Chaos Leaves Town

Back tracking another two weeks – – –

I was wandering in the Golden Zone here in Mazatlan just looking at stuff when I ran across a laundromat. Now this is important because I’m staying here at least a month and I need to do my laundry at least once every two months or so and it was getting to be time to do that.

So I walk up to the laundromat…but first, you guys need to know something about Mexico and their building codes. Or rather lack of them. They don’t seem to mind having a 3″ step right in front of their buildings. You also see 2″ steps followed by 8″ steps followed by a 4″ step. Get the picture? Most stairways around here are crazy with all sorts of step heights, each step being different from the previous.

Anyway, as I approached the place, the paint job was so good that I simply did not see the 3″ step, and promptly, with force, hammered my left foot big toe into the cement step. DAMN, Shit, Whoa!! Pain and agony ensued. But I limped into the place and checked prices like I’d intended. That helped me ignore the pain.

Now I’m limping and can hardly walk. I expect that the toe on my left foot is broken but if you go into a doc with a broken toe they usually just shrug and say, “Yeah, it’s broken, sorry. Bye.”.

I hobble down the street a ways and decide to take the bus instead of walking. Jump on the bus and 2 miles later get off to go to a bar for 1 or two beers to kill the pain. I wander in at The Purple Onion and find that there is only one seat left at the bar right at the end…where the waiters drop off the empty glasses. I clean myself off an area at the bar and hoist myself up on the stool using my left foot for leverage on the foot bar. OF COURSE it slips off the damn thing and my toe bashes into the bar. YIPE! Whine!

So I drink 3 beers instead of the one or two I planned on and try not to think of the pain.

Around an hour or two later, I leave the bar and climb into a bus to take me to the RV park. The bus is nearly empty but I don’t want to walk to far back into it so I choose the first seat. You know, the seat right close to the front door? And here in Mexico the buses have a barrier between the entrance and the first seat but it’s also closer to the seat then buses are in the states. So while I’m sliding into my seat I WACK my toe on a metal pole. HOLY SHIT did that hurt.

Within 4 hours, I’ve wacked my toe HARD 3 times. I haven’t looked at it yet. I get off the bus and hobble to my RV. When I look, there is no blood but it is swollen, the nail is broken and it’s black and blue.

The next 2 weeks I always wear socks and shoes for protection and had to put a box in my bed to lift the blankets up off my foot in order to sleep. But now it looks pretty good, it doesn’t look like a big, rotten purple grape anymore.

Ahhh, Mazatlan. Worth the pain.

Meanwhile, and backtracking this storyline by 2 weeks, I was heading into Culiacan on Mex15 and I was pissed at having to pay tolls every 50 miles or so. I ended up bypassing some of the toll roads, but missed about 3-4 of the bypasses because the signs are all in Spanish.

So, when I get to the outskirts of Culiacan, pop. 300,000, I bail off the freeway (non-toll road) onto a bypass route right through the city that I think will get me to the next bypass. I’m driving a 37-foot long bus and immediately get into trouble because my lane is fast disappearing and there are hundreds of cars trying to get in front of me. Made it but just barely.

I follow the ‘Mex15 – Mazatlan’ signs deep into the city. Finally, the signs peter out and I make a wrong turn onto a 6 lane but surprisingly homey street. I travel a mile or two, don’t see any Mazatlan signs and stop to ask a traffic cop, ‘Mazatlan?’ while I point in the direction I’m heading.

He answers ‘Si’ and I continue driving east. 4 miles later I’m cussing the guy. Not a single sign for Mazatlan. So I look for a left turn to do a turn around. Three or four streets later, I give up and just turn onto a side street going north, about a block up, I take a left into what initially looks like a street I can get the rig through.

Big mistake. I get onto the street and it’s a two lane, with cars & trucks double-parked all along it. The one owner who saw me coming moved the first truck out of the way. The next truck? I hear a ‘clank’ as my tail passes it. I stop, jump out and run back to talk to a guy looking at it and find that it’s the driver side mirror folded over. I’m groaning when a local that was nearby wanders over, grabs the mirror and shows me that it’s just flipped over, it is one of those breakaway mirrors and all he had to do was flip it back out to where it belonged. Gave me a big smile as I climbed back into the RV. Whew.

I wiggle my way up the street and finally get to the intersection but there is a small pickup truck with it’s rear end half way into the intersection. Damn. So I start jockeying back and forth trying to get around the damn truck so I can take a left turn. I’m frustrated and not very competent so I’m nervous as well. By now there are several cars that I’m blocking coming behind me and on the right too. Around that time, a guy walking down the street sees what’s going on, walks out into the intersection, sizes the situation up, and starts to guide me in the turn, basically motioning me to go for it. I follow his directions and I slip into the intersection, around the truck, and by all the other parked cars, straightening out and off down the road felling much happier. I give the guy a beep and a wave and he smiles back. Nice people down here. Oh, and all those other people I was blocking? No body even beeped at me. A couple drivers waved as I headed on down the street.

I get back to the main drag and finally find the sign I needed and a few minutes later I was back outside of town. I’m on a 4 lane highway and about 15 minutes later, I see that building that means ‘toll road’, I’d just passed a truck stop so I whipped a U turn and headed back. Then I wander around the truck stop asking people if they speak English. Finally found a guy and ask him where the free road is. He points and tells me where I missed the road. I head back the way I came and, following his directions, found the on ramp. Which I notice has a big ass sign that reads, ‘Libra’, Oh, FREE. Huh. Now I know what to look for.

It’s 75F, a light breeze coming from the north off the ocean, and a bar way down there at the end of my ride. Can it get any better? No, really, can it?

I’m heading for the huge rock way way off in the distance. To the right of it is a beach restaurant with food & beer. And no windows. Does have a roof though.

This is a condo down the beach a ways. As I was passing it, a gal ran out and stopped me and tried to sell me one of them. They run from $100,000USD to $300,000. You can see the stepped building way off in the distance in the first picture.

Here’s another shot of one of those haciendas being refurbished. I thought that they had run out of money and stopped working on it. But, no, today I saw a guy working in there. Some of them are quite run down, falling down really.

Well, I found a nice place in Mazatlan to settle into. New park with WiFi. Nice flat spaces. My waste hose reaches the sewer though most here don’t because the builder put them clear at the back of the spaces instead of along the side like most parks.

This is on the street outside the RV park I’m staying at:

And my rig all cool looking, those big trees are coconut, the small trees are limon’:

It’s now Feb. 8th and I’m OK to talk about the game that was stolen from the Seattle Seahawks by the superbowl officials. But not willingly. Anyway, here’s some pictures taken during the game in the Purple Onion bar in the ‘Golden Zone’ of Mazatlan. They had snacks, happy hour prices all day, and 7 TVs all set to english. A good time was had by all, except us Seahawks fans. At least two touchdowns were stolen from us by the officials.

The bar:

After this picture, the game got exciting, then depressing so I didn’t get any more shots, sniff.

Across the street from where I’m staying, there is a run down, old, large RV park with haciendas. The place is crumbling. I think it was built in the ’30’s or so and remodeled several times since. These pictures are of some of the villa that are being refurbished and then rented out for $300p per day ($30). When this is finished it will have a killer view of the ocean. The RV part is so old that the pads are like they were made for 20′ trailers. Too small for todays RVs. But the area is filled with palm trees, is nice and flat, easy access, etc. Someday it will be a great property and a great place to park the RV for several months.

Looking out the broken window of one of the beach front villa’s:

Standing on the veranda looking west:

Looking back into the park proper:

After visiting that place, I headed to the turn around to just sit a while, the fishermen were all returning to shore and hauling their boats up onto the beach. I do enjoy watching people work. Out a ways was this ship, looks a little worst for wear doesn’t it? Which reminds me, you folks should see the size of the shrimp around here. They are even bigger then what we call prawns up in Portland, Oregon.

Over there is more building, it’s way north of Mazatlan so I think it’s a different city. My guess is those towers are condos.

Well, those of you who watched the game yesterday now know that the officials stole the game from the Seahawks and gave it to Detroit. There were so many bogus calls that I stopped counting them. And to go the whole game without the Stealers making any game changing mistakes? No freaking way.

Anyway, on the way to the game I got on the wrong bus again. But, I’d left so early that I had plenty of time. And a map. The bus looped to the east for several miles and came back to the street I needed to be on before heading south. I jumped off there and sat at a bus stop waiting for another bus north bound. And of course there was an American Steeler fan there. Drinking a beer, on the street. Don’t see that stateside much. Anyway he kept telling me ‘No, that’s not the right bus’, I’d look at my map and he’d be wrong. Missed three buses that way.

Finally stopped listening to the guy, jumped on the next bus, which happened to be the right one, and off to my bar. Got there an hour late but early enough to get a good table.

Offered to let an American who has lived here for 6 years share my table so I got to learn lots of stuff about living here. One of his friends joined us and he happened to have once been the drummer for a salsa band. Had met and partied with the Rolling Stones. Opened for other big groups of the ’70s. Small world. The Stones were on the half time show in case you did not watch the Super Bowl.

Had a lot of fun, a kick ass Mexican style dinner, wandered back here at around 10pm and just woke up at 10am. An excellent adventure.

So, what’s been going on down here? PERFECT weather, every day, every night. There is a light ocean breeze that just doesn’t quit until around 8pm or so. The day time temps are in the 75-80F range and I’ve been sweating just a little in the middle of the day. The rest of the time it’s perfect. Light shirt, shorts, sandles are all you need.

Yesterday I went way downtown to find a place that makes tamales. Took the bus to where I’d been told. Walked the 2.5 blocks and, nope couldn’t find the place. BUT, I stopped into a little tiny Mexican cafe that had a few tables set up. These are shops that would remind you of the smallest business you might have seen in your downtown. Anyway, there happened to be an American young man in there that helped me order a traditional Mexican breakfast. Scrambled eggs (I won’t even try to spell EGG in Spanish but I can now say it) with onion, peppers, re-fried beans, goat cheese, cafe’ (coffee). All for $20p + $2p tip. Then I wandered off down the street and found an open barber shop. Got a good cut and then walked to the beach side to find a return bus.

This got me to thinking, when I was 17, I was in Viet Nam at Da Nang harbour. I willingly left the ship to wander in downtown Da Nang alone even though there were those on the ship who warned me against it because of the Cong that would randomly shoot Americans sniper style or toss satchel charges (bombs) from their scooters while riding by a crowd. Kinda like the same stuff I heard about going to Mexico (danger!, danger!, Will Robinson! , arms waving), mostly by people that have never been outside the states in their lives. I don’t feel that uncomfortable here (or Vietnam) even tho I don’t know anyone or even the language.

Yesterday, on the way back I did some serious walking in dangerous parts of town, accidentally. In one area, they were refurbishing a really old building. I stopped to check it out and started wandering back behind the building, just about as I got to a wall, I spotted part of someone, carrying a large stick/club stealthy like heading for a meeting, with my head I thought. So, practicing my mantra to the kids, I slowly backed up and got the hell out of there. But I could have misinterpreted that meeting too. Anyway, even getting lost 3 times yesterday didn’t bother me much since there were always people willing to help me, every time.

Anyway, it’s great fun here so far, today I’ll be at the bar until 9:30pm watching the Hawks kick the Steelers asses.

I finally headed into Mexico Jan. 31, 2006 on a sunny warm day. I entered at Naco, Arizona/Mexico. I had to go get the US customs agent to unlock the gate for RVs. The regular opening guy was suppose to be there at nine but still wasn’t there at 9:30. The car route was way to small for my rig.

After crossing the boarder, I stopped at the first official looking building…perhaps 25 feet inside the gate, and a young female guard asked me (nicely) if she could come into the rig and inspect. Not a problem. Anyway, she looked around quickly but I noticed that she didn’t bother to open the door to the back bedroom! I could have had 10 people in there. The door was held closed with a bungee cord so it wouldn’t bang around while driving but not hard to open.

After that quick inspection, she tells me to go to a building across the street but I should park first. I ask her if it’s OK to back up the rig and park in some spots behind me and she indicates yes. So I start the rig and promptly back the rig into a sign that wasn’t high enough for my rig. A guard walks out and tells me that I should go park across and up the street a couple hundred feet. Doesn’t mention the damage to the sign and neither do I. So I drive over and park. Grab all my credentials and wander back to the boarder.

I go into the office, hand the guy my passport and he says, “We can’t let you enter the country with this”. My chin drops. Then he flashes a smile and says, “Until you sign it senor!”. Whew. So I sign it and he tells me to go outside, up the street and get a stamp on the entrance documents after paying $21. So I go out and search for the ‘banco’ to do that. Passed a street kid asking for money. Didn’t give him any. Turned into an alcove and found what looked like a bank…she says, ‘Nope not here, up the road farther’. I pass the kid with the can again. Don’t give him anything. Get to a bus stop with three girls waiting. Ask them. They think they know and call the kid with the can to guide me. He takes me back to the place I’d already been to, wrong place. She tells the kid in Spanish where to take me. He guides me back around the girls, chattering to them in Spanish, and into the correct place. Inside they finish my paperwork, stamp it and collect my money. I wander back (you’re suppose to go back) and give the kid a couple bucks as I pass him. He seems happy. I return to the boarder station, the agent checks it over and says, ‘Welcome to Mexico’.

So I start out going south from Naco, Mexico generally heading to the west coast. I haven’t any special destination in mind but from my reading the west coast will be the safest and quickest way to get familiar with Mexico and it’s people.

My first picture in Mexico, heading due south:

So I passed though a small town in the desert mountains, Cananea, with the regular old Mexican building style and spot a couple clean cut young men a couple hundred yards up the road. I can see them talking and flashing smiles as they happily threw out their thumbs for a ride from me. Probably joking, and probably very surprised that I stopped to pick them up. I don’t speak a word of Spanish and they don’t speak a word of English. But we had a great time playing at trying to understand each other. They turned out to be nice young men on the way to Magdelena. They had hard hats and indicated that they were miners. I handed them an English to Spanish translation sheet and the best they came up with was asking me if I had a ‘wiff’. No, I say, I don’t have a ‘wife’ but did have two bambinos. (Italian I know). They got a 100 mile free ride and I got some company.

After Magdalena I start hitting toll roads. They’re everywhere down here. The feds contract out to road building companies and then don’t pay them. The contractors set up toll roads to pay for it all. Lots of left over corruption from the PRI days. And they’re still around. Or so I was told by a local. One thing, there is always a toll road bypass maintained by the government. Usually an old two lane road. So far, when I’ve been able to find the bypass, they have been fine, just require a little more effort to stay on the road and try to remember to slow down for the topes.

The first day I made it to Guaymas, and the recommended park was full. So I head to the coast and found another place. It was also full. So I stayed in a little crummy campground that was asking $22 USD per night. Not worth it. Owners really needs a good spanking for ripping people off. It was right next door the full place that was cleaner, had cable TV with US channels, free WiFi, better in all respects for $20 USD per night.

Got this shot as I was leaving a place nearby along the coast…it was also full:

Here’s a shot of the beach near where I stayed looking West:

A shot looking west toward the RV park, under that yellow sign:

The next morning, I headed south on Mexico 15 (M15) towards Los Mochis and arrived there around 3:30pm, stopping at a WalMart. Found a cash machine there and got my pesos (dollars are OK in Sonora county) and found beer on sale. I spent the night in a campground nearby M15. This whole day was uneventful so I didn’t take any pictures.

The 3rd morning in Mexico I left the park early and headed to Mazatlan using the M15 Free route. It was a little dicey in places, I almost ran the rig off a 12″ high road edge for instance, but I recovered and made good time. I passed through several small villages with the traditional Mexican open air business along side the road but it never worked out that I was hungry when I found an interesting place to stop. I did see the stereotypical Mexican wearing a sombero sitting on a two wheeled cart pulled by a donkey once.

I arrived slightly north of Mazatlan City around 4:30pm and found the RV park I was told about the night before. It is newer then most here, pleasant, has WiFi and nice flat spaces, and is near the beach. After checking in and trying to set up my satellite dish, unsuccessfully, I go to bed with cool ocean breezes drifting through the RV. B-t-w, this park only takes pesos, no cards, and I only had around $300p. So I give the guy $200p. Next morning I head for the beach north looking for a bar that will be open for the Superbowl. No luck at the 3 places I stopped at, they didn’t even have TVs. But I got some beach pictures and spent an hour soaking up sun and wading in the water (kinda cool for swimming).

Here’s my first shot of the beach at Mazatlan, this is right next to several small business and this turn around is the furthest north, no road after here:

There’s an island way out there:

A view of ‘Hotel Row’ in Mazatlan. I’m on the northern edge of Mazatlan’s beach here:

By now, you’re asking yourself, “Were there any people on the beach in that 75F weather?”, here’s the shot that tells you:

Not on the beach.

Oh, wait, looks like people over there on the rocks…

Yep, there they are. There were more people later.