Puerto Vallarta is Winnipeg South

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 25/02/2019 (2650 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, is a place where in the mid-winter months of January and February you have more chance of bumping into your neighbours than you do on a shopping trip to Polo Park.

Where else would you see someone walking around with an “I Love Transcona” T-shirt?

Not in Winnipeg, that’s for sure.

One person who loves the place so much that she has moved there permanently is Megan Kravetsky.

Born and raised in Winnipeg, she now runs the very busy Blake’s Restaurant & Bar on Avenue Francisco Medina Ascencio, which is the main road that runs through the hotel zone between the airport and downtown.

When I called in at Blake’s last month the place was hopping. There was a rock band complete with horn section playing on the outdoor patio and, even though it was just late afternoon, the place was crowded.

As a diehard Jets and Bomber fan, I found it appropriate that Megan is running a sports bar and it’s a great venue for watching Jets games on TV.

Megan spent 15 years working in the restaurant industry in Winnipeg. Despite working two or three jobs at once she struggled to make ends meet and couldn’t see a clear path to her goal of owning her own restaurant one day.

Even though she says you can never take the Winnipeg out of her, Megan knows that Mexico is now her home, and she has come to appreciate the culture, history and relaxed mentality of the people there.

If you head a few miles north of Puerto Vallarta, to the laid-back artistic community of Bucerias, you may come across Sandra Neumann and her husband Andrew, another couple of former Winnipeggers who now run a delightfully charming restaurant there called Sandrinas.

Although Andrew’s family has a history of operating Greek restaurants, the couple never intended to open a restaurant in Mexico. The plan was to open an internet café, which they did 18 years ago and it has developed into a thriving eatery, complete with live music nights.

Their son Paul has now opened up his own place just down the street, Chin Gon, an Asian-themed restaurant.

Sandra tells me that life is not much different from living in Winnipeg except that it’s warm all the time.
And who can argue with that?

Trevor Smith is a community correspondent for River Heights. You can contact him via email at smitht@mymts.net