Mazatlán

What a weekend!  After Mabel greeted me (after a crazy day of only teaching one class and being shuffled off to a professional development meeting) with, "Laura Klapheke, you are late," I grabbed the two things I had left to pack (pillow and mask) and tossed them in my suitcase.  I had planned on changing out of my skirt into some shorts, but I knew Mabel was already drumming her fingers so I decided against it.  I grabbed my Land's End carry-on that has served me SOOOOOO well since Columbia Avenue gave it to me for graduation from high school.  I have dragged that sucker all over creation since then.  It has lost some zipper pulls, but other than that, it's perfect!  As I was rolling it across the parking lot between our house and bus stop, I was realizing that it may not, in fact, last forever.  The wheels are going to get a run for their money this year with the crazy terrain. We got on the bus, and I was in charge, since I was the one who'd been to the bus station by bus before.  I felt pretty good for knowing how to get us both around!As we passed through downtown to get our second bus, we stopped in Tacos Hermanos Morenos, my favorite taco dive.  We each got a quesadilla to go.  Mabel mentioned that it's just not as good to-go as it is when you're eating there, but we were hungry and it was approaching 2:00!

We got to the bus stop and bought our tickets.  It was about 13 dollars, and I was nervous about how the ride would be.  The answer is: nice.  It was two hours on the dot and a "non-stop" ride.  We actually made two stops, but they were very brief.  They were the kind of stops the city buses make; two people on, two people off, we're on our way!  An old man and a younger woman stood the first 45 minutes until we stopped.  I don't know why.  There weren't seats, but what I mean is I don't know why they were on the bus if there were no seats.  I was glad we had gotten on quickly because we did not have assigned seats!  

Thank goodness it wasn't us standing the whole time.  With about 30 minutes to go, a man got on the bus selling empanadas de piña.  Basically a pineapple pastry.  They were two for a buck, so I got two.  I needed to try them.

We got off at the bus station in Mazatlán (can't tell you how glad I ma that I've found my accent marks!) and Mabel told me we would be taking a pulmonia (pull-moe-KNEE-ah) instead of a taxi or bus.  It was kind of like a car but not and it would be cheaper.  (See picture above, but this particular pulmonia goes with the story later.) 

Our pulmonia dropped us at our hotel (Emporio) for 50 pesos.  I walked in and was amazed.  The lobby is open air.  You walk in and go down some steps, but there are no walls.  You walk right up to the desk.  We checked in more or less and then walked up another set of steps to the pool and ocean view (see first 2 pics).  Who's ready to come visit now?!

Cosette and Alma were already swimming (they had left at 11 that morning) and Papá was chilling in a lounge chair.  We had to get his credit card so they would let us in our room.  So we did that, changed in to bathing suits and went to their room to refresh everyone's beer.  As we were walking up, Mabel said, "And by now you know that we can't do anything without beer."  So true.

We swam in the pool and it was wonderful.  We thought we might try to ocean, but it was a red flag and a white flag meaning don't swim and jellyfish.  My one encounter with a jellyfish was enough to make me RUN in the other direction for the rest of my life, so we checked out the pool.

Friday night, we ate dinner around 9:30 after getting cleaned up.  In a non-Laura manner, I ordered a club sandwich.  It was delicious and came with fries.  But after a day of bus travel and sun, my eyes were drooping.  Mabel was ready to go dancing.  I had to pass.  She and Alma headed to the Oyster bar while Cosette, Papá Jaime (HI-may), and I went for a quick stroll.  He took me up to Malecón (mall-ay-CONE), which was the same name as where Mabel and I had walked.  I asked him what that meant, as it was a word unfamiliar to me and I wasn't sure if it as someone's name or what.  He said a malecón was any walkway that runs along a river, lake, ocean, etc.  After that 5 minute walk, we went back to go to bed.  At 5, I heard Mabel come in.

Somehow, at 7:30, she popped out of bed.  

We got dressed and called the other room to see what time we wanted to eat breakfast.  They had a great buffet.  We ate outside, and in the shade with the breeze, it was really nice.  I had amazing fresh fruit, granola and yogurt.

Papá Jaime wanted me to see all there was to see, so we drove around the waterfront to the lighthouse.  We stopped to see the fresh fish for sale.  We stopped to see the little shops.  We stopped to look at the water.  The whole time, I was thinking, "I need to be on exchange in Mazatlán!"

We headed back to the hotel and swam and I lay out for awhile.  We decided to check out the ocean again.  It was still jellyfish infested, but we walked up the beach to look into parasailing and sailing.  The parasailing was from another location and already rented out for all day.  The sailing was 300 pesos for all three of us, so we jetted back to the hotel and got money.  

Alma had only brought change, so she was bumming off her dad the whole time.  We paid for the first 100 pesos and climbed aboard.  It was a wee bit nauseating at first, but then it was just breathtaking.  Mazatlán is gorgeous in general, but to be in the ocean, and see where you were, and see that you're headed to this island.  So neat.

It took about an hour to get from where we began to the island.  When we got there, we got in the water for a bit.  Our boat driver (sailor?) told us there were no jellyfish.  I'm not sure why I believed him, but we didn't see any, so no harm no foul.  

When we got back, we were absolutely famished.  It was about 4 and we hadn't eaten since breakfast at 9.  

So we cleaned up and went to a seafood place that Alma wanted to go to.  Cosette wanted sushi, but who eats sushi at the beach?  Okay, a lot of people, but who eats sushi in Mexico? :) Alma and I both really wanted shrimp.  Mabel actually wanted pizza.  But we all decided to go to seafood.  We got another pulmonia and off we went to our restaurant.  I asked the guy if I could get a picture.  I had wanted one when we got to Mazatlán, but hadn't gotten one because off we went!  He obliged of course.  Then he told me that he would come back for us in an hour if we wanted.  We were kind of off the beaten path (not too far, but not near the main drag), so I guess not too many taxis/buses/pulmonias would be passing through.  I asked the girls and they said sure.  The food we ate was indescribable really.  I had shrimp tacos.  It came with three and some white rice.  I had lemonade to drink which is so quenching in this heat.  Alma and Mabel had ordered shrimp pate for us all to share (which they eat on tostadas- basically one big tortilla chip in the shape of, well, a tortilla).  As we were eating, some guys walked in and the girls waved and then got these expressions that made me wonder what was going on.  

They were checking out what was going on at the guys' table but didn't want to be seen.  I was so confused.  Turns out they had seen them at the oyster bar the night before.  Alma said, "Always curl your eyelashes.  The instant you don't, you know you'll run into to someone.  You just never know."  And with that, she pulled down her sunglasses.  I was cracking up.

Before our meal was finished, the taxista came back for us.  He parked and waved.  While we were finishing and paying, he cleaned his pulmonia and waited. At one point we looked up and thought he was gone, which kinda ticked me off since he'd already been waiting fifteen minutes (what was five more?), but we realized he'd just moved so a woman could back out.  

He took us back to our hotel where we dropped Cosette off and walked up the beach to the Oyster Bar.  The girls got a bucket of beer for less than 10 bucks.  I ordered a Coca Light and it came in a large glass with plenty of ice, but at a price: $3.50.  That's US dollars.  Wow.  I told them that in the States you NEVER pay that much for a coke and that you get free refills.  They agreed that it was too much, but were surprised that it was more than the most in the US.  

As they were finishing their beers, in came the cops.  They were checking for IDs.  Interesting.  They said starting at 8:30, you couldn't be in there without IDs.  They had left everything back at the hotel, so we finished up and headed out.  Note: finishing up in this case meant that Alma poured her last beer in a to go cup and walked out in front of the cops.  Different.

From there we walked around.  I wanted some ice cream, so we went to Dairy Queen.  I got a snickers blizzard, and besides the fact that it was soupy from the heat, it was DELICIOUS and hit the spot!  We continued walking when Alma realized she was hungry.  So she got a hot dog.  At that moment, my phone rang and it was Ashley calling.  I was expecting her call since it was her birthday.  It would've cost me an arm and a leg to call her since I was out of my area and she already had an account set up to call me, so it worked out.  I think it still drained me of my minutes because I have to buy more credit, but such is life!  It was really good to talk to her.  I was sad to miss the Smith family birthday dinner (her sister's birthday is two days before, and I've been a guest at the dinner for the past 4 years at least, maybe 5), but I'll catch it again in September 09.

From there, we went back to sit by the pool for a bit.  We continued our previous conversation about languages (next entry) and then decided to just call it a night.  Alma came to our room for a bit.  While we were at the pool, three guys from their 2nd floor balcony called down to us and asked if we wanted to go dancing.  Mabel said yeah, we needed to eat dinner and get changed, but we'd meet them in two hours.

Hilarious.

In our room, we chatted more about the differences in languages and then Alma went up to her room.  The next morning at 8, Cosette and Alma knocked on our door to say goodbye.  To everyone's surprise, Mabel was still asleep.  We got up around 9:30, got dressed, and went out for breakfast.  Then we packed up and hailed another pulmonia to the bus station.  We caught a last minute bus to Culiacán and got there in about 2.5 hours.  I guess the driver makes the difference in time?  We bussed it back home where Mabel slept the afternoon away, and I wrote pointless lesson plans (basically copied the exact words from the teachers' guide, as that is what the form asks for).

Mazatlán was an amazing place that was easy to get to and small enough to navigate by foot.  It had amazing foot and enough to do while still being a relaxing place.  It is highly recommended to any of you who come to visit and need a getaway.