Why Zihuatanejo And Ixtapa Mexico Are Hidden Gems

By Author: Julia Bennet
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Zihuatanejo is a hidden gem on Mexico's pacific coast. Once a small, sleepy fishing port, today Zihuatanejo, along with its sister city Ixtapa located a few kilometers north, is a growing tourism magnet for foreign visitors that hasn't lost its charm - at least yet anyway. For all the mexperts out there, one might be surprised to discover that Ixtapa unobtrusively is currently behind only Cancun and Puerto Vallarta as the most popular destination for tourists from north of the border.

In many respects, Zihuatanejo is what Acapulco used to be back in the 1950s and 1960s when it was at its peak in terms of international chic - probably for many of the reasons that Ixtapa and Zihuatanejo do today.

Zihuatanejo is a traditional Mexican town, set on a gentle bay surrounded by a ring of green mountains. While Acapulco has grown to over half a million people, Zihuatanejo remains a tranquil town of about 60,000 while Ixtapa boasts a mere 6,000 residents.

One of the major attractions of the destination is its truly spectacular collection of beaches. Zihuatanejo boasts four beaches, two of which are truly exceptional. ...
... While Playa Principal and Playa Madera are nice beaches, Playa La Ropa and Playa Las Gatas are the real stars of the show. And then there is Ixtapa, which boasts the amazing Playa Palmar, the area's main beach, with its interesting rock formations, wide sandy beaches located on the open ocean. A drive a bit further north is the tropical paradise, "La Isla" as its known around town (like Las Gatas in Zihua, La Isla is accessible only by boat).

While the beaches and the amazing tropic landscape and Mexican culture are the real attractions, Zihuatanejo also offers an assortment of good shops, a couple nightspots and some very good restaurants. Most of the nightlife, however, is in Ixtapa. The connected chains of plazas in Ixtapa also offer free live entertainment on most nights, dozens of shops and a large variety of restaurants.

What makes Zihuatanejo and Ixtapa so special is that, though both get quite "touristy" in high season, they are exceptionally clean, well maintained, and pleasant. Ixtapa in particular deserves an award for the best-groomed tourist city in Mexico. Other than a handful of slightly pushy street vendors, the destination offers a hassle-free safe experience in what is still a largely undeveloped tropical paradise.

A few things one must do while in Ixtapa and Zihuatanejo include visiting La Ropa, Palmar and Las Gatas Beaches. Taking a trip to the island. Walking around downtown Zihuatanejo, dinner at one of the restaurants on the mountain that rings Zihuatanejo, and doing a bit of shopping for some authentic hand-made souvenirs, and taking a long walk (or a ride) around the tailor-made bike paths that wind through Ixtapa. For the more adventuresome, there is fishing, boating, parasailing, scuba diving and snorkeling.

Enjoy it now in 20 years the developers will probably have ruined it.

Want a bit of traditional Mexican flavor in a glorious tropical setting? Try Zihuatanejo. Looking for a modern, implacably designed and maintained tourist resort on the ocean? Try Ixtapa.