Mancora a year later

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8th Nov 2010

Having spent a few weeks in Mancora enjoying the sun, The job I come up here to do didn't pan out but thats ok better it happens now than when I am well into it.

Mancora is a little different to a year ago, The road paving that was going on last year is now completed, The Artisania market is very pretty now with benches and new plants, making it a pleasant area to chill out and people watch, also the main street to the beach is is paved and clean, no longer a dirt track, the colorful shop fronts and restaurants looking pretty sharp.

Some businesses have disappeared while other have popped up. The string of colorful tents that last year flanked the beach are gone with the seafront restaurants serving their dishes on site. Delfines is still there and is by far the best beach side restaurant, the cerviche is super good.


There is notable erosion to the beach, the sand bars change all the time but the beach is smaller as land gets taken over by the sea.

Green eggs and Ham is still going strong and still serving the best breakfast in town, Kika ad Papa Mo are still running around and working their hinds off, A new item on the menu is a prawns in beer, how can it not be good, A magic mix in my opinion.

We stayed with friends the first few days until their family arrived, then we hopped between a few hostels until we settled in a rustic little place north of town called Hostal Naif.

The hostel is built like Gilligans Island but has more than what we need. The main house is constructed from bamboo with woven grasses making up the walls, the terrace has bamboo railings bound together with twine, the steps made from flattened bamboo, they creak and shake but are effective.

We had a room on the first floor which had the interesting feature of a sand floor, quaint but we decided to move to another room as sand was getting into everything, a clean outdoor kitchen completed our temporary home and we had the company of 2 Iguanas, one young and beautifully colorful, the other old and gnarly, the old man didn't have much time for the young fella and chases where common place on the grass roof above us.

We reunited with old friends and forged new ones, Mancora is like that and we without a doubt met an unforgetable bunch.

We also met 2 chaps from the U.S. who are friends of friends and as Mancora was beginning to heat up for the season we decided to head south and check out the ruins of Chan Chan and the village of Huanchaco which is famous for its grass boats used by the local fishermen.

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