat). We left from Placencia, a friendly, quiet village of about 500 residents made even quieter in October 2001 when Hurricane Iris obliterated 80 percent of the structures in town and killed 22 people, including 17 American divers. We headed 20 miles east-southeast to Ranguana Caye, a spit of sand with palm trees and turquoise bungalows. Read and her younger brothers hit the water the moment the anchor did, gamboling like porpoises amid massive leaf corals.
Belize, Central America’s only English-speaking country, has 1,000-foot-wide barrier reef atolls to dive, 100-pound tarpon off Ambergris Cay to catch, and Mayan temples to explore. But from the moment Read enlightened us about her responsibility vis-à-vis the sea, we freed ourselves from agendas. We were dinking around the outposts, dropping anchor alongside coral castles, and exploring former pirate haunts. We might cruise Punta Ycacos Lagoon in hopes of spotting manatees. Or we could swim with hawksbill turtles in the marine preserve at Laughing Bird Caye. We’d decide all this later.
Following Ranguana Caye, we ran 15 miles in an afternoon to the Sapodilla Cays, the southernmost islands. That evening Onne puttered the dinghy to a fishing panga and swapped two quarts of pineapple juice and a frozen key-lime pie for just-speared snapper fillets—dining out, cays style.
On one of our last nights, everyone retired to the cabins, leaving me on deck to sleep under the full moon. Clouds stole across the sky like great white secrets. Exhausted, I tried to remember how I got so tired: woke at sunrise, kayaked to a broad turtle-grass flat, waded around stalking bonefish and permit, paddled back, snorkeled. Not such a mystery after all. I started to think about the next day and realized that . . . well, I am not in charge of tomorrows.

Just Park Me in a Palapa in Yelapa

Rocky’s shrill whistle pierced through the sound of waves crashing beneath my bedroom. Untangling myself from mosquito net and sheet, I lurched out to the balcony of my two-story casita to peer at the dark pre-dawn ocean. Rocky, my beachfront neighbor and a former fishing guide from Arkansas, was gliding past in his sea kayak, trolling with a simple hand line of 30-pound test and a two-inch lure. He jabbed his paddle in my direction. Vamos!
I sighed. It was going to be another routine day in Yelapa, a fishing village 12 miles southwest of Puerto Vallarta on Mexico’s Pacific coast. Getting to the 1,200-person settlement requires a bumpy 30-minute ride by outboard water taxi south from Puerto Vallarta, along the rocky coast of the Bah’a de Banderas to Yelapa’s little hidden cove.
I’d start the day by joining Rocky to fish along the southern edge of the bay, Mexico’s largest, through schools of porpoises and the occasional manta ray, and past cliffs alternating with uninhabited, palm-laden lagoons. If I was lucky I’d come home with some tasty fish—known locally as sierras—for ceviche. By midmorning I’d be back at my rented casita cleaning my catch, eating a late breakfast of mangos, and pretending to write in my journal while staring out at the Pacific.
My first hard decision would be whether to hike or swim next. If the onshore wind seemed steady and strong, it might be a good day to hike two and a half hours to the top of one of the 2,000-foot summits that nearly surround Yelapa—a derelict ranchito atop one peak is a favored takeoff spot for parasailors. Or I could swim a half-mile from the casita to the center of Yelapa’s main beach, where lollygagging and slurping fresh shrimp cocktails are the main pursuits. I’d squeeze in a siesta, of course, and then make my way to the south end of the beach, where steps lead up to the town—a maze of adobe walls and red-tile roofs crisscrossed by cobblestone lanes. There are no cars or motorcycles in Yelapa, though there is traffic of a sort. Mules, the taxi/truck/car/bus of Yelapa, provide the only overland way out of town, up narrow mountain trails that would make even the hardiest SUV stall.

About two years ago, the town got electricity. Some people lamented this progress, though its only real results are television, two dozen streetlights, and too much Ricky Martin played late into the night. And the placid village has adapted itself to more vigorous visitors: Sea kayaks can be rented from Hotel Lagunita or Casa Isabel, local fishermen at the docks arrange day trips, and Miller’s Dive Service offers multiday trips to the small islands in the bay.
I might contemplate these changes as I prepare for a twilight fishing jaunt. Unless, of course, it’s game night. The locals (Raicillas) and the gringos (Bimbos) play softball three or four nights a week at a dusty field a mile up the Río Tuito from town. The game starts around 5 p.m. and ends eight or nine innings later or when you can’t see the ball—whichever comes first. After several hundred games, the series is just about even.
If the innings are quick, there’s time to get back to the casita for a cocktail and sunset observation. Then it’s a short walk to satisfy my addiction to the barbecued chicken, fish, and ribs served at Pollo Bollo. By 10 p.m. it’s time to tuck myself under the mosquito net—where the rhythm of the waves will anesthetize me until Rocky’s whistle wakes me again.
Yep, same old routine.
THE DETAILS:
Boats bound for Yelapa leave at 11:45 a.m. Monday through Friday in front of the Hotel Rosita in Puerto Vallarta (about $9.50 per person one-way; 011-52-322-223-2000, ). Cabanas for two at Hotel Lagunita (011-52-329-298-0554, ) cost $45-$75 per night; the hotel offers kayak rentals and guided waterfall hikes. Casa Isabel (; e-mail, Isabel@yelapa.com) also has kayaks and rents five palapas that sleep two to six people for $45-$75. Miller’s Dive Service (; e-mail, millersdiveservice@juno.com) offers five-day dive packages for $165 to $175 for two-tank dives. For fishing and kayaking with Rocky, contact his company, Yelapa Extreme Kayaking (rockmoninoff@hotmail.com).

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MY NINE-FOOT BEAR surfboard picked up speed as I dropped down the face, alone on a perfect Pacific wave at Los Cerritos Beach in Baja California Sur. The tube held for a tantalizing second, then it sectioned, crushing me into the water and breaking my leash. I found the Bear, washed up on the beach, with a nasty gash in its nose. I then did what so many before me had done when overwhelmed by Baja’s wild side: I sought refuge in Todos Santos.

Ah, Baja: A bird’s-eye view of Playa los Cerritos

Nestled on the coast along the western watershed of the Sierra de la Laguna, Todos Santos has for centuries been an outlet for escapists—Jesuit missionaries fleeing angry locals, the wealthy elite of La Paz seeking release from the blistering heat and humidity on the Gulf side. In Todos Santos, a crowd is two people you don’t recognize, although the town now boasts Internet cafés, two surf shops, art galleries, and an English-language bookstore. Locals still use landmarks, not numbers, to give directions down dirt streets. Sea turtles lay their eggs on the beaches, gray whales cruise the shore, and a fishermen’s cooperative sells its daily catch on the sand that fronts the town. It’s that Baja.
Surfers have long been drawn by the half-dozen reliable breaks—like Los Cerritos, La Pastora, and San Pedrito—that begin a couple of miles north of town and extend south toward Cabo San Lucas. Now, as then, one-lane dirt tracks that angle off Mexico 19 and wind through palo verde, cacti, and mesquite spit you out on the beach. Large-scale development, however, never took hold in Todos Santos, and expat artists and writers began dribbling down newly paved Mexico 19 in the mid-eighties, attracted by the cheap hacienda rentals, the climate, the solitude, and the views—sunsets over the Pacific that radiate sky-wide; thick, briny mists that obscure the towering Sierra de la Laguna to the east; and deserted beaches stretching into the distance.
The 21st century has arrived in Todos Santos—barely. You can check your e-mail if you must, but it’s still best to leave your watch at home.

The road less Gringoed: in search of an authentic slice of paradise

Bienvenidos a Mexico: Parras de la Fuente’s home crowd

SOUTH OF THE BORDER is where you’re bound. Mexico: desert too hot for the mind to think, ocean too blue and beautiful for the body not to fall right in.
We do it every year—my wife, Sue, whose father is from Guadalajara, and our two young daughters. We did it a month ago: decided at dinner, bought $300 tickets online that night, pulled the kids out of school in the morning. We arrived in Acapulco at midnight, rented a battered VW bug, and drove off into the sultry blackness.
This time, we went in search of what we thought might be lost: the classic gringo-free village on the beach. The place where fishermen still creak out in painted rowboats before dawn. Where there are burros wandering around in the dunes. Where a squat woman walks along the sand selling slices of homemade chocolate cake.


Several times we pulled off on rough roads, only to find that they dead-ended at tin shacks. And then we found it—down a long dirt track that wasn’t on the map, leading to a village that had changed its name. The main street of cobblestone and sand sloped straight into the ocean. The few other streets wandered pleasantly past whitewashed buildings, the door frames painted blue or green or purple or red. The clean scent of an empty sea wafted through slim palm trees.
This was the place. We knew it instantly. After driving along the coast for two days, with hot air blasting in the car while Sue tried to keep our two sweating girls occupied by teaching them nursery rhymes in Spanish, we had slipped back into enchanted Mexico.
We found a pink hotel on the edge of the village, just above the sea. We had our own tiled balcony. Downstairs was a café serving tortillas de maíz and frijoles for breakfast and whatever the fishermen brought in for dinner. The beach was immaculate, and we buried one another in powder-fine sand. Every day we boogie-boarded till the sun sank into the ocean and the mœsica Mexicana began drifting down from the café.
There are plenty of out-of-the-way villages and dead-end roads to discover in Mexico. In the pages that follow, you’ll read about six more hideaways—from the highs of the Sierra Madre to the heart of Maya country, and beyond. Bike, hike, surf, fish, and explore by day, then find a place to tune in to the setting sun. Whichever backdrop you choose, the Mexico of your dreams is still there. Go find it.

Up in the old hacienda: the mining town that time forgot

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CLOSEST AIRPORT: Puerto Vallarta, 40 miles west
GETTING THERE: Most visitors to San Sebastián choose the 15-minute flight from Puerto Vallarta over the three-hour drive. Aero Taxis de la Bahía operates daily plane service ($80 round-trip; 011-52-322-221-1990). Or fly there and mountain bike back: Contact BikeMex ���ϳԹ���s ($220 per person, including airfare and all gear; 011-52-322-223-1680, ).
WHERE TO STAY: Hacienda Jalisco ($70 per person per night, including breakfast and dinner), a mile from the center of town, has seven rooms. Book through Pamela Thompson in Puerto Vallarta (011-52-322-223-1695; e-mail: pmt@prod-igy.net.mx). A Welsh/Canadian couple run a bed-and-breakfast r…

The traffic is murder: marching through the thick of Novillero

ONE NIGHT AT A GALLERY opening just off Puerto Vallarta’s main drag, an older gentleman named Bud Acord overheard me whining about the sunburned Canadians taking over the city.
“Listen, I have a little hotel up in the mountains,” he told me. “You want to see Old Mexico before the tourists and developers gobble it up? Then spend a couple days in San Sebastián. Hell, it hasn’t changed in a hundred years.”
The two-and-a-half-hour drive up into the Sierra Madre to San Sebasti‡n del Oeste was on a road so rutted that my seat belt was the only thing stopping me from being propelled through the roof. As we crested the 5,500-foot ridge above the town, its whitewashed, red-tile-roofed buildings, cobblestone central square, and Spanish church looked like a mythical, forgotten city. Founded in 1605, San Sebasti‡n was once so prosperous from silver mining that at its peak in the mid-19th century the region had swelled to nearly 20,000 people. (The town now has about 600 residents.)
Though some of San Sebastían’s palatial haciendas from that time have fallen into ruin, Bud Acord saved one of them. An artist from California, Acord was among the first wave of gringos to “discover” Puerto Vallarta and its surroundings in the early sixties, when John Huston was filming The Night of the Iguana. Acord bought the Hacienda Jalisco, which dates from 1854, for next to nothing and restored the place to its original state—which means there’s still no electricity, but plenty of rustic grandeur.
That evening in the courtyard, a few other guests and I ate an extraordinary four-course dinner made with ingredients from the hacienda’s gardens. The next day I hiked to some abandoned mines with a guide. After he unsuccessfully tried to convince me to explore the pitch-black shafts, he let me in on the local lore: In the past, mine owners buried their silver to keep it safe from bandidos, saying, “When it is safe, we will return.” Of course, they never did. So the silver remains—along with much else worth seeking out.

La bicicleta tranquila: where the singletrack and vino tinto flow

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CLOSEST AIRPORT: Saltillo, 90 miles east
GETTING THERE: Avis, Budget, and Hertz have offices in Saltillo. Or drive the 285 miles from Laredo, Texas: Take Mexico 85 south; at Monterrey head west on Mexico 40 to the Parras-Paila Carretera turnoff. Where to stay: The Posada Santa Isabel, in the center of town near the Plaza de Armas, has a pool (doubles, $40; 011-52-842-422-0572). For resort digs with fine dining, try the Hotel Rincon del Montero, two miles north of town (doubles start at $118; 011-52-842-422-0540).
WHERE TO EAT: Carne asada reigns in Parras, and the best beef is at El Corral-n (entrees, $7; 323 Colegio Militar).

Cruising Parras de la Fuente

PARRAS DE LA FUENTE LIES surprisingly far off the Gringo Trail for a place that’s less than a five-hour drive south of the border. Home to the 405-year-old San Lorenzo Vineyard at Casa Madero Winery—the oldest vineyard in the Americas—the town of 64,000 people is a natural oasis high in the desert state of Coahuila. Pecan trees shade the boulevards, and branches laden with pomegranates overflow into the courtyards. Wealthy industrialists from Monterrey flock here, attracted by the tranquilo atmosphere and the vino tinto. Yet the Parras I know is more fat tire than cabernet.
When I first traveled here in my uncle’s beat-up truck last April, the inclusion of my mountain bike was a lucky hunch. But the hunch paid off in the form of more than 30 miles of dusty singletrack just south of town. When I returned last August for the annual Festival of Grapes, the bike was the first thing I packed.
The morning after my arrival, I pedaled south, into the high country. Some six interconnecting singletrack circuits wind through the hills surrounding Lima Canyon. A fast, even spin took me past the Estanque Zapata, one of three local reservoirs fed by subterranean springs, near the starting point for the four-mile Ojo de Agua loop, site of a weekly cross-country race between two intensely competitive local bike teams, the Coyotes and the Raptores.
After a few small, technical climbs, I lit out through the hills, following the scree-filled trail through the sierra. By the time I’d completed a few circuits in the 90-degree sun, I was exhausted, and pedaled to the La Luz swimming hole, a palm-shaded reservoir in the shadow of the Santo Madero Church, a late-19th-century mission set on a rocky outcrop. There I met a local rider, who eyed my bike and asked if I’d be racing the next day. I nodded, “��í.”
“Que le vaya bien,” he said, grinning like a crocodile. I knew I didn’t stand a chance against the home crowd—but there’s always next time.

Get disconnected: a high-altitude sporting hub with only one line out

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CLOSEST AIRPORT: Oaxaca, 37 miles southwest
GETTING THERE: From Oaxaca, drive east on Highway 190 to Tlacolula, north to D’az Ordaz, then turn left onto the small road to Cuajimoloyas. Contact Tierra Dentro (011-52-951-514-9284, ) for two-day all-inclusive hiking and biking tours ($85-$95).
WHERE TO STAY: The only lodge in Cuajimoloyas has four bunks to a room, showers, and flush toilets ($9 per person).
WHERE TO EAT: Food in Cuajimoloyas doesn’t stray far from comida t’pica Mexicana: Rice and beans and chicken predominate at the handful of comedores.

Fruit and pepper venders in Oaxaca

THERE’S ONLY ONE PHONE in the mountain village of Cuajimoloyas. It was ringing like an ambulance siren when we drove into town, so I hung my head out the window to listen for the loudspeaker announcement: “Margarita Suarez,” it echoed through the dusty roads and tapered off into the forest, “tienes una llamada….” An unconventional system, sure, but a fitting introduction to Cuajimoloyas’s other surprises—and this peaceful outpost just 37 miles northeast of Oaxaca has plenty of them. Like walking into a crumbling building to find a small fleet of dual-suspension mountain bikes (with clunky steel frames and bottom-rung componentry, but double shocks, nonetheless). Or finding out that the villagers voted a few years ago to make “ecotourism guide” an official town-government post. Or realizing that the lucky man who currently occupies that post, Joél Contreres, moonlights as a researcher for a French scientist studying the region’s enormous mushrooms. (This I learned when we were blazing down a trail and, without warning, Joél threw down his bike, dove into the trees, and popped out of the woods with a porcini bigger than my head.)
Over 10,000 feet high, with towering pines and peaks as far as you can see, Cuajimoloyas is a community of small farmers and woodworkers whose Zapotec heritage and simple pine-and-plaster structures bear few signs of Spanish influence. Cuajimoloyas and seven nearby villages constitute the Pueblos Mancomunados, a 27-year-old organization of mountain dwellers dedicated to protecting their shared forests and preserving their traditions. Tourism could be the region’s best defense, with hope hinging on the more than 60 miles of hiking and biking trails built on the former logging roads and ancient paths that connect the eight villages. All eight towns now have basic lodges where bikers, birders, and backpackers can fall asleep on a bunk and wake to the songs of warblers and the orange glow of sunlight creeping into fog-filled valleys.
On my visit to Cuajimoloyas last spring, I counted two other gringos in town, but saw no one on the trails. Joél fried up his prized mushroom for our lunch, even though it would have fetched quite a few pesos at market. I promised I’d be back, and that next time I’d bring dessert.

Time out of Maya: where the past is a blast

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CLOSEST AIRPORT: Mérida, 80 miles west
GETTING THERE: The only regular bus service to �۲���ܲ�á runs from Mérida on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday afternoons, returning Saturday, Sunday, and Monday mornings. Those looking for a more flexible schedule can rent a car in Mérida (Alamo, Avis, and Hertz have branches at the airport).
WHERE TO STAY: �۲���ܲ�á Campamento (doubles, $35 per person per night, including three meals and a guided tour of the town and ruins; 011-52-985-858-1482, manray.csu-hayward.edu/campamento).
WHERE TO EAT: The cooks at �۲���ܲ�á Campamento provide traditional Yucatecan meals like pit-barbecued turkey with habanero sauce.

Look sharp: Mayan relief at Uxmal

FLICKERING HEADLIGHTS slice through the Yucatán night as our rented van speeds past the spiky gumbo-limbo trees and poison sumac lining the labyrinthine roads. Earlier, in the midday heat, our entourage—which included my three kids and two brothers—left the Disneyesque Maya ruins of Chichén Itzá and headed southwest into the parched hinterland. Our destination is �۲���ܲ�á, a village of a hundred thatch-topped huts where my friend David Freidel, a Southern Methodist University archaeologist, has spent more than a decade excavating a city that predates Chichén Itzá’s sixth-century temples by at least 500 years. Here, Freidel told me, life for the Yucatec Maya proceeds much as it did 15 centuries ago. At Chichén Itzá, the deserted pyramids left us wondering about the Maya’s daily life—at �۲���ܲ�á, we would witness it.
A chorus of barking dogs, touched off by a lone howl, greets us as we pull into Yaxun‡’s central plaza. A pleasant aroma of warm tortillas and smoke lingers in the night air. We see families sitting around cooking fires in pole-walled huts, while silhouettes of pigs and chickens poke their way around the dirt courtyards, fringed by avocado and banana trees. Up the street, past the 19th-century limestone church, we check into �۲���ܲ�á Campamento, a field camp that Freidel’s team of archaeologists turned over to the locals in 1996. The enterprising villagers renovated it into an eight-room inn, blending ancient Maya construction with hot showers and comfortable beds. This night, however, we choose to sleep strung up in hammocks like netted groupers.
Fueled by a breakfast of mouth-searing huevos a la Mexicana (onion-and-habanero-laced eggs) and sweet juice squeezed from green oranges, we strike off with Ceno Poot, a Maya man who has worked as an archaeologist, a cook, and, most recently, an eco-guide. Ceno leads us to the log hives of stingless black bees, which produce chardonnay-colored honey—a highlight of the Maya diet that is harvested only during full-moon ceremonies. In a recently discovered limestone cave, we crawl 45 minutes down a tunnel to find a room littered with pre-Columbian pottery shards. Later, we hike two miles along a 1,200-year-old ��������é, the raised road that once was �۲���ܲ�á’s thoroughfare to the city of Cobá, 60 miles to the east, stopping off at a sinkhole to cool off in the cobalt water.


To cap the day, we duck into the hut of a local shaman named Don Pablo. Known for both his classic Maya profile (Roman nose, sloping forehead) and his famously effective healing ceremonies (locals afflicted with everything from depression to viper bites swear by him), Don Pablo agrees to bless my daughter, Irene, motioning for her to sit in a plastic lawn chair facing sacred Maya artifacts. Tracing Irene’s aura with laurel branches, he intones 2,000-year-old prayers in conquistador Spanish. As I watch, the ritual strikes me as the consummate melding of the ancient and the contemporary, of pure Maya spirit enduring in a world of relentless change. Which is why I came to �۲���ܲ�á in the first place.

Pass the bass, por favor: a jungly sanctuary on the San Rafael River

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CLOSEST AIRPORT: Tampico, 100 miles south
GETTING THERE: Barra del Tordo is 270 miles south of Brownsville, Texas, via Mexico 180. Bus service from Brownsville to Aldama (30 miles west of Barra) costs $26. Call ahead and someone from El Paraiso will meet you at the station.

WHERE TO STAY: A room in one of El Paraiso’s palm-log cabins, arrayed around the swimming pool, costs $95 per person per night, meals and activities included (011-52-833-213-9956, www.spagetaway.com/ gulf/paraiso/paraiso.htm). The only in-town option is the spartan Hotel Playa Azul, a two-story, 14-room hotel next to the fishing docks (doubles, $35; 011-52-833-250-1272).

WHERE TO EAT: El Paraiso, for fresh sea bass garnished with cilantro, oysters in garlic broth, or whate…

Jaguar country: the ranch at El Paraiso

DRIVE FIVE HOURS SOUTH of the border from Brownsville, Texas, and hook a left at the town of Aldama. Drive another hour east and you’ll find yourself in the fishing village of Barra del Tordo, Tamaulipas. The community is so peque-o that a thick strand of shipping rope passes for its sole speed bump. On some highway maps, Barra del Tordo doesn’t exist at all—which makes it the ideal backwater.
The village of roughly 1,000 inhabitants sits on the banks of the San Rafael River, a half-mile inland from the Gulf of Mexico. The saltwater river harbors prized snook, trout, largemouth bass, redfish, and even tarpon. Schools of grouper, snapper, ling, wahoo, and kingfish swarm the Gulf, and the sweetest oysters this side of the Apalachicola River thrive in the lagoons and inlets in between. The town’s main beach, Playa No. 2 (with showers, day shelters, picnic tables, and cooking pits) lies two miles southeast of town and is such a big nesting ground for the endangered Kemp’s ridley sea turtle that an international research station was established there in 1977. From March through August, visitors can help locate arriving ridleys and transport their eggs into the nesting corral.
But the real show begins on a rickety dock on a creek near the San Rafael, about a mile west of town. Make arrangements in advance and a wooden launch will ferry you four miles upriver to El Paraiso, a 16-room resort set on a bluff, part of a 1,000-acre ranch in a zone once known as Los Jaguares (the big cats still stalk “way back in the thicket,” or so the locals say). Wherever you look, fish are jumping out of the placid water, landing with audible plips and plops, while ospreys swoop down to pluck up dinner.
Factor in kayaking on the river; horseback riding, hiking, and mountain biking on more than 15 miles of trails around El Paraiso; and windsurfing on the Gulf (the lodge’s staff will boat you back down the river); and you may find yourself too wound up to remember the purpose of your journey. Lest you forget, you’re here to relax.

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