A Sesh at Shore Skatepark

Shore Skatepark is hard to leave. Even after spending all day there, you don’t really want to go home. Lucky for Shore Skatepark owners Emilio and Ceci, they don’t have to. With their crib upstairs, they have perhaps the coziest set-up of any skater in Vallarta (and perhaps, anywhere!). Though located right on the side of the highway going into Punta de Mita, Shore is easy to miss. It’s low-key fence and tall surrounding plants make it hard to spot. But man is it there, and has been for 15 years. 

Upon entering, you are surrounded by Ceci’s garden. Enveloped by plants, each step brings you closer and closer to the concrete park. An open park with a full pipe in the front, half pipes scattered throughout and the bowl in the back, Shore is perhaps the best in the bay. It’s purely skaters paradise. With so many spots to skate, it’s no wonder those who go stay all day.

To the left of the park is Ceci and Emilio’s house, which sits on top of the Shore store, a colorfully lit skate shop heavily decorated with stickers and every board ever owned by Emilio and family. We’re talking boards from the 70s and Lords of Dogtown days, back when skating was just starting out.

As I settled in and began to configure my camera for the shots that were to come, I watched Emilio and his homie Ruslan clean up the rain water that was left in the bowl from last nights storm. After a few minutes, the boys emerged from the bottom of the bowl with huge smiles on their faces, indicating that the water was gone and it was time to shred. As you watch Emilio skate the bowl, you feel somewhat hypnotized by his effortless flow. It’s clear from watching him that he lives and breathes skateboarding, that it is engraved in his genes.

While Emilio was in the flow of the bowl, I took some photographs of Ceci. A natural not only on surfboards and skateboards, but in front of the camera, she showed me around the park. Our first look was in the full pipe at the front of the park, where Ceci hopped on her board and began cruising up and down. Ceci dances on a board, and you feel as though you are watching poetry in motion.

After we had gotten some fire shots and the day was coming to an end, we sat down with Ceci and Emilio to get the scoop and story on Shore:

J: Tell me the story of Shore Skatepark. How did it get started?

E: Shore started in 2006 with a mini ramp that one of our friends gave us. It was a metal frame ramp, and we poured concrete on it. 

J: When did it become your guys’ house?

E:We started building the ramps and then around 2010 or 2009 we started building the rooms and around 2016 we moved here. 

J: Before that, it was just a skatepark?

E: Before that it was the skatepark growing and the storage room.

C: But we would come pretty much everyday to just chill and skate. And we were like “one day we will live here.” And now we live here. 

J: So back in the day, everyone would come and chill here and skate from morning to night?

E: Yeah or sometimes when we weren’t here, people would just hop over the fence and it was like that for a long long time. Because we would try to be here everyday but you know, we were traveling sometimes or working and doing other stuff. 

J: It’s a private property but open for everyday use?

E: Yeah of course, as long as they respect the area, the place. 

J: Do you have a lot of new people come or is it mostly the same faces?

E: Yeah, since it’s a really touristic place we always get new people coming to check it out, a lot of Americans.

J: How do they hear about it?

E: Well Punta Mita is big for surfing and skating and everybody in town knows of the park, it’s right on the road. So we get a lot of traffic, a lot of tourists looking to skate.

J: Any celebrity or pro skaters?

E: Yeah, a lot!

C: Tony Hawk!

E: Tony Hawk, Omar Hassan, Chet Childress, Grant Taylor, Jon Dickson --

C: C.J. Collins, Jake Phelps+, Figgy

J: Ceci, I heard you have a really cool Tony Hawk story, I’m dying to hear it!

C: Oh yeah --- so one day I was gardening here, because I love gardening. I was all sweaty and full of dirt and then someone knocked on the door. I saw a face between the fence and I’m like “oh it’s somebody, whatever.” And then I open the door and it’s Tony Hawk. And he’s like “Hi, is the skatepark open?” I was in shock, you know. And I’m like “Yeah of course.” and he’s like “Hi, nice to meet you, I’m Tony” and I’m like “Yeah, I know who you are.” I called Emilio, because he was at the surf shop and I’m like “dude, I think you should come, Tony Hawk just showed up.” It was the second time he was here. He was here before but the first time he came it was super crowded and a different vibe. Everyone was asking him for autographs and I think he just got overwhelmed. But this time the skatepark was open and he brought all of his family, his kids. Riley Hawk was here, his older son. And yeah, it was a good session, it was like a private session for him and his family. 

J: So what does a busy day look like for you guys?

E: Weekends are usually busy, Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays. It’s like 15 people or more.

C: Sometimes a big crew from Vallarta comes and another crew from Sayulita, and another crew from San Pancho. So whenever they get all together on the same day, it’s a busy day. 

J: It sounds like you guys have a lot of traffic coming in and out. 

C: Yeah, some days it’s busy and some days it’s super chill, like nobody comes. 

J: How do you guys like living at your own skatepark? What does a normal day look like for you?

E: Well I work outside of here, I go to Punta de Mita to the surf school, so I do some surf lessons or boat trips. But I try to be here in the afternoons at least because that's when people mostly like to skate. But sometimes I just close and go surf whenever the waves are good. 

J: Is it cool to just drop out of your bedroom window onto the ramp and start your day skating?

E: It’s not like I ever do it like that [laughs] but yeah it’s a cool set-up. 

C: Some days I wake up and start skating right away. I do private skate lessons so three times a week, I wake up, have breakfast, get ready and start skating at 10am. And that's the way I start my day. In the afternoon I have more lessons with kids so it’s fun to be able to just wake up and work at my house. My commute is the staircase from our bedroom to the park. 

J: So talk to me about the DIY culture and how you guys got into it.

E: Just with the years building here at my place. Always hiring people who know more than me and my homies who know how to build. But mainly being here, when there was a ramp being built and also trying, you have to try and mess up. That’s how I got into it, building my own park. I had an opportunity with Redbull when I was 22 in 2012. I got to travel a lot and see a lot of different parks and different DIYs also. I got to meet some people who were really into that. And before that, I had the background of building this place. It wasn’t how it is right now but it was a pretty good skatepark. So I helped with the construction here. When I was up north in the states with Redbull I had the opportunity to help in some projects with big names in skatepark building and got to meet the dudes behind it. So redbull really helped me to travel and see all these different skate scenes and skate parks and pools. 

Redbull was paying me so I didn’t have to do much other than skating and meeting people. After a little while in San Diego with Ceci, we decided to come back home to Mexico.

J: I don’t blame y’all. So whose land was this?

E: This is my Dad’s land and he bought it 15/16 years ago. The down payment for this land was actually a panga. This place was owned by an old lady who has a bunch of sons. And one of the sons is a fisherman. He didn’t have a boat and my dad did. 

J: So your Dad said here guys I just bought this land, build a skatepark or what happened there?

E: Yeah he also likes to skate. It was just the land and this guy gave me these metal framed ramps with plywood on top. We brought them here but the wood got all fucked up. So my dad and I and some other dudes put concrete on top of the metal framing. My dad also loves to skate so that once we got those frames that kind of became the purpose of this land. 

J: So for the last 14 years you guys have just been building this park?

C: When I met Emilio, there were only two half pipes and this bank. But everything else was plants, like nada. Mostly grass, two halfpipes and the banks. And little by little we built it up.

J: When you guys came back from Cali that’s when you started building more?

C: It was already kind of built up but I think after California we had a different vision. We also wanted to make things better because maybe at the beginning it was like “oh whatever, let’s just put this here, and that there.” We put more work into the rooms too. It was not only the ramps at that time but also the rooms upstairs, but they weren’t in very good condition. It was not very nice to live in. So after California, we made the rooms better so that way we could live here. So it definitely changed after California.

J: Ok guys, so tell me about your newest addition, the bowl!

C: The bowl was a dream, just like living here. After we started living here, it was like ok, one day we will have a bowl. Emilio made it happen with a lot of work and organization and support from people in the community. 

J: Who helped you guys make it happen?

E: Dreamland!

C: And Alex and Kristi. They’re friends of ours, and one day they started the gofundme and that’s what really started it all. Suddenly people started donating money and when we had the money, Dreamland came and made it all possible. 

J: What’s Dreamland?

E: Dreamland is a skatepark construction company from Oregon. They’re one of the biggest and most recognized in America. 

C: They build pretty much all around the world. 

E: Then we also got the support of Vans and Build Ramps Not Walls.

J: So having a bowl has been a big game changer?

C: Oh for sure, it’s the only bowl in the area.

J: Did you see a lot of change in traffic once the bowl was put up?

E: Yeah, but right when we finished the bowl, covid happened. 

C: It’s been weird because when they finished the bowl it was February 19th and in March we started the quarantine. So a lot of people have been here skating it but we couldn’t do the opening party. But yeah I definitely see a difference in the skaters who have come to skate the bowl, like kids are now skating a bowl with concrete coping. And that’s cool to see their level going up. 

J: Do you guys do skate lessons?

C: Yeah I do, for one family in particular. 

E: There’s a hope of making a full skate school but we need more people who can help us. We can’t do it all you know. 

C: There are parents who are calling me asking for skate lessons but I can’t do it by myself. For safety reasons, I can’t have a bunch of kids and then only one instructor. But definitely one day we would love to do lessons and make it a school.

J: And last but not least, how did you both get into skating?

E: Family. I got started in skating because of my dad. He always skated, since he was a kid too, so I grew up with skateboards in my house all the time. I can’t remember when I started skating. And I can’t remember how many times I hit my head either, hahah. 

C: And me, because of Emilio. He gave me my first skateboard. I met him at a skate contest in Vallarta like 11 years ago. I didn’t know how to skate and Emilio gave me my first skateboard. I liked it so much. At the same time I was learning to skate, I was learning to surf. So I got really into it.

Whether you are a beginner looking to experiment with half pipes and try your luck at the bowl, or an advanced skater wanting to increase your skill level and just skate your heart out, Shore Skatepark is the place to go.