Looking out my Backdoor: The Sleaziest Hotel in Chacala

We told her. We told her. Never again is she allowed to pick the hotel.

“The owner is really nice,” she said.

“Yes, the owner is a nice man; his wife is nice, his three-year-old daughter is cute.” The hotel is sleazy.

Not sleazy in the way of an immoral business conducted in a hotel on the outer edge of town posting hourly rates, but sleazy in the way of shabby, dirty, sordid, inadequate and unpleasant.

In her defense, she didn’t know and none of us checked it out before we booked.

I suppose we’ve all had an experience like this, if we’ve traveled. I remember a motel off the highway on the way to Phillipsburg … but that is a different story.

Lani, her husband, Ariel, Carol and myself drove to Chacala on the coast in Nayarit. If one has a large enough map and a magnifying glass, one might find Chacala north a bit from Puerto Vallarta. We went seeking a three-day holiday to scout out the town as a possible destination to flee next year’s colder weeks in January.

We chose Chacala, a tiny fishing village, carved into the mountains on the edge of a small bay, for its isolation and quiet. The setting is beautiful. The townsfolks welcoming and friendly.

Our hotel perched two blocks above the main street along the beachfront. Straight up the hill on a street covered with ankle-turning rubble. The hotel office is a cell phone in the owner’s pocket.

Built onto a narrow lot, the two floors each contained three rooms. My room required a precarious climb up a curving narrow staircase littered with construction debris.

Sparse. Dirty white in color. A cell with two beds, a bathroom, and one dollar store plastic chair. No shelves, no dresser, no tables. One bedside wall lamp had no bulb. The other lamp had a bulb but didn’t work. The bathroom bulb had burned out and not been replaced. There was not a spot of color. White sheets covered the beds.

I made the best of it. I emptied my suitcase onto one bed, converting it to closet, drawers and shelves. For a mere three day trip, I had packed my two down pillows and my blue plush blanky.

We all made the best of it. After all, what’s to complain, we did have hot water for showers.

Did I mention construction debris? Work men were building a third floor to the structure, adding three more rooms above. Seven in the morning until dark, hammering, hammering; dust and noise prevailed.

I speak but a minimum of our collective complaints. To say the hotel is “bare bones” might be complimentary. Why didn’t we move out? I don’t know. We grumbled. A lot. We had prepaid, in cash. Perhaps our room fees paid this week’s construction costs. Perhaps hope of a refund was long gone.

Chacala, a lovely jewel on the sea. Chacala is not a tourist destination, not a high-rise resort town. We popped into several hotels, peered into empty rooms, inquired about rates. We poked our noses into hotels with a dozen rooms. We checked out others with twenty or thirty rooms, all clean, all colorful, all reasonable in price, all along the beachfront, none perched precariously on the hillside.

We ate seafood at a different restaurant (or street stand) every meal. We found the best coffee in town. We spent hours on the beach, lingering over every meal. We talked. We read books. We lounged. Carol and Lani swam. Ariel and I shared a dozen oysters on the half shell, in ecstasy over every bite while Carol and Lani grimaced with disgust. We had good times.

Then we trudged back up the hill to our hotel.

——

Sondra Ashton grew up in Harlem but spent most of her adult life out of state. She returned to see the Hi-Line with a perspective of delight. After several years back in Harlem, Ashton is seeking new experiences in Etzatlan, Mexico. Once a Montanan, always. Read Ashton’s essays and other work at montanatumbleweed.blogspot.com. Email [email protected].