La Danza del Venado, or Deer Dance, is perhaps one of the most popular folkloric dances from Mexico. It is performed frequently in hotels in Puerto Vallarta, and I’ve also seen it performed at Vallarta Adventures’ Rhythms of the Night. In the dance, a deer fights for his life, as he is chased by two hunters, who ultimately succeed at killing him. I recently met Cruz Juan Martínez, a former first dancer of acclaimed Amalia Hernández Folkloric Dance Company in Mexico City. He now manages VallarDance, his own dance company, …

Lifehacker, one of my favorite websites, recently featured an awesome tip on how to strap your compact camera to your car’s visor and create a time-lapse movie of your trip. This is possible thanks to the fact that many digital pocket cameras feature a movie and/or interval photography mode that makes it possible to piece together short video clips such as this one I created this past weekend, as I was heading to Boca de Tomatlán. If you are not familiar with this beautiful road, here is a chance to …

Puerto Vallarta’s mountainous surroundings offer a handful of choice restaurants from which you can enjoy spectacular sunsets and views of the entire city from above. But which one is the best? Well, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. In Emiliano Zapata, my neighborhood, also known as Zona Romántica, South Side, and even Olas Altas, there are three restaurants that offer glorious views looking down from Altavista, the city’s southernmost neighborhood, toward the northern half of the bay: Casa Isabel, El Palomar de los González and Vista Grill. All …

For over four years now, I’ve had the pleasure of collaborating with Alphonse Deserville photographing his spectacular custom-made bathing suits for his online catalog. I so much admire Alphonse, I’ve featured him before in this blog. Throughout the many shared photo sessions, I’ve often chuckled about what I affectionately call The Alphonse Maneuver, a subtle but effective technique to park your butt in your bathing suit and make it seem more prominent—particularly useful for those of us challenged in that department! You’ll be amazed at what you can accomplish by …

So much attention is being placed these days on the influenza virus that is causing havoc in our economy… And it’s no surprise. We’re all trying to make sense of what’s going on and how it will affect our economy. For better or worse, my Vallarta Lifestyles Managing Editor alter ego (let’s call him ME!) is responsible for tallying up the results submitted for VirtualVallarta.com’s Readers’ Choice Poll. Every morning, ME gets to work, checks his email, and soon after that, he reviews the votes received for the previous day, …

My friend Brad had been telling me about Casa Pericos, a new multilevel getaway palapa, for a few months now. And after hearing all sorts of amazing stories about the owner traveling all the way to Bali to bring in a wealth of beautiful furnishings for this incredible hideaway, I had to see it with my own eyes. I was able to do this a couple of months ago, while my friends Earl and Joe were visiting from Boston. The place was still waiting for some finishing touches. Two months …

The much anticipated menu guide for this year’s Vallarta Lifestyles’ Restaurant Week event is now available online for browsing and download. There are 36 restaurants participating in the 2009 edition of this popular food festival,and diners can choose from one of three options in each of the following courses, Appetizers & Salads, Entrées and Desserts, to customize their dinner. And to keep things simple, the menus have a fixed price — $179 or $299 pesos — determined by each individual restaurant. Since this event has become increasingly popular over the …

I recently had to dash to San Pancho to take some photographs for Vallarta Lifestyles and my friend Nicole invited me to stay at a cozy and affordable little casita, Casa de Rita, which she manages. Given its excellent location, I thought it would be worth sharing. Also, I understand that the owners, who live in Puerto Vallarta, are strong supporters of EntreAmigos, San Pancho’s non-profit community organization, run by Nicole, offering the organization a percentage of the casita earnings. So if you stay at Casa de Rita, you are …