Hard rain gonna fall
The road was nice and smooth, and fast, and I made it about an hour north of Barra de Navidad before the sky turned dark and lightning started streaking between cloud and earth. I thought I could wait it out under cover of a Pemex, but no. At one point, crossing unexpectedly deep water, my feet were swept off the pegs as the bike plowed through.
The road stayed good all the way to the hill into Puerto Vallarta, then it completly went to pieces, like Richard Burton. As I passed the deserted location for "Night of the Iguana" mud was washing across the road, filling bottomless potholes with a brown slippery mess. This is a fancy, expensive, neighborhood and the road is a disaster. There is a tunnel at the north end of the bay. As I went through, it was dark and the street was rushing with water. Like a journey down the river Styx, when I came out into the new commercial, nightmare, area of Vallarta, the side streets were 18" deep under water and the traffic was terrible. Busses were forming 4 foot breaking waves and compacts were drowning.
Eventually I left the Starbucks and Home Depots behind and the road returned to the narrow, curvy, overgrown, Mex 200 I have come to know and love. I arrived in Sayulita as the sky cleared. A still touristy, but cheaper and laid back, town. Found the funky Hotel Sayulita Central and diner and the beach.
