Where? Survival Beach, Maleza Baja, Aguadilla, Puerto Rico
Address
Survival Beach, 14, 6 Cliff Rd, Aguadilla Pueblo, Aguadilla, 00603, Puerto Rico
Hours of operation to hike to Survival Beach you need to park by Surfer’s Beach and walk to the trailhead. According to Google, the gate to Surfer’s Beach is open 24 hours, but growing up in this area I can tell you that’s not always the case. There isn’t an official source of information stating when and why it open/closes. But if you go during normal day hours, it should be open.
IMPORTANT: We visited this beach on an early morning day during a weekday. The beach wasn’t crowded at all. We were the first ones to arrive there and this lasted for about an hour. The amount of people we saw on our way back was minimal.
Fee None. This is FREE access. Yay!
Pets allowed. We saw people hiking with their dogs and splashing with them in the water. BUT, please, practice Leave No Trace principles. This includes, collecting your pet’s 💩 (and yours too or dig a hole!)
Restrooms None. Not even porta potties.
Food There isn’t any food kiosk or food vendor on site. This is a secluded beach located in an undeveloped area. And we want it like that! Bring your own food. There’s many restaurants, cafes, bakeries and eateries near by. This beach is within a five minute drive from the Rafael Hernández International Airport (BQN) in Aguadilla.
FYI: The day we visited, there was a man selling cold coconuts just by the trailhead, see picture above. His prices range from $3.00-$5.00, depending on the coconut size. Fresh coconut water is the most refreshing drink (and hydrating) while hiking on a beach. I believe he’s regularly there.
Parking available at Surfer’s Beach.
Note: The gate to access Surfer’s Beach is right after the store Surf Zone. There’s a paved road that takes you down the hill but afterwards it’s a sand path. There’s multiple holes on the road too. Locals drive here with any car, at their own risk but a four-wheel drive vehicle is better. BE ADVISED!
What to expect
After parking, you may want to explore Surfer’s Beach a bit. This beach is beautiful too but it’s rough and not great for little kids. There’s a lot of wave activity and it’s literally used for surfing, and surfing classes. You might see people getting surfing classes there.
(1) Explore Surfer’s Beach and/or (2) go to the Survival trailhead and start hiking.
To walk towards Survival Beach, you’ll continue straight to the dead end and you’ll quickly see the trailhead sign. If the tide is low enough, you can get to the beach by walking on the shore and on top of ocean rocks. But on this visit, it wasn’t low enough. I also think that it’s always best to play it safe and take the route through the beachy woods. The tide in the Caribbean can change in a matter of minutes.
As mentioned before, this hike takes between 15-20 minutes for the average person. It’s categorized as moderate in All Trails. Length wise, it’s about 2 miles round trip.
It’s a short hike but it’s strenuous. Especially, because weather in Puerto Rico features high humidity and high temperatures. The day we hiked to this beach it was around 80% humidity and over 90 degrees.
While you hike this trail you’ll be rewarded with beautiful views of the ocean. There’s even certain spots where you can get off trail and venture into beach areas .
You’ll know when you get to Survival Beach because you can’t miss the huge boulders on the water. The scenery is out of this world!
It’s almost unbelievable that this place is about a five minute drive from the airport in Aguadilla. The views make it seem like if it’s on a very very remote place.
Once you get to this spot, you need to continue walking on these rocks. This is already part of what is considered Survival Beach.
There’s plenty to explore here, such as walking all the way to this little peninsula to observe a lot of sea urchins and crabs.
You can totally choose to stop your hike here. This area is long and wide enough. We decided to continue walking a little bit further and were greeted with even more fantastic views.
After hiking a little bit more and witnessing the views pictured above, the hills became steeper and longer. We were tired and under prepared as my kids were wearing Crocs and I was wearing flip flops. Therefore, we went back and stayed on the first sand stretch of Survival Beach.
Note: Waterproof shoes with good traction are best. Bring the flip flops on a backpack.
As you can see, this is a very wild and secluded beach. We were the only ones here for about an hour. We saw very few people coming in and on our way back.
This beach is a photographers dream. There are so many opportunities to get good shots here. It was actually very hard to choose pictures for this blog post and Instagram. Just be assured that we stayed here for about 2.5 hours and didn’t want to leave. It was like being in paradise, literally and figuratively.
Later on, we hung out next to this boulder. Another big rock produced a huge shade so I rested there while the kids played.
Don’t forget to bring the following essentials:
Sunscreen anytime you will be exposed to the sun you should wear sunscreen. Follow the instructions for application to allow it to dry and if you have the means, please use a sunscreen that is labeled reef safe. You can read more about it here.
Waterproof shoes with good traction and support. You can bring the flip flops in a backpack.
Hat consider getting a hat from a local vendor in the island.
Beach toys I don’t recommend to bring floaters to this beach, this isn’t a spot for floating devices which will most likely be blown away and left in the ocean. But a couple of small beach toys would be ok.
Do not bring ridiculously loud speakers to play music, use your headphones for that. Also, this is not a beach for cookouts.
I hope you have a great time visiting this beautiful place. Being in contact with nature is proven to make you feel better and happier. Let me know if you go how it goes and remember that the easiest way to stay on the loop is to follow me on insta, where I also share videos and more on my stories/highlights!
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LuzWanderer 