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<\/p>\nFrom behind a bright pink counter, Irelda Su\u00e1rez dishes out generous helpings of ice cream covered in sprinkles and chocolate sauce to kids in her tiny shop. The sound of hunks of metal being hurled into a dump truck puncture the air.<\/p>\n
Ms. Su\u00e1rez\u2019s shop in a quiet neighbourhood in Puerto Vallarta shares a wall with a convenience store that was torched Sunday, its exterior blackened and everything inside destroyed. Across the street, a truck has been reduced to a twisted, charred skeleton.<\/p>\n
This is not the Puerto Vallarta of a week ago. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Irelda Su\u00e1rez\u2019s ice-cream business is intact, but many others in Puerto Vallarta, from convenience stores to sporting-goods shops, are blackened shells.<\/p>\n
Before last Sunday\u2019s violence, the tranquil beach town was perceived as one of the safest cities in Mexico. With its cobblestone streets, welcoming restaurants and friendly people, it has for decades been a popular destination for tourists and, for many Mexicans, a good place to live.<\/p>\n
Canadians who have been coming here for years and residents alike say they\u2019ve never seen anything like the kind of destruction that was unleased by drug cartel thugs when their leader, Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, known as El Mencho, was killed in a shootout with Mexican special forces. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s still very fresh, and we are living with some kind of uncertainty,\u201d said Ms. Su\u00e1rez, who remembered an incident from years ago involving the cartel in the city after a failed attempt to capture El Mencho. \u201cUncertainty that it might happen again.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\t![](\"https:\/\/www.theglobeandmail.com\/files\/graphics\/0223-nw-wo-mexico-cartels\/0223-nw-wo-mexico-cartels-mobile-small.png?token=0\")
<\/p>\n
Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, or \u2018El Mencho,\u2019 was mastermind of <\/p>\n
the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) \u2013 one of Mexico\u2019s most <\/p>\n
powerful drug cartels.<\/p>\n
CJNG significant presence<\/p>\n
Feb: 22, Tapalpa,<\/p>\n
Jalisco state: Oseguera <\/p>\n
Cervantes is wounded <\/p>\n
in a clash with soldiers <\/p>\n
and dies while being flown<\/p>\n
to Mexico City.<\/p>\n
graphic news, Sources: BBC; DEA; Reuters<\/p>\n
\t\t![](\"https:\/\/www.theglobeandmail.com\/files\/graphics\/0223-nw-wo-mexico-cartels\/0223-nw-wo-mexico-cartels-mobile-large.png?token=0\")
<\/p>\n
Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, or \u2018El Mencho,\u2019 was mastermind of <\/p>\n
the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) \u2013 one of Mexico\u2019s most <\/p>\n
powerful drug cartels.<\/p>\n
CJNG significant presence<\/p>\n
Feb: 22, Tapalpa,<\/p>\n
Jalisco state: Oseguera <\/p>\n
Cervantes is wounded <\/p>\n
in a clash with soldiers <\/p>\n
and dies while being flown<\/p>\n
to Mexico City.<\/p>\n
graphic news, Sources: BBC; DEA; Reuters<\/p>\n
\t\t![](\"https:\/\/www.theglobeandmail.com\/files\/graphics\/0223-nw-wo-mexico-cartels\/0223-nw-wo-mexico-cartels-desktop.png?token=0\")
<\/p>\n
Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, or \u2018El Mencho,\u2019 was mastermind of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel <\/p>\n
(CJNG) \u2013 one of Mexico\u2019s most powerful drug cartels.<\/p>\n
CJNG significant presence<\/p>\n
Feb: 22, Tapalpa,<\/p>\n
Jalisco state: Oseguera <\/p>\n
Cervantes is wounded <\/p>\n
in a clash with soldiers <\/p>\n
and dies while being flown<\/p>\n
to Mexico City.<\/p>\n
graphic news, Sources: BBC; DEA; Reuters<\/p>\n
The cleanup this week was swift. Cars and trucks that had been set ablaze were quickly taken away, leaving a pile of ash behind. Shops that had been set on fire were covered with white tarps.<\/p>\n
On the Malec\u00f3n boardwalk one evening, Barbara and Carl Nunns, who rented a condo for two months and have been vacationing here since 1998, recounted sheltering in a restaurant Sunday. The retired couple from White Rock, B.C., had been watching the Olympic gold medal hockey game when restaurant staff said they were closing the blinds and turning off the TV and lights. <\/p>\n
Ms. Nunns said that around 5 p.m. they decided to return to their condo because they didn\u2019t want to walk home in the dark. The streets were empty, and they passed scorched cars, buses and stores.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut we got back home safely. We\u2019re continuing our holiday. We\u2019re coming back next year. We\u2019ve already booked,\u201d Ms. Nunns said. \u201cThey\u2019ve been trying to find him forever and they got him,\u201d she said of El Mencho. \u201cSo now we\u2019ve got to deal with the aftermath, but we love it here and we will come back.\u201d<\/p>\n
Police have been busy clearing away burned cars in Puerto Vallarta. In one Costco parking lot, Mexican Navy Marines keep watch as workers try to remove a truck from the road.<\/p>\n
Others who were caught up in the cartel\u2019s retribution remain similarly determined to put it behind them. <\/p>\n
Not long after Katharina Stieffenhofer, her husband and friends arrived at the airport to catch a flight back to Winnipeg on Sunday, they were ushered into a narrow hallway to hide. <\/p>\n
She slept on her yoga mat and a piece of cardboard on the floor at the airport that night. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt just seems unreal, very surreal right now, and it seems like a long time ago,\u201d Ms. Stieffenhofer, 70, said in an interview at a hotel in Puerto Vallarta on Thursday, before catching a flight back home. <\/p>\n
She and her husband have been vacationing in Mexico for years, and she\u2019s not going to let one violent episode deter her future travel plans. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe violence that happened with the cartel should not reflect on the Mexican people. I still love the people, love the country, and if my health holds out, I plan on coming back next year.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018Everybody just hit the floor … I was really scared.\u2019 Listen to Katharina Stieffenhofer\u2019s account of chaos at the Puerto Vallarta airport, including footage of what she saw.<\/p>\n
For locals, though, who can\u2019t fly off if things take a turn for the worse, that uncertainty still sits heavily across the city. <\/p>\n
Outside a string of torched shops, Maclovio Lorenzo, carried a tray of cheesecakes and banana bread \u2013 not that you could smell the sweets: The acrid smell of burnt rubber and plastic still clung to the air.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe consequences, we carry it,\u201d said the 63-year-old salesman, taking in the destruction. \u201cSales are better today,\u201d he said, but he lost two days of work. <\/p>\n
He said he has read about violence in other parts of the country but has never seen anything like what happened in Puerto Vallarta last weekend. \u201cThey spooked the tourists and the citizens of Vallarta,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
He worries about what the future holds. \u201cThose people are heartless.\u201d<\/p>\n
Open this photo in gallery:<\/a>Once upon a time in Mexico: More from The Globe and MailThe Decibel podcast<\/p>\n After years of dealing with cartels like El Mencho\u2019s \u2013 sometimes with violence, sometimes not \u2013 Mexico is under increasing pressure from the Trump White House to show results. Freelance journalist David Agren spoke with The Decibel<\/a> about the politics involved. Subscribe for more episodes.<\/a><\/p>\n Mexico in perspective<\/p>\n Fear of cartel retaliation sets rural Mexico on edge<\/a><\/p>\n From Cuba to Puerto Vallarta, Canadian snowbirds find fewer havens<\/a><\/p>\n