The bay does the work. You just pick the boat.
Which Marietas trip actually holds a permit for Hidden Beach. What a Yelapa day costs once the open bar is counted. Whether the humpbacks are still around in March. Reviews of every tour you can book in Puerto Vallarta.
Four bookings a first week in Puerto Vallarta gets built around.
The mountain day, the boat out to the Marietas, the taco walk downtown and the whale calendar. What each costs, and what the people who took it say.
01The big day outPuerto Vallarta Best Zipline Canopy + Tequila and Speed Boat RideCanopy lines over the Cuale canyon, a tequila stop and a speedboat back into town. One booking, most of the coast.
02The boat dayIslas Marietas & BBQ lunch at MajahuitasOut to the Marietas for the frigate colony and the swim into Hidden Beach, then lunch on the sand at Majahuitas.
03The first eveningWinner 2025 Downtown Vallarta Food Tour with Vallarta Food ToursSix stops through the old town while the heat drops. Book it for night one and the rest of the week eats better.
04December to MarchWhale and Dolphin Watching with a Biologist in Puerto VallartaA biologist on board and humpbacks calving in the bay. Outside those months this one simply is not running.
Banderas Bay is thirty miles across and every good day starts at a dock.
Four kinds of day afloat, what it costs to board each one, and which piece of coast it reaches.
★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · Islas Marietas & BBQ lunch at Majahuitas
The MarietasFrigate birds, a permit, and the tunnel swim into Hidden Beach.
Los ArcosGranite arches ten minutes south, and the clearest water in the bay.
Yelapa and the south shoreNo road in. A waterfall behind the village and lunch on the sand.
Catamaran daysShade, a swim ladder, open bar, back before the light goes.
All 50 bookable days afloat →
Puerto Vallarta first, then whatever the bay road reaches.
A surf town over the Nayarit line, a marina strip north of the airport, a fishing village that empties at lunchtime, a silver town up in the pines, and a cove you can only get to by panga.
Behind the beach the Sierra Madre starts and the road turns into riverbed.
Quads through the arroyos above the Cuale, canopy lines strung across the canyon, the Jorullo bridge five hundred feet up, and a waterfall to swim under at the far end of most of them.
The days out more people take than anything else on this bay.
Every Puerto Vallarta review →What the bay is busiest doing, and what earns each of these its slot.
1
Puerto Vallarta Best Zipline Canopy + Tequila and Speed Boat Ride
Fly across 19 jungle ziplines with guides such as Pepe, Edgar, Fernando, and Chica, then cool off in river pools, use kayaks, visit the animal sanctuary, and taste tequila. Choose a speedboat or land transfer. Expect steep steps, a five-hour outing, and extra costs for food, photos, and port fees.
From · $120
Read our review →
2
Winner 2025 Downtown Vallarta Food Tour with Vallarta Food Tours
from $59
3
Extreme Adventure, Wildest Bridge, ATV & Ziplines
from $129
4
Mega Yacht ALL INCLUSIVE Yelapa Waterfall & Snorkeling Adventure
from $117
5
Food & Mixology Tour:Tequila,Tacos, Mezcal and Agave Cocktails
from $98
6
Outdoor Ziplining, Waterfalls & Speed boat in Puerto Vallarta
from $129
7
Boat and Snorkel Tour to 5 Islands of Los Arcos
from $48
8
Islas Marietas & BBQ lunch at Majahuitas
from $99
Puerto Vallarta eats late, cheap, and standing up.
The carts open when the heat drops and stay lit past midnight. Around them: raicilla poured in mountain villages, chocolate ground by hand off the Malecón, and tequila tastings that finish in the town the drink is named after.
What a day out of Puerto Vallarta actually costs.
Every tour on the site, grouped by price. The best morning on this bay is cheaper than most people expect. The yacht is not.
Malecón walks, city loops, the botanical gardens and the short snorkel runs down to Los Arcos.
The standards: Marietas boat days, quad runs into the Sierra Madre, taco walks and whale season.
Private yachts, chartered fishing days and the all-inclusive beach clubs across the water.
Humpbacks calve in Banderas Bay, close enough that you hear them first.
A few thousand whales come down from Alaska between December and late March to give birth in the deep water off Nuevo Vallarta. Boats keep their legal distance; the calves do not always return the favour. A small panga with a biologist aboard beats a big catamaran for this, every time.
- 1Whale and Dolphin Watching with a Biologist in Puerto Vallartafrom $105
- 2Sunsets and Whales Mega Yachts ALL INCLUSIVE: Puerto Vallartafrom $80
- 3Whale Encounter Puerto Vallartafrom $99
Three things that only happen on Banderas Bay.
Beach clubs and canopy parks run the length of Mexico. A permit-capped swim into a bomb crater, a village with no road to it, and a bridge for quad bikes five hundred feet over a river do not.
Playa del Amor
Hidden Beach sits inside a collapsed crater on the Marietas, opened up by Mexican navy bomb tests a century ago. You swim in through a low tunnel, and only when the tide lets you. The islands are a national park with a daily cap on visitors, so the boat needs a permit and the swim needs a guide who has one.
- 1Islas Marietas & BBQ lunch at Majahuitas★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 1,130 reviews
- 2Marietas Islands Snorkel Tour & Hidden Beach★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 981 reviews
- 3Full-Day Trail to 6 hidden Beaches, Colomitos & Snorkel★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 527 reviews
Yelapa
Yelapa is forty minutes by panga from Boca de Tomatlán and there is no other way to arrive. A waterfall runs behind the village, the pie ladies work the sand all afternoon, and the last boat back is the only clock anyone keeps. A day trip buys you about four hours, which is roughly one swim short.
- 1Mega Yacht ALL INCLUSIVE Yelapa Waterfall & Snorkeling Adventure★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 2,515 reviews
- 2Islas Marietas & BBQ lunch at Majahuitas★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 1,130 reviews
- 3Yelapa Waterfall, BBQ at Exclusive Majahuitas Beach & Open bar★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 760 reviews
The Jorullo Bridge
A suspension bridge built for quad bikes spans the Cuale canyon on the Rancho El Charro road, and it moves under you as you cross. Most of the Sierra Madre circuits, quad or canopy, end out on that deck with the river a very long way below.
- 1Puerto Vallarta’s Best Canopy Zipline + Jorullo Bridge walk!★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 817 reviews
- 2ATV and RZR Jorullo Bridge Experience in Puerto Vallarta★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 528 reviews
- 3Hiking Jorullo Point★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 138 reviews
Four Puerto Vallarta bookings that will not wait.
Most of this coast can be arranged over breakfast. These four run on national-park permits, a whale calendar, and boats that leave whether or not you are aboard.
- 01Islas Marietas & BBQ lunch at MajahuitasThe islands are a national park with a daily visitor cap. Only permitted boats run the Hidden Beach swim, and those seats go weeks ahead in winter.
- 02Whale and Dolphin Watching with a Biologist in Puerto VallartaHumpbacks are in the bay from December to late March and nowhere near it in June. The season is the booking.
- 03Mega Yacht ALL INCLUSIVE Yelapa Waterfall & Snorkeling AdventureThere is no road to Yelapa. You travel on the panga timetable, and the last boat out does not wait for lunch to finish.
- 04Puerto Vallarta’s Best Canopy Zipline + Jorullo Bridge walk!The canyon circuits run one group at a time with a fixed size. In high season the morning departures, the cool ones, go first.
An hour north the bay ends and Sayulita starts.
Cobbled streets, a beginner break that forgives nearly everything, and San Pancho twenty minutes further on. Most people come up for the day. A fair number move the rest of the trip up here.
Every Sayulita day →
July to October the rain arrives at five and the bay turns the colour of tea.
Storms here are short, loud and almost always late in the day, so the mornings stay bookable. What changes is the water: river runoff kills snorkelling visibility for a day or two and the mountain tracks turn to mud. Take the early boat, then move under a roof.
Old Vallarta is eight blocks deep and best walked after six.
Everything in old Vallarta →
The Malecón sculptures, the church with the crown on it, the river island between the two halves of town and the Zona Romántica climbing the hill behind. These three carry more travellers than anything else in the city.
Taco carts, in the right order
Six or seven stops through Emiliano Zapata and the Zona Romántica, birria to marlin, with the al pastor trompo saved for last. Somebody else does the ordering, which is most of what you are paying for.
The Malecón, end to end
Sculptures the length of the seafront, the crowned church, the market on the river island and a tequila stop nobody warns you about. Worth doing on day one so the rest of the week has a map.
The gardens up the Tuito road
Half an hour south and eight hundred feet up, where the orchid house, the river swimming hole and the restaurant terrace sit several degrees below the coast. The bus back runs on the hour.
By place — the bay and the belt
By kind of day — boat, mountain, kitchen or board
Old town, the mountain, the Marietas, then north over the Nayarit line.
Old Vallarta
Sierra MadreThe newest Puerto Vallarta tour reviews.
The rest of what just landed →
Marina Vallarta: Yelapa and Majahuitas Snorkeling Tour
Read our review →
From Puerto Vallarta & Nuevo Vallarta: Canopy Zipline Tour
Read our review →