Birds and Birders Flock to Sleepy San Blas, Mexico Rosemary McClure - LA Times
go to original March 23, 2015

A river crocodile (American crocodile) hangs out on a fallen tree during the heat of the day at the edge of the river La Tovara. (Daniel A. Anderson)

Crocodiles are built for the kill. They slide slowly through a river on a warm day almost completely submerged, but able to see and hear because their eyes and ears sit atop their skulls. Then they quietly close in on prey, the only warning a set of glistening eyes peering over the water's surface.

I wasn't looking for those eyes; I was looking for birds when we spotted our first croc during a boat ride through mangrove swamps outside San Blas, a fishing village and birding capital about a four-hour drive north of Puerto Vallarta.

"Can we go in closer?" yelled our American guide to the boatman, pointing to a 12-footer moving through high grass several feet from the boat. "No," screamed the driver. "It might come into the boat."

"In that case, never mind," said the guide.

It was shaping up to be a fascinating trip. I'd tried to stay away from high-traffic tourist destinations on this vacation in western Mexico, venturing into some of the smaller cities in Nayarit state on the Pacific coast. I wanted to see wildlife instead of high-rise hotels.

San Blas, a onetime hippie colony and longtime surf capital, fit the bill perfectly.

I had been here once before, many years earlier. At the time, people said San Blas was destined to be the next Acapulco. It never happened; San Blas remained a sleepy little town of 10,000 people, which made me happy. There wasn't a shopping center, five-star hotel or condo complex in sight.

In the meantime, it had become a low-key, first-rate ecotourism destination, known as one of the top birding regions in the world. Its mangrove swamps, lagoons, estuaries and beaches make it an important natural shelter for 300 species of birds, according to Audubon Society studies. In the Western Hemisphere, it's said to be second only to Panama.

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