Our Museums - The Navy Museum
The same way we can start a stroll along the beautiful Cuale River Island, something no one should miss out on, continuing through the pedestrian bridge onto the “Malecón” (boardwalk) we will have covered a good chunk of the nicest part of downtown Vallarta.
We can, likewise, tour the history of Mexico, starting at the Cuale River Island Museum that shows us the history of our western Mexico region starting approximately at on year 5000 b.c. all the way to the conquest of Mexico (see “Our Museum”, PVMirror, July 2008).
Well, as we leave the museum and climb the pedestrian bridge and walk onto the Malecón, by the Open Air Theater we will find the Museo Naval (Navy Museum), that shows us our country as it relates to the sea, this time, from the times of the Spanish conquest all the way to modern times.
 We are shown the process by which the coastal regions of the Mexican Pacific were conquered, like Colima, by Gonzalo de Sandoval, in 1523; Tepic, (named Santiago de Compostela back then) by Nuño de Guzmán in 1531; and the conquest of the indomitable Purépecha peoples of Michoacán that took from 1526 to 1537.
Then comes the long struggle to establish a commercial route permitting the traffic of spices from the islands Magellan called “Saint Lazarus” that we now know as the Philippines, in honor of the Prince of Asturias, future King Phillip II of Spain. Magellan died in the process but Juan Sebastián Elcano continued this circumnavigation and thanks to him Spain consolidated this route that operated from 1565 to 1815 between the Philippines and Acapulco. These vessels were known as the “Naos of China” (Vessels of China in Portuguese).
The exhibit also describes the function assigned to the Port of San Blas, starting in 1768, as a support shipyard for the northern explorations of the Californias, as well as the defense of the Naos of China.
You will find references to the institution of the Marine Infantry, as independent Mexico was being born between 1821 and 1822 and its battalions in Acapulco, Veracruz, Campeche and Mazatlán.
 From there we move on to the story of the Island of Clipperton, keenly named Island of Passion by Magellan. The island was first claimed theirs by the French; then granted to Italy by the Vatican; then handed to France by Italy and finally abandoned by France a few years later. This Mexican island lived a tragic chapter at the beginning of the XX century, when the country, humbled by an internal revolution abandoned the pioneers without their bi-monthly restocking from Acapulco, over 500 nautical miles apart.
We will tour through the birth of our Navy Aviation and the Navy Oceanographic Directorate, both dating back to 1917.
The exhibit is composed of descriptions, navigation charts, scale replicas of old and modern vessels, topographic scale models of the Mexican Republic and several of its ports; scale models of the Fort of San Diego in Acapulco and the Fort of San Blas; navigation gear, canons, uniforms, whale bones and scenes showing the commitment of our Navy to the community in cases of rescue and support in disasters, clearly showing the country’s pacifist vocation.
The upper floor features a coffee-shop with a panoramic view of the bay and the Malecón. There is also another exhibit area with monthly-changing themes; presently there is a colorful, tropical-coastal photographic exhibition organized by young photographers from the Centro Cultural Cuale art workshops. This way we have made a full circle ending at the beginning of last month’s story (see “Our Museum”, PVMirror, July 2008).
The Museo Naval (Navy Museum) is open Tuesday to Friday from 9:30am to 7:30pm. Saturdays and Sundays from 10am to 2pm and from 3pm to 7:30pm.
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And remember, September is the month of Mexico!
Eduardo Rincón-Gallardo
E-mail: toureps@prodigy.net.mx
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