Riley Blakeway’s Guide To Mexico


Feeling chilly? As anyone who’s seen this will know, good time having cerveza purveyors Corona Extra had themselves a road trip for the ages in their new short film, Someplace Else, which brought together an eclectic posse of creative types including surfers Ozzie Wright and Dylan Graves, musician Hanni El Khatib, artists Rose Ashton and Jeff Canham, skateboarder Andrew Brophy and director Riley Blakeway. The latter of whom we caught up with to discuss all things Mexico. Salud!

What is the best place to have a drink in Mexico? Cerritos Beach, Cabo. For some reason I had the best time drinking here out of all of my Mexico trips.  We would walk straight in from the beach to our hotel on the sand and sit in a hot tub that overlooks the bay. There wasn’t any nightlife or anything like that, it’s a small surf town but a really good spot to relax and drink a beer.  

Where are some of your favourite surf spots? Chacala is pretty damn good. It’s a 20-minute boat ride from a small harbor just north of Puerto Vallarta and it’s made up of two left point breaks. There’s a quick barrel on the take off and a few little ramps here and there. The backdrop is awesome for shooting too – big, tropical palm trees and massive birds straight off the set of Jurassic Park. It’s an easy wave to surf which also means it’s gringo friendly so expect to be sharing two foot waves with a middle aged tourist from Phoenix, waving a GoPro.  

Where are some of your favourite skate spots? I have to say Puerto Vallarta because it’s the only town in Mexico I have ever skated. There isn’t too much to skate around there but it makes for a fun challenge. I spent a lot of the trip with my head out the car window yelling stop and I would get excited about rough little street spots that I normally wouldn’t look twice at if I were in LA or Sydney but they were fun as fuck. I feel like it’s a novelty skateboarding anywhere in remote parts of Mexico and we had a lot of fun just skating flat ground or mellow spots around town. There’s some DIY stuff here and there too.

  

Where is the best spot to watch the sun set? Playa Mita beach. A cool, old, Californian hippy let us park our bus on a cliff outside his house that overlooked the ocean whilst Jeff and the gang painted the bus one afternoon. It’s a pretty remarkable part of the world down there and the vibe is always good when you’re with a bunch of bros, an esky full of beer and a cliff view like that.  

Where should we eat?  Puerto Nuevo is my favourite. A small town just over 50 minutes drive from the California known by locals as “Lobster Village”.  I use to drive down there with friends all the time when I was living in California as a kid. You can stuff yourself full of fried lobster cooked in lard (Langostas) with all the trimmings to make tacos for about 10 bucks. I’m yet to leave that place without a stomachache but it’s one of the best eats you’ll ever have.   

What are the three things you need to pack on a trip to Mexico? I forgot board shorts on my last trip and had to swim in boxer shorts the entire time so I’m going to go ahead and list that as number one. The second is money. The food and stay is mostly cheap but you’ll need cash for bribing your way out of just about anything that the Federales decide to bill you for. Especially if you’re bringing in a bunch of camera equipment.  If you’re on a holiday a surfboard is pretty key. I can’t really think of a better place to get salty then a Mexican shore break.    
What little town people might not know about should they explore? I had a lot of fun shooting in a little town called Banderas, just outside of Puerto Vallarta. That whole zone is really unique in comparison to other parts of Mexico I’ve been to but something about this place really stood out to me. Every street looked like it belonged on a Mexican-themed film set at Paramount. It had a surreal, almost quirky look to it and made a perfect backdrop for filming scenes in the movie.  
 
Where should people drop some cash and what should they be dropping it on? One of the best things about going to Mexico is knowing that you don’t need to burn a hole in your wallet to have a good time. Most necessities are cheap and for me I’m usually just spending money on food and beers but firecrackers are a good way to spend some cash.  I can’t remember where but one time I bought a bunch of firecrackers with some friends in Baja and apparently each one was the equivalent to a quarter stick of dynamite. We spent a whole afternoon blowing things up on the beach at Rosarito. 
See more at coronaextra.com.au

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