Azulea Adventures - 70934 Puerto Escondido

While I was sitting on my surfboard, looking at the cliffs that stood protecting the beautiful blue waters of the bay we learned to surf, I found myself mentally writing the review of our time with Azulea Adventures and the town of Puerto Escondido. I underestimated how quickly after returning from our trip "real life" would engulf our free time with traffic, work, bills and day to day realities. Now as I sit here 3 months later, to attempt to put the beauty of the place and our hosts into words I have at last found the best way to describe what Azulea Adventures offers: An escape. My boyfriend an myself were far from easy patrons, mostly because I was brining him from 15 hours away for his Birthday Trip.. and he had no idea. About the surfing, or the trip, not even the flights. Once we arrived to Puerto Escondido, Carlos picked us up at the airport. He was easy to find, tropical board shorts and a huge smile - our trip was off. As he drove us to town Carlos filled Brad in on his Birthday surprise..that he was his private surf instructor for the week! The rest of the afternoon he introduced us to the little surf town where we would be staying, walked us down the beach and as we watched the local talent surf the waves he explained Surfing Theory to us...while answering all our first time surfer questions. After, Carlos took us around town to help find dinning options for us during the stay - difficult patrons part 2. We are vegetarian and vegan. Poor Carlos. During the next 5 days we spent time exploring, eating some of the most wonderful food I have ever tried, watching sunsets on beach hammocks (with pina coladas) and practicing our spanish with the locals. Mind you most people in the town spoke far better english than we did spanish, and everyone we met was so welcoming and helpful! Carlos met us every morning at and took us to the quiet bay 10 minutes away for our 2 hour surf lessons. We would start each lesson with stretching, drinking fresh coconut water and watching the waves come in waiting for our perfect moment to start practice. As we watched other schools take their new surfers into the bay it seemed like a very stressful experience, they would take large classes out into the ocean and when waves came they would shove their boards and yell "up, up"..to which most did not make it to a standing position. At this point we were feeling a little anxious to get in, wondering if we would also be falling more than standing on waves. By a miracle named Carlos, we not only did not fall every time , we even surfed by ourselves! I found out after a few of our lessons that Carlos was on the national surfing team in Puerto Escondido when he was younger and it shows. When we first went into the bay he has us spend a good amount of time learning just how to sit and balance the board, count waves coming in and learn to stand and lay back down with ease. After our first lesson both myself and Brad were standing up, catching waves and riding them in to shore. It was incredible. By the end of the trip we had taken to calling Carlos our Mr. Myagi, for surely without him we would have ended up swimming back to shore. The accommodations provided by Azulea Adventures are about a two minute walk from the local shops. Fully gated, private pool and only 4 apartments. Our Apartment had three balconies, a hammock, two showers, two bedrooms both with private AC, a full kitchen, living room and then upstairs a private roof deck with ocean view. Enough said, it was gorgeous. Looking back on our trip, despite the wonders of Puerto Escondito, the joys of surfing for the first time and beautiful views, what stands out to me the most is the time we spent with Carlos and his family. Thank you Carlos & Ruthanna for all you did to make our trip so special. You both made our adventure so much more than a vacation, but a special happy place we hold in our hearts and cannot wait to return to. P.S - The surfing photos below were taken by their Daughter, she is a wonderful photographer!