The development at Puerto Escondido

Puerto Escodido was supposed to be a part of the Escalera Nautica, which was a project to develop lots of marinas up and down both coasts of the Gulf of California and on the outside of the Baja peninsula. The idea was that if there were marinas no more than a day apart the whole way, thousands of boats would come streaming down from the US to spend large amounts of dollars in Mexico. It appears to have been canceled, but who knows, these ideas have a habit of getting reincarnated as the real estate market cycles, so perhaps it will be revived at some point. Personally, I don't think it's lack of marinas that keeps people from bringing their boats to Baja - more like lack of time, as it's a pretty long trip, but what do I know?

In anticipation of the many many boats that would be flocking here once the nautical staircase was completed, Fonatur (Mexico's tourist agency) started a residential development here. It never really got off the ground, and all that's here now, some 10 years in, is a sort of spooky half started neighborhood. Streets, streetlights, even a few structures, but nothing more. The desert is slowly and inexorably taking the area back, but it will be quite a while before these aspirational bits of concrete and steel are reabsorbed.








There's a smallish boatyard here, but apparently, there were plans for much bigger things, as there are stands sufficient to hold about 500 boats stored in large fenced parts of undeveloped lots.