A Place I Love: Rancho Primavera in El Tuito Gretchen DeWitt - SPCA-PV
August 17, 2015

I love Rancho Primavera in El Tuito, which is an hour's drive south of Puerto Vallarta.

It´s ranch and farm country, filled with animals and orchards and is very beautiful country.

With storm clouds gathering, it was almost as hot and humid there on Friday as it was in Puerto Vallarta.

After checking into the house on the small lake with my three young grandchildren, we went with Bonnie Jauregui, one of the owners, to look at the twenty bunnies and almost as many chickens in the large hen house.

Also there and being fostered by Bonnie, a one-year old rescued macaw named "Eduardo," who is just learning to fly from ropes to a large branch and a dangling piece of driftwood. It was a surprise when he landed on my head.

After a swim in the lap pool, we walked back to the lake house to change into our riding clothes and to cover our exposed skin with olive oil. It seems to be the best protection against bites from the "jejenes," the tiny mosquitoes that are called "no-see-ums" by northerners.

On the side of the dirt road, we spotted a slender green garden snake slithering through the grass with the head of a large green and yellow frog in its mouth. The legs of the frog were still moving.

We met Bonnie at the stables, who had rounded up five of the twenty-plus horses that roam free on the gorgeous 2000-acre property.  A beautiful four-week old foal was there nursing from a horse that Bonnie hadn´t known was pregnant. There are no stallions on the ranch, so the mama had had a visitor. Bonnie had been worried about the baby soon after its birth, because he had been bitten by his brother, a yearling, as well as by vampire bats. The foal, yet to be named, is thriving.

Early evening riding was on some of the many trails, through mango orchards, past passion fruit vines growing next to a stream, and across the green meadows where white ginger grows wild, giving off a delicious fragrance.

Dinner was late - and delicious - in a tented taco stand, while torrents of rain fell and thunder and lightning filled the sky above us.

For more information about this beautiful location, visit Rancho Primavera Mexico.

To see all the photos and get the latest news from SPCA-PV, visit Gretchen's Blog.

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