Mazatlan 2007

Saturday, February 3 (Pat)

We woke up relatively early (7am) considering we went to bed after midnight. Since we were out of Raisin Bran we decided to have breakfast at the Playa Maria restaurant. Ron had Mexican eggs and I had a ‘light’ veggie omlete. Both were very good. Back at the room I finished up the book “Prey” by Michael Crichton that Ron had read last week and he added journal entries onto the laptop. Then we got ready to head off to El Centro. We caught a bus and stopped of at an internet café near the book store across from Costa de Oro resort and caught up on e-mail. That took me over an hour so Ron waited outside. Next we took a pit stop Cost de Oro and caught a Sabalo Centro bus and headed for the market. Another beautiful, sunny, perfectly blue sky day. Not too hot – almost cool in the shade. The bus travels the majority of the malecon before turning down a narrow street. After a few more turns we are at the ‘mercado’ and get off the bus and head in. We are in the corner where the meat stalls are so get hit with the aroma of fresh meat. It is always an interesting sight to walk through as the vendors slice up meat cuts using very sharp knives. All body parts of the animals are on display it seems. We are here to shop for the grandkids and to find our ‘chili’s’ and a ‘sun’ for our carport Mexican patio. We wander through the aisles looking for ideas for Matthew, Austin, Christine, and Rob. At one store we see some interesting ceramic mobiles of different designs. Ron picks out a nice yellow sun and flower mobile for Christine and Rob for one hundred and thirty pesos. We wandered through the aisles – many vendors are very pushy/persistent so it helps to know what you are looking for, otherwise you could get talked into buying a lot – t-shirts, sandals, trinkets, curios, etc. We found a place with colorful ceramics – large bell peppers and other veggies and some interesting sun ceramics. Not quite the right ones. Then we went to the adjacent stall and they had a bunch of chili’s hanging from the ceiling. Red, yellow, green, and some multi-colored ones. The red ones were ceramic, Ron liked the multi-colored ones – they were bigger and made out of paper mache so they will travel better. They also had some suns. More ceramics in the next stalls – lots of colorful suns, iguanas, snails, turtles, etc. Tucked under a shelf we spotted a number of well-painted, colorful sun ceramics with happy painted faces. We checked out several and settled on a shiny finish, blue rays with yellow center face sun about eight to nine inches across. Just right for the ‘patio’. Now it was Matthew, Austin, and Ethan’s turn. More wandering. Ron bought some pastries. Then we saw some small frog figures drinking Coronas, playing drums, etc. Ron picked out two for Matthew. We went back to the first stall and picked out a baby sized woven Mexican jacket for Ethan. Enough shopping. Off to the cathedral and plaza. At the plaza we sat on a bench and watched a guy feed the pigeons. A few would be there, then from all over the plaza pigeons would be flying in, hopping all over each other in a feeding frenzy. No special noise to alert the others – they just knew some rice was being tossed on the ground. We went into the gazebo structure in the center and Ron took some video. Then an older kid showed up with a pigeon on his shoulder eating out of a bag of rice. He handed me a small plastic bag filled with rice. I tossed a little out and of course bunches of pigeons showed up. I put some rice in my hand and held it out and soon I had two, three, four, five pigeons on my arm, on top of each other, eating the rice. The kid said the rice cost ten pesos a bag and that he was very poor. Ron gave him fifteen pesos in coin, but he wanted paper money (the smallest denomination in paper money is twenty pesos). Fifteen pesos is enough for a little bag of rice, so Ron handed him back the rice, let him keep the coins, and we walked off. More picture taking around the plaza and cathedral. We were getting hungry and I wanted to wash my hands after feeding the pigeons so we headed to Panama Pastelarie, a fun restaurant kitty-cornered from the cathedral. I had tortilla soup and Ron had quesadillas. Lots of Mexican families eating there so it was noisy but entertaining. They have a tall cart full of scrumptious pastries being wheeled around to tempt you so we had the girl come by and I chose an apple bread cake and Ron had a neapolitan cake. Yum! We decided to find our way towards the Angela Peralta theater. A block or so from the plaza we decided we had better make sure which street we needed to be on to find it. A real estate office was on the corner so we went in to ask directions. A very nice gentleman – who spoke very good English since he was raised in the U.S. – chatted with us. We asked some general questions about homes in El Centro. He then showed us the interior of the building. It was an old building that had been converted to a school. His mom bought it and was remodeling. It was eight thousand square feet. In the center was an open garden area just re-cemented. A tiered fountain was in the center. Wood post structures were placed around the garden. Now this is what we want – only smaller. He showed us a finished room with a gorgeous tile floor that looked like patterned wood. Very nice furnishings, high ceilings. We talked a bit more with the gentlemen, Kris DeSoto, and got his card for future reference.

To get to the theater/plaza we just had to head up the street from where we were. At the plaza they were setting up for some event. There are a lot of adjacent restaurants with outdoor seating. A neat place to eat. It was getting cooler and we had all our shopping bags to lug around so we decided to walk up to the malecon, get a beer, and then catch a bus to Playa Maria. We found the same little restaurant we were at Tuesday and enjoyed the sunset and a couple of cervezas. Very clear so the sun just disappears into the water.

Caught the Sabalo Centro bus – toured through El Centro, then off north through the Gold Zone to Playa Maria. We had some chalupas at the malecon restaurant and were still full. We decided to just change clothes and head down to the Purple Onion to listen to Brenster again. We got a seat outside and ordered a couple of Pacificos and some chips and enjoyed the music for a while. We even bought one of his CD’s. Later we stopped at the super market to get some cereal and coke then took a bus back to the resort. Some reading and journaling and off to bed – midnight again!