Spotfinder
Santa Marianita (Playa Bonita)
Overview:
Santa Marianita is a small fishing village about 20 minutes south of the city of Manta. This is a 300 meters wide, 4km long sandy beach, with plenty of space for learning, launching and landing, and a sometimes surfable shorebreak with waves from 1 to 1.5-2 meters high for intermediate and expert riders. A couple of restaurants can be found near the launching area where riders gather. The beach is never crowed.
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Directions:
• From Guayaquil or Quito: you can either take a bus (10 hours from Quito, 3 hours from guayaquil) to the city of Manta (3rd biggest city in Ecuador, so many buses go there). Or fly into Manta from Quito (35 minutes flight).
• From Manta: Once in Manta, the easiest choice is a taxi that can take you to Santa Marianita beach.
If you rent a car in Manta, then from the airport go to the the Barbasquillo neighbourhood, south of the center of Manta. From there take the road that goes to San Mateo, a fishing village 5 minutes further south from Manta along a coastal road. To go to San Mateo there's a fork in the road where you have to take a right. As you enter San Mateo take the first street to the left, a very steep street that goes to a bridge and then steeply up again. Then go left and follow the road along the hills until you see signs with the name Playa Bonita or Santa Marianita (the village next to Playa Bonita).
find low-cost flights to Santa Marianita (Playa Bonita)Level required:
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Beach rules:
Kite responsably
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Details:
• Wind: the Manta area is very dry, with one of the lowest rainfall averages on the coast. This, combined with the strong equatorial sun, makes the air over the interior heat up a lot. Meanwhile the water is relatively cool, so there is a high pressure difference between the hot air over land and the cooler air over sea which creates the strong thermal winds.
We have a long windy season, from May to January, with average speed between 18 and 25 knots. Wind starts slowly picking up from about 11am to reach its peak at around 1:00 to 2:00 pm and last approximately until 4:00-4:30 pm.
The windy seasons starts when the rains stop and the cold water currents arrive.
• Waves: conditions are choppy and small waves from June to Oct (dry season). Then, from Nov to Jan (wet season) we have 1.5-2 meters waves days, specially good for riding at the southern most point of the beach.
• Weather: the weather is warm, with average air temperatures around 25-30°C (77-86°F) and water temperatures of 21-24°C (70-75°F) in winter (dry season), and of 25-28°C (77-82°F) in summer (wet season). No wetsuit needed, eventually a rashguard for colder days.
Medium season:
45-70% >= 4 bf
Best season:
70% >= 4 bf
Day activities:
Night scene:
the city of Manta has all the night life, restaurants, etc etc
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