Fire Dancing

The post about this evening is just below this video

Wonderful night at Plazuela Machado and broken toe

Never did get the Jeep yesterday supposed to be for sure by noon Monday. Will believe it when he gets here.

Well crap! I just went to open the door for John and caught my little toe on the leg of the recliner. It’s not supposed to stick out at a right angle is it? Doesn’t hurt but am sure it will. Have it taped to the next toe – about all I can do for it.

Back to yesterday. We decided to go out to the Plazuela Machado for dinner last night. All five of us. John’s truck is too big to take to that area – well he didn’t want to drive it there and neither did Bill. So we thought we’d take a cab. Oops five of us and a driver won’t fit comfortably in a cab. Nor in a pulmonia so we HAD to take one of the red pick up truck taxies – yes! I’ve wanted to do that every time we’ve been here. All we had to do was walk out in front of the RV park and catch the first one that came by. Here it is.

Bill rode up front with the driver and Carol, John, George and I rode in the back on these narrow benches.

Here’s George looking at the people in the car behind us looking at us.

Had to take one coming home too. Luckily the evening was a lot warmer than they have been lately. It was actually fun.  

The plaza was really busy last night lots going on all around. Several of the restaurants had musicians playing and lots of vendors and people eating and walking around.

We ate at Beach Burger – haven’t been there for a while. Carol and George had good hamburgers, John a huge burrito thingy, Bill an Italian Chicken Salad and I had my old standby Quesadilla.

While we were eating a band was setting up in the gazebo – they started to play just about the time we finished eating. But one nice thing about eating there is you can sit at the table long after you finish your main meal. No one rushes you off.

Across the plaza from us we could see a burst of flame every once in a while. Carol finally got curious enough to go check it out. It was a man creating paintings using spray cans. Then he would set the picture with a flame from a blow torch! The painter was an older man kneeling on a pillow. He was dressed in suit pants, a white long sleeved shirt and a tie! And his pictures were incredible. Here is a butterfly he did – the picture doesn’t do it justice.

I took a series of pictures as he was painting a picture for ME! Bill requested it. He got to choose the picture he wanted from a whole stack of photographs and this one reminded Bill of some of the sunsets we’ve seen here in Mexico. It took him about 20 minutes to paint one picture and he was selling them for 100 pesos about US$8. Some of the more complicated ones he charged 200 pesos for.

Any way…here he is with his set up.

Putting on the bottom colors using a piece of cardboard to keep this color from getting on the upper part of the picture.

Using a piece of sponge to paint in some details.

He made the rays of the sun by putting the spray can nozzle down on the paper then gently tapping it and turning it and tapping it again. In this picture he was using a piece of cardboard dipped in paint to add detail to the painting.

He has added the rock and palm trees to the painting.

Setting and drying the paint.

A not so good photograph of the finished painting. I love it. I'll try to get a better picture of it later.

I took some movies of him painting but I took them with the cell phone and am having problems getting them into a format that I can use. Will post them later if I can upload them. [Right now I can’t fool with UTube ‘cause I’m trying to keep up with the NASCAR race on line and the connection is squirrely.]

All the time we were watching the man paint the band in the gazebo was playing and several people were dancing to the music.

A while later we heard drum beats and had to go check them out. A group of young people were playing drums and a xylophone and a couple of them were dancing with fire batons. They were pretty darn good. Took movies of that too but….

You never know what you’ll see or hear when dining out in the Plazuela Machado.

A good time was had by all. 

This morning Bill, George and I again went over to Torres – the restaurant on the beach for breakfast. On Sunday mornings they have a saxophone player. So we again enjoyed our meal to the sound of music while watching the waves break over the sand. The birds have been thwarted in their sugar steeling. Now if a table is not occupied the sugar container is covered with a small plate. And if they head for an occupied table a waiter chases them off.

Don’t know what we’ll do the rest of the day – it is an absolutely beautiful day out. Warm and not windy = perfect for parasailing and we can’t get to the beach without a car. I wonder if I'd be able to run on the sand to get up in the air with my toe sticking out sideways?

The Best Laid Plans

What’s that saying about “best laid plans”? First off we still don’t have the Jeep back – should have it by 10:30 this morning. I will believe it when I see it drive in and park next to me.

Yesterday afternoon I saw a small car pull up to Ms. Tioga and a couple got out and knocked on George’s door. He invited them in and they had a long visit. They are from Alaska and have been reading his blog for a long time and they just happened to be vacationing in Mazatlan right now. So they wanted to meet him.

In the mean time we were waiting for John and Carol to show up. They should have been here in Mazatlan around 3:00 – Soon it was 5:00 and we hadn’t heard from them and they weren’t here. George brought his new friends over to meet us and mentioned they would like to go out to Fat Fish for ribs with all of us. We were starting to worried about John not being here. So we called his cell phone – the only number we had was his Idaho cell – we got a “this phone is not in service” reply. We know he has a cell he uses in Mexico and couldn’t find its number……George checked his address book and didn’t have a different number either. It would soon be dark – time to really worry. We finally decided that if they had had problems flat etc. and it took a while to fix they would have not driven on if it meant driving at night. So we decided to go ahead and go out to dinner. The five of us squeezed into the little car George’s friends had rented and went to Fat Fish for RIBS for dinner.

When we got back to the RV park John and Carol were there. We were so glad to see them. Why didn’t you call? Well they had tried to call us and no one was answering the phone. They were calling our house in Indiana….We tried to call them – but no service. No that wasn’t right that number just rolled over to the cell phone he was using. Checked the number….Duh – I’d reversed the numbers of the area code – no wonder they weren’t answering. And the only phone number they had for George was his Skype number. Talk about a CF.

Any way an angel was sitting on their shoulders yesterday and several Mexican angels were around them. About 100 north of their starting point bright and early yesterday morning there is a Fito Sanitario – produce check point. Everyone gets stopped there – it was where we met the official whose only words in English were “Open Please.” But back to their story. As they were pulling out of the check point Carol heard a PSSST – She told John to stop that a tire had just gone flat. He stopped and sure enough a flat on the 5^th wheel. As he was changing the tire Carol walked past the bed of the truck and noticed the 5^th wheel was lying on the truck. She called John over to look. Part of the hitch had broken. Thank goodness they had to stop for the flat. A couple of big rig truckers stopped at the check point had come over to help with the tire. They finished changing it while John went to talk to the officials. Luckily there was some construction going on at the check point – some welding. They talked to one of the welders he took a look at the hitch and thought he could fix it if he could get off work and if they could get the rig to his house. His boss told him he could quit for the day and John followed him to his house. John says other vehicles did not appreciate that he was only driving 20 mph on the Autopista (toll road.) But they made it to the house and the man was able to do some weld it enough that they made it to here. By the time they finally left there around 5:00 they still had almost 100 more miles to Mazatlan.

So they had pulled into the park just before we got home from eating. About 7:30. John's RV train.

They are still here today. In the morning light John found another crack in the hitch. So they are waiting for a repair man to come this afternoon to see if he can fix it. Sounds like they might spend the weekend here – want to or not.

Bill called the Jeep dealer at 10:30 and Willie is still not ready – maybe by noon. If not then…Monday????

At least the weather is beautiful. Warm sunny and not windy. 

Yarn and grocery shopping in Mazatlan

Let’s see what happened that was exciting yesterday. Ummmm….we got propane. And that’s about it. Oh, yes. All the parts for the Jeep have arrived and it should be all together sometime today.

I think I have the knitting part of knitting figured out. I discovered it goes much easier when there is soothing music playing in the background. I’m serious. Discovered a pattern for a small afghan that can be done using just knitting stitch. Make different colored squares and whip stitch them together. I think I can do that. Soooooo…
This morning we grabbed George and a taxi and went into downtown. I HAD to buy different colored yarn of course.
First though we stopped at Panama for breakfast. I love the way they display days specials using real food. Looks so good.

And their bakery goods – to die for.

Wanted to get some but didn’t want to drag them around with us to the yarn place and the Central Market. Should have gone back inside before we got back in the taxi.
The taxi that took us there also picked us up and brought us back here – we set a time to meet him and there he was. (I really wanted to ride in one of the red pick up trucks but we didn’t get too. – Probably would have been pretty cold.)
After eating we went to Parisina – the big yardage/craft store so I could pick up some yarn for my project. Got about five different colors – should be enough to keep me buys until we’re home. (I’ve run out of special thread for my beading projects so can’t finish the one I’m working on till I get home and can order more.)
Got to the Central market and stopped to talk to one of the ladies I buy my blouses from. Was hoping she got in some new ones but she hadn’t.

Bill and George

 But I have been looking at this dress every time we go in there. Nope didn’t get it – just admire it. All hand embroidered. So pretty.

You never know what you’ll find going on in the market. This guy was playing the xylophone. He would stay in one place for a while then pick it up and move to another area.

We picked up some groceries and a little magnet for me. Just wandered around until it was time to meet the taxi.
We did stop at the Jeep place on the way back to the RV and they said Willie should be ready sometime today. Hope so because we are supposed to go out to dinner to Fat Fish – the rib place tonight with John and Carol. They are on their way home to Idaho from Aticama and plan to spend the night here by us.
A new month already – time flies. Remember to back up your computers.