Mexican Homes & Gardens 3 - A Jungle Village Casa

This Sayulita home was one of our favorites. It was actually a compound of buildings, surrounding a large round palapa-roofed (thatched-roofed) outdoor living area. I didn't want to intrude with pictures of their living spaces – I really only wanted photos of the gardens, but it was so damn beautiful! Each "room" was its own building - living room, kitchen and four or five bedrooms. They were all distinct "cottages" surrounding the palapa. The owner was there and happy to have me take some photos.

Our first view of this casa
was an immense white wall,
with bougainvillaea lopping
over the sides and these
great big asparagus ferns
in pots way up high.

This was our first stop on our Mexican "Casa & Garden Tour" with the friends we were staying with. This homeowner was very gracious -- she was hosting an art show at her house for a visiting artist. We ran into the home owner a few more times out and about before our vacation was over.

The pool was just a step below the palapa-covered patio. The gardens filled in and around and behind the buildings. Each bedroom cottage had its own pricate outdoor patio. The whole setting, behind a gated tall wall, was like walking into a small village in a jungle, with one of the bedrooms appearing to be more like a tree house than a separate cottage like the others.

The gardener helping the owner of the house is an expat American named Tom. He gave us a tour of the garden. Much of it is fairly newly planted, but he assures us that within a year, you think it was here forever. He's originally from Austin and used to own a nursery named Park Place Garden Center.

He is an avid fan & collector of palms and cycads. Except he keeps his collection of palms & cycads in the gardens of the people he designs for. That way, they get to buy them, and he gets to visit them. I cannot do any of the trees and cycads here justice by remembering their names, but his eyes lit up and he talked of them excitedly, yet tenderly. I'll show photos from his wild house and garden later in the week. You'll want to see it.

I think I could live in Sayulita and coordinate the "Garden Walk Sayulita" tour, its own version of Garden Walk Buffalo. If only I could find a way to make money doing it...

One of my favorite features Tom designed was this fountain
wall fronted by tall horsetail plant. I want this in my yard.

With foliage like this, who needs flowers.
I have that variegated ginger plant on the bottom as a house plant.

The central gathering area under the palapa. It felt more like a village square than a living room.

The stone pool wall had rock outcroppings that served as planters for creeping plants.

What looks like a large bug crawling up this tree is a vine.
It'll eventually sort of become one with the tree.
When I get to post about this gardener's own home, I can show
an example of a similar tree, now dead, used as
a post to hold up his house. It's a work of art.

Close up, it looks even more like a bug!

This is a pencil cactus or milk bush plant. I have one here in Buffalo
I keep as a house plant. It's about one foot tall and spends its summers
in the Harry Potter garden. I can see it would rather be in Sayulita.

One of the bedrooms & its private patio.

The base of the rock pool wall hosts this dark garden.

Great Suess-like silhouette. The white walls really make the plants stand out.

Bougainvillaea in tree form.

The man likes his exotic cycads. Can't fault him for that.