Things to Do in Puerto Vallarta

Puerto Vallarta sits on Banderas Bay on Mexico’s Pacific coast, in the state of Jalisco. It’s an old fishing port turned resort city of about 280,000 — the cobblestone Zona Romántica (Old Town) is genuinely old, the Malecón boardwalk along the bay is lined with bronze sculptures and street performers, and the surrounding Sierra Madre mountains drop into the ocean within minutes of downtown. North of the city, the bay rolls into Riviera Nayarit (Sayulita, Punta Mita, San Pancho); south, it gets wilder and quieter (Yelapa, Mismaloya).