Troncones, Mexico

An unassuming surf town hidden on the Mexican Pacific coast.

It was dark when we landed in Zihuatanejo airport, in the Mexican state of Guerrero. It wasn’t supposed to be – relentless thunderstorms delayed our flight by almost three hours. Getting into Troncones at night was exactly what I was trying to avoid, yet scheduling challenges and now this flight delay made the arrival a lot more stressful.

Guerrero is one of six Mexican states designated as Do Not Travel destinations by the US State Department. The website ominously asserts: “Do not travel due to crime. Crime and violence are widespread. Armed groups operate independently of the government in many areas of Guerrero.” My travel companion and I did ponder whether going was actually a good idea. Further research showed the US State Department website is known in travel circles for its overly dramatic warnings (as a French citizen, their blurb on travel to France makes me want to laugh hysterically). I also found out their Canadian and UK counterparts were a bit more reassuring in their assessment of the situation on the ground, and a deep dive into local Facebook groups confirmed that this area of Guerrero was currently very safe.

Still, the plan was to arrive in full daylight, and to get right into the prebooked car, whose driver was to wait for us inside the terminal.

I breathed a sigh of relief as we slowed down and made a sharp left into a smaller road.

Beyond the delay, our flight was uneventful, and none of the severe turbulence the pilot warned us about actually happened. AeroMexico uses Embraer 195s on this route, operated by their subsidiary AeroLittoral three times daily. Other airlines link the two cities: low-cost challengers Volaris and Viva Aerobus each fly the route once a day. The schedule dictated we fly AeroMexico’s last flight of the day into Zihuatanejo airport.

From the airport to Troncones, most of the travel occurs on Highway 200, also known as La Costera. At first, the road passes through the Zihuatanejo suburbs as a four-lane highway but as soon as it leaves the resort of Itxapa to the left and veers into more mountainous terrain, it becomes a two-lane strip of asphalt that, at night, feels like a road to nowhere. There are hardly any houses within sight, and no public lighting. Our driver, possibly looking forward to finally ending its day of work, was driving faster than humanly possible through the darkness. Oh great, I thought, if we are not stopped by a bunch of blood-thirsty criminals, we’ll hit a cow or two instead, and that will be the end of it.

Thankfully, both the US State Department warnings and my inner thoughts were wide off the mark, and I breathed a sigh of relief as we slowed down and made a sharp left turn into a much smaller road leading to the coast. After a few minutes in pitch darkness, we finally arrived in Troncones. It was past 10.30pm on a Thursday, and beyond a few dogs, no soul was to be seen.

It rained a lot during our first night. At times, the thunder seemed unbelievably close to us but by the time we got up everything had cleared, and the morning light was glorious. Our hotel room had a direct view of the beach and we wasted no time in walking along the shore to get a sense of the town from the water.

Unlike other Pacific beaches (like Puerto Angel’s in Oaxaca state), Troncones’ doesn’t feel super welcoming. Really high waves come crashing with godly force on shore and the beach is dotted with boulders of various shapes and sizes - most are of the kind you don’t want to end up crashing on. As a result, we stayed away from the water and, throughout out stay, only saw a few people venture in. During high season, the beach is allegedly a surfer’s paradise. We saw nothing of the sort, but then again, the whole village felt like it belonged to us: until late afternoon, when Mexican tourists from surrounding towns, or even Mexico City, drove down, we were among very few people wandering around.

I have seen many sunsets on the Pacific but the one in Troncones was among the most beautiful.

Our first day was spent doing very little and enjoying the lush grounds of our hotel. I chose to read a book -The Twist of a Knife by Anthony Horowitz- because the internet connection was spotty, a constant around town. The heat, although intense, was nowhere near as suffocating as it can be up north in Nayarit or Jalisco, probably because of lower humidity, which made it relatively more pleasant. In all fairness, the best weather happens in the wintertime, which is Troncones’ high season.

As it was getting close to sundown and although menacing clouds were forming in front of the Sierra Madre mountains, we decided to hike up to the Troncones mirador to enjoy the view from above. It took us about fifteen minutes. At first, it felt easy: someone well intentioned had carved a few wooden signs to show tourists the right path. However, once we got to the last house up the hill, it was every man for themselves. We guessed we had to cross through a thick forest and after a few minutes, saw a clearing that led us to a flimsy wood platform affording us gorgeous unlimited views of the coast.

I immediately thought we were going to be the forest’s mosquitoes’ dinner, but we stayed relatively bite-free. I have seen many sunsets on the Pacific but have to admit the Troncones one was one of the most beautiful – probably because we could see the light changing over the ocean but also over the lush forest that covers the surrounding hills. I half expected howler monkeys to start shouting but it didn’t happen (there are no monkeys in Guerrero).

The rain eventually caught up to us as we were having dinner – fresh seafood with rice and beans, a coastal staple which is always a treat - and flooded the restaurant’s ground floor. We had to run through the storm to get back to our room, in flip flops, like the unprepared tourists that we were. Lesson learned (or probably not).

It's true that nature felt very close to us in Troncones, and that is part of the magic of this unassuming little town.

On our second day, we decided to go out in the wilderness and chose an excursion with Costa Nativa, a local tour company. Miguel, our guide, drove us about thirty minutes along the coast, all the way to Boca de Lagunillas, where we left the car and got on a canoe to paddle through the laguna in brackish water that, at the end of the rainy season, is high enough to flow into the ocean.  It wasn’t the case that day but we enjoyed the peace and quiet of the river’s closed mouth, with sightings of many cute baby iguanas (I never thought I would use “iguana” and “cute” in the same sentence but there you have it) as well as the fluffiest baby herons, which we stayed clear of, as we didn’t want to startle them lest they fall into the water, which is likely lethal for them at a young age. Aww factor 10 out of 10.

Miguel had grown up in Troncones and then left for the US, where he stayed about ten years, so his English was flawless. He knew he would come back to Troncones one day, and we didn’t feel like asking him why he did, but he confessed he was missing the great skiing opportunities his life in Nebraska was affording him. Being a reliable tour guide isn’t a full-time job in Troncones in the low season, and Miguel mentioned the tour we went on (and for which we were the only two customers) doesn’t happen every day. As a result, he also works construction jobs to make a decent living.

Initially a small farming community administered as an ejido – communal land used for agriculture in which community members have a right to use land that is otherwise owned by the state, Troncones made a name for itself in the 80s as an undiscovered surf destination for intrepid explorers.

In 1991, as part of the process to enter the North American Free Trade Agreement, Mexican president Carlos Salinas had Mexican property laws updated, allowing ejidos to be rented or sold. This drove investment in Troncones, and the creation of a (very modest) sea front of commercial properties.

Lucky for us, this didn’t turn Troncones into another modern-day Tulum. The village still feels very laid back and only counts 800 full-time dwellers. Very few cars pass by its main road, and you tend to see more cats and dogs than people (crocodiles have also been reported but we didn’t see any, except on a rusted yellow warning sign by the town’s main bridge). The sense of community and hospitality is palpable, whether at the grocery store or the pharmacy.

On our second evening, which was thankfully rain-free, we chose to walk along the beach (I have to admit I am a little obsessive-compulsive when it comes to closing my activity rings). It was pitch dark and, the beach being rather large, we couldn’t count on lights from the nearby hotels to show us the way. As a result, we almost walked on a Golfina turtle which had come on the beach to lay eggs – it turns out September is peak nesting season. I immediately turned off my phones’ light and we stayed far away. Now much more aware, we saw three more turtles on the beach, one of them in the process of digging a hole to bury its eggs. It was quite impressive but we also felt like intruders in a play we had no part in, so we backed away and let nature do its thing.

We felt like intruders in a play we had no part in, so we backed away and let nature do its thing.

It's true that nature felt very close to us in Troncones, and that is part of the magic of this unassuming little town. We felt like guests in a world that wasn’t primarily made for us, in a place that mass tourism hasn’t yet discovered (and hopefully never will). Real estate developments do exist in Troncones, but what we saw was small scale, and relatively well integrated in the fragile ecosystem. It may be one of the silver linings of the safety situation in Guerrero that it keeps development opportunities at bay for the time being. The town feels undisturbed by the small flow of tourists passing by, and definitely not heavily marketed as the next it-town on the Pacific coast like Puerto Escondido can be.

On our third and last day in town, we walked further than we ever had to the east, and ended up discovering another beach past the main one. The Joluma bar marks the boundary between the two of them, and the smallest beach, which has no official name I am aware of (which admittedly doesn’t mean much), feels like an even quieter version of playa, with very few buildings, no one around, and water that appeared to be shallower, if not any less treacherous. We took a little break under a palapa to call a friend who had been teased enough by gorgeous sand pics to demand a live debrief, enjoying a very rare moment of passable cell service, and ended up eating lunch on the beach, in one of the many restaurants affording patrons an ample sea view. Once again, we were almost alone, but by then we were used to it and not worrying about having walked into the only restaurant in town to avoid. I have to admit our hotel’s recommendations were spot on.

We watched the sunset on the beach, drinking here a margarita, there a mojito, eliciting curious looks from the many dogs that came up to our table to beg for food – I will say most of the dogs we saw were friendly, sported a collar and none of them looked malnourished. You can tell a lot about a community by looking at how they treat their animals, and on this index, Troncones passed with flying colors. I did take a few selfies with dogs, one of them eliciting cries of laughter on the family chat, since I had failed to notice a dog doing his business in the background as I was busy pouting next to another canine. Needless to say, this photo will not make it here.

We had initially planned to end our last day with a mountain hike, courtesy of Costa Nativa, but like the most optimistic plans laid out at the beginning of an ambitious weekend, we laid this idea to rest fairly quickly after having sat down for drinks. I assume we would have gone, had we stayed a fourth day, and I kind of want to do it whenever I go back to Troncones – the opportunity to see many birds and endemic flora was quite tempting, and supporting a nice local tour company was an added bonus.

Once we got to the last house up the hill, it was every man for themselves.

Our last day was a Monday (US Labor Day, to be specific) and scheduling required an dreadfully early wakeup call of 5am, to catch a 7.30am flight from Zihuatanejo. It had rained quite a bit overnight, and as we left town and got onto the narrow road leading to highway 200, we came upon a massive tree that had fallen on the ground, completely blocking the way. Before I could even compute we might have to miss that early flight, I realized in our luck, the tree had fallen by a small right of way which we were able to use to go around. I can’t imagine how we would have dealt with this situation otherwise. It was another way for nature to remind us it had the upper hand in Troncones. We were lucky she didn’t want to make too strong a point.

Back on the highway, I started reminiscing about how I had been so scared coming in at night and how I felt we might get abducted at every turn. After three idyllic days in Troncones, these fears were completely erased from my mind, and we arrived to the airport just before sunrise.

The experience in Troncones made me go to another of the Do Not Travel states, Michoacán. My entry on Morelia, its capital, is here.

We really enjoyed Troncones, its tranquility and closeness to nature and its unassuming charm. I would love to have the opportunity to come back at a different time of the year and if I do, I will definitely write about it.

Images: Troncones mirador at sunset, Troncones main beach (twice), Troncones more secluded second beach, Laguna Boca de Lagunillas, Troncones main beach.

All images are mine.

Costa Nativa tours: website