Since before we left on our trip we'd been looking forward to a February visit from our friend Lara. Accordingly it was a bit of a shock when she actually showed up at the airport in Puerto Vallarta, carrying a bag of stuff for us and looking remarkably like we remembered. We were momentarily confused when Cristina Aguilera came off the plane, but we remembered Lara didn't travel with bodyguards, pink pants, an orange tan or a tiny dog.

Lara had recently taken her architecture licensing exam and was looking forward to a break. Her first few days were scheduled in Puerto Vallarta at a hotel in the Zona Romantica, to be followed by a trip to tiny Chacala for a stay in a chic bungalow there.

Our first evening she wore her new green shoes and we sat drinking 2x1 margaritas at a bar on the South Beach malec�n while she filled us in on the progress of "Battlestar Galactica". Later we went to Daiquiri Dick's nearby and ate nouvelle Mexican seafood that was not bad at all.

The following day we strolled around the parts of Puerto Vallarta we liked the most: the Zona Romantica, the Rio Cuale and the neighborhoods up the river, and the hills of Gringo Gulch that remind us of San Francisco with their architectural curiosities and views into people's kitchens, decorated with traditional Mexican handicrafts and sprawled with bougainvilleas.

After a few days of poking around Puerto Vallarta we had her come to the boat in La Cruz, an hour's entertaining bus ride through Nuevo Vallarta and Bucerias, past the Mega where the cruisers (and other gringos) shop for cereal and sandals. We tried to show her the high life in La Cruz but it's a pretty sleepy town so we had to settle for a stroll on the beach, lunch in the cockpit, and Bloody Marias while we waited for the water truck that never showed up.

The following morning Lara boarded the bus for Chacala, and we left the dock at 0700 for the 43-mile trip around Punta Mita north. Around 5 we got to Chacala, where she hailed us on the radio (we'd lent her our handheld) and then made friends with some local teenagers who didn't quite believe she was waiting for that yacht that was anchoring so ponderously in the bay.

Lara seemed to be in a state of giddy disbelief at the bungalow she was staying in. Elevated above the cove at the south end of the beach, the Casa Majahua was like something out of the computer game "Myst": A series of buildings sprawling up the lush jungly hillside, with stone paths between and shirtless gardeners maintaining the flora. Each room is different, with window seats projecting out into the trees and bathtubs sunk into the floors. It was almost as neat as staying in a boat.

For several days Lara stayed at the hotel and we stayed on the boat across the cove, meeting late in the morning for a stroll on the beach or lunch or dinner with sand between our toes. One evening Lara invited us for supper at the tiny, outdoor hotel restaurant-salads, paella and Argentinian wine by candlelight-and afterwards we brought a bottle of Cuban rum and a computer with "Night of the Iguana" on it to her suite. With jungle sounds creaking outside and the surf breaking on the beach below, we lay on the futon and watched that classic film that created the myth of Puerto Vallarta.

Some local fishermen had befriended us and kept bringing fish out to the boat, singing "La Mariposa" as they came. They told us about a cove a couple of miles to the south where we could take our dinghy and go swimming on a deserted beach there. This sounded like the perfect combination for a picnic. So I grilled the mackerel they'd given us, along with some vegetables, and made enormous sandwiches. We packed them, Lara, and ourselves into the dinghy and motored across Chacala bay, past the big rock, around the second rocky point, and deep into the cove they'd told us about. At the back of this cove was a beautiful sandy beach fringed with palm trees. A gang of wintering-over Canadians had come to the beach on a horseback tour and were having a jolly time. We had a jolly time, too, swimming and eating our sandwiches and sitting in the shade. And when the Canadians had left and we had the place to ourselves, it felt like the exotic, palm-fringed fantasy that we'd set out for.

Our eyes were clouded with tears when the bus came to pick Lara up in Las Varas to take her away, back to Puerto Vallarta and thence San Francisco. We had looked forward so long to her visit, and we hadn't had a moment's disappointment. This is the hardest part of the traveling, and in a way the sweetest, that we miss our friends and family so and yet can see them so briefly.