Experience the best of Puerto López

Puerto López is a fishing town on a wide bay on the coast of Manabí province in Ecuador, with a beach where fishing boats land their catch and a small seafront of cafés. It is the gateway to Machalilla National Park, a reserve of dry forest, beaches and islands that protects both coast and sea.

Isla de la Plata, a flat island offshore, is nicknamed the poor man's Galápagos for its blue-footed boobies, frigatebirds and nesting albatrosses. Humpback whales come to breed in these waters from about June to September. Los Frailes, a wide curve of pale sand inside the park, is one of the finest beaches on the coast, and the community of Agua Blanca has a small museum of the Manteño culture and a sulphur spring.

Ceviche, fish soup thickened with peanuts and corviches, plantain fritters filled with fish, are staples of the Manabí coast. The coast is dry, with cool, grey months and warm, bright ones, and whale season is the high point of the year.