A quiet Saturday evening in Mazatlan

Sunday

As you can probably guess we are having lots of quiet time lately. Got out and about a little yesterday. But didn’t get over to check out the progress on the church. Have to do that.
I mentioned we went grocery shopping at the Mega store here. Here is a pic of the moving sidewalk you have to use as the store is on the upper floor. Once on the moving sidewalk the carts don’t move – you can let go of the handle and they just sit there. Some kind of magnetic locking system for the wheels. Can you imagine kids with the carts if they rolled free? Or trying to hang on to a really loaded cart?

Yesterday we went to the big used book store here – exchanged seven of our read books for seven new [used] ones. Cost us about US$1.70 per book. Should keep us busy again for a while.
Barnes and Noble is back to not letting me download any books because I’m using a Mexican internet system. Will have to wait until we cross the border and I can get back on a US system to be able to read them. They were happy enough to take my money though. And yesterday I tried to log on to another site and got back the message – “Only for customers in North America” – funny last time I looked Mexico was part of North America. Some one needs to study geography – or don’t they teach that any more.
Some times I wonder why NASCAR even runs in Daytona – if I was an owner I’d only run my cheapest/junkiest cars there – that’s all you get to take home is junk. Just write it off as a demolition derby. Expensive weekend for KBM – both truck and Nationwide car got wrecked. Neither his fault. Hope today is better.
Drove out to the lookout point on the south end of town to see the sunset – not much of one to see. No clouds to add interest.

Watched these guys fish for a while.

Can not figure out how they got down there. No dry land to walk there. They had to have climbed down the steep cliffs. You can just barely see them way down there on top of the rocks in the left middle bottom part of the picture.

From there it is only a short drive to the Plazuela Machado where we decided we’d have dinner. We got there kind of early for a Saturday evening but there were a lot of people there already. And lots of vendors setting up. Just as we were coming into the plaza we passed this girl. Her 15^th birthday outfit getting pictures taken.

Later on as we were leaving we watched a bride and groom have pictures taken. It is such a pretty setting.
The Hacienda Hotel on the Malecón changes the lights on the front of the hotel for the season. They still have their Valentine Day heart lit. Looks neat. 

We didn’t stay in the plaza as long as we usually do it was getting quite cool and damp out. The dampness seeps right through to the bones.

Anyway that has been all we’ve done lately. Everyday more and more RVs leave the campground heading north. In 13 days we'll be one of them. Of course we'll still be a long way from home.  

Lazy Day

Friday

A rather cool windy day today spent most of it at home. Giving my foot and Bill’s leg a chance to rest. We did go to Sam’s club this morning but nothing else exciting.
Yesterday we went to the Mega grocery store. It is very modern and has almost any thing one would need. The store itself is on the second floor – you have to take a moving sidewalk to go up and down. Underneath is a parking garage and an area of small stores.
I see that Danica Patrick got the pole position for the Nationwide race tomorrow night. Good for her. I hope she has a good season. My favorite driver is starting well in the back half. But at Daytona it doesn’t make much difference where you start.
Have three library books to read - I forgot to change the checkout days so I have to read them all in the next seven days. One is from a series by Beverly Connor. Pretty good. She writes about a Forensic Investigator named Diane Fallon. I'll have to check more of the series out.
A man and his wife just came by selling home made apple turnovers. Smelled good but didn't buy any. Our neighbors bought four of them so their trip to the back of campground wasn't in vain.  

Work on church is progressing

Had to look it up to see what day today is – Thursday – easy to forget when there are no plans or specific things to do to remind you.
Thinking more and more about what we’ll have to do when we get home than what we are going to do the remaining time we are here. One thing we have to do at home is replace Willie’s license plates – because they were personalized I wonder if we’ll be able to get the same ones – I bet not because they were stolen.
Went to Centro Historico again yesterday and all the streets are now open to traffic. Most of them had all the Carnaval kiosks and stages gone and were clean. The only ones they were still working on were right where the night before parade was.
This never ceases to amaze me. However many fit. I’d be scared to death that I’d drop the baby. Especially in the traffic here. But then I don’t like riding on one of them anyway.

Went by the church to check on progress. They get a lot done in one day. This section is recemented and marked but still needs painting.

Bill talking to the workers. They use special cement for the refinishing and mix it by hand in a wheelbarrow, put it in buckets and send it up to the workers. This refurbishing should last about 40 years. The padre made them take off all the old cement right down to the bricks. They were going to just put the new over the old but Padre said nope!

The worker is showing us how the lines are made in the cement. With a level and a trowel to make the indentation. While standing up on a piece of board between two pieces of scaffolding.  

Sending a bucket of cement up to the top.

The wheelbarrow it is mixed in and giving a bucket to one of the workers.

The guy WAY up on top who is doing the edge work. He is smoothing the cement with a wooden form to give it its dimension.

The work is fascinating me so every time we go over there I want to walk by and check out the progress.

Went in the Municipal Mercado and walked around a bit. Bought a couple of baseball type caps – 3 x 100 or about US$2.50 each. Saw a guy walking around with a cart with these beautiful plants on them. I’ve never seen anything like it before. He was selling them, but the ones he was selling for about three dollars were only five inches tall.

A close up. If we see him again maybe I’ll get one anyway – see if it ever grows up.

We are now kind of in a holding pattern cause we are waiting for our friends to get here before we go anywhere out of town.

Best sign off, Bill just fixed breakfast and it looks and smells good. Don't know what we'll do today but know we need tomatoes at the market. Feels like it is going to be really warm today.