La Cascada

La Cascada

La cascada is Spanish for “waterfall” and one of the attractions people always mention when asked what to do at Yelapa. It’s visited every day by the sheeple from the Vallarta booze cruise who are shepherded here by their backward-walking guide and warned against any food vendors (except those on the playa who reputedly give the guides a kickback).

Last year, this vendor told me she spent all of the offseason
weaving these clothes...right.

There are lots of other vendors, though, who live up that way and tend their displays of mostly scarves and jewelry made who-knows-where, as well as a few folk objects of more local provenance.

The path up to the waterfall takes you into the jungle and is a relatively short, very pleasant and easy stroll. I meandered up that way yesterday.

I enjoyed the interactions with the vendors I met, although one--Solchi by name--I remembered as being stickily persistent. Memory served--it was hard to get away without buying something I didn’t want, and, since she knows where we’re staying, I’m sure she’ll hunt me down to close a sale that’s mostly in her mind.

El Doctor, vending near the falls

At the other extreme was Aurora--a smiling easy-going lady with whom I’ll enjoy chatting again. And finally, El Doctor, so called by me for his distinguished looks and demeanor, from whom I bought a funny little coconut mask of El Payaso--The Clown.

Every good stroll ends with a cerveza

One of these days I’ll return again to la cascada to see if I can find the trail the pescador in Vallarta told me about--the one that climbs to the basin at the top of the fall, being muy cuidado, of course, to avoid Solchi along the way.