Mexico - Sayulita

SAYULITA STREET VIEW

This street is a sample of the pictoresque and relaxed style of Sayulita.

Sent by Natalia from Fortín de las Flores, Mexico.

Sayulita is a small town in Mexico along the Pacific Ocean at the southern end of the state of Nayarit and north of Banderas Bay. It has a population of approximately 5,000 inhabitants.

According to information collected by the historian of Sayula, Jalisco, the name Sayulita was given by Mr. Don Lauro González Guerra to honour his hometown, Sayula. The word Sayulita is a diminutive of Sayula, which in Nahuatl comes from Tzaulan, meaning "place where flies abound," which in turn derives from zayolin, the Nahuatl word for fly.

Early inhabitants of Sayulita were drawn to the area to work on coconut palm ranches, where coconut oil was extracted from the palm species Attalea cohune. During the coconut oil boom, many people died of lung diseases caused by inhaling the dust that the coconuts gave off when split. The hacienda grew, and in addition to oil production, it soon became an important livestock emporium. In 1936, the livestock were sold and the land donated to the port workers with the intention to continue producing, leading to the formation of the Sayulita ejido (read more).