Погода: Пуэрто-Эскондидо, январь

January is the dry, hot heart of the Puerto Escondido season - our row gives 29.7C reading as 33C with 5.3mm of rain across 1.4 days and a 27.4C sea - and it is also, regulars report, when the famous surf is at its smallest. Visitors in January describe waves that were simply not that big, with one reporting no high surf at all across a whole stay. That is a plus or a minus depending why you came. What does not change is the danger: Zicatela and La Punta are too much for beginners in any month, lifeguards move people out of the water at Zicatela without a board, and the world competitions are held here for a reason. High season also means far more traffic in town. The record: 22.3C nights, humidity 77 percent, 10.4 hours of sun and AQI 32.

Regulars are specific real rain essentially tapers off starting this month, November through March or April widely regarded as the best window here, a trip genuinely unlikely to see a drop of rain during this stretch. Our row backs that hot, genuinely dry read, 30.4C reading as a scorching 36C, over 23.2C nights feeling 27C, with rain light at 25.7mm across 6.6 days and humidity at 84 percent. Regulars are consistent the whole September-through-January run reads as close to perfect weather-wise, daytime temperatures commonly cited in the low-to-mid 80s Fahrenheit throughout. The sea sits at a bath-warm 29.9C. The record: 10.4 hours of sun, a 10.6 kph wind and AQI 31.

Regulars name the winter-into-spring stretch, running roughly November through this month, as the reliably dry window here, with a drop of rain highly unlikely on any given day before the pattern changes moving into May and June. Our row backs the dry read directly, just 4.9mm of rain across 1.6 days, alongside real heat, 30.6C reading as 35C at 74.4 percent humidity, over 24.4C nights. Surf is called out as a specific draw of this transitional month, with conditions still lively before the wetter, muggier stretch that regulars say builds from June through October. The sea sits at a warm 27.9C. The record: 11.4 hours of sun, a 15.2 kph wind and AQI 42.

March closes the busy season here, which regulars date December to March, and the swell is a little further along than January's. Their practical division is by beach rather than by month: Carrizalillo is the calm cove, quite flat with small waves in early March and swimmable through the whole winter, while the surf beaches carry enough size by February and March to make swimming there hazardous even when the waves are not huge. The roughest water of the year comes with the summer rains, and the surf competition is held in late November. Our row is the dry, hot version of Mexico's Pacific: 30C reading as 34C, 4.4mm across 0.8 precipitation days, and a 27.3C sea. The record: 23.4C nights, humidity 75 percent, 11 hours of sun and AQI 34.

December splits in two here. The first half is quiet - one early-December visitor reports very few people and plenty of surfers to watch - and then high season arrives, running from mid-December through most of January, with the Christmas-to-New-Year stretch described as a madhouse as the whole country heads for the coast. Hotels along this coast book out months ahead for those two weeks. Zicatela is why the surfers come and why the swimming is not the point: this is the beach that hosts world competitions. The record: 30C days that feel like 33C, 22.2C nights, 0.9 precipitation days carrying 4.5mm, 10.3 hours of sun and a 28.5C sea.