Everyday life

I got a good excuse.  My 6 year old computer has really slowed down and is behaving unusual with annoying windows that pop open when I'm writing and writing is a big deal for me. It's kinda weird as I could use my phone or my pad but ever since taking poetry from Dick Hugo at U of M many years ago I've found that the keyboard itself is a huge part of the creative process. So I got it back  today after using my by buddy Cesar to scrub the computer for me. About 10 years ago I got a horrible virus and was going to buy a new computer. Well, I had Cesar take it and it came back better than new. So this time he emptied the caches, cleaned the hard drive and updated all of my programs for 1800 peso, a C note at Mile 14. The programs include Microsoft Office Suite that itself is worth a hundred bucks. So if any of you need computer or internet help the guys at Aztech are the best, give Cesar a call at 669 9943705 , he'll fix ya up.

Need the good stuff....PescaMaz is the place. Located behind the basketball court across the beach from Playa Norte just past the Fishermans monument . Just go inland at the Turtle for now (Carnaval eh ? ) and take a randy at the first road on the corner of the kids water park.

Rafa Vega not only has the good stuff but it's mainly geared to us surf guys. With all the high tech stuff I got the last 4 nice fish I got including 2 Robalo just minutes apart came on a homemade feather jig....he's got them. Just ask for a ' Plouma ' and he has all sizes. I learned this year that I'm shopping for Mexico fish in Mexico from here on out...no more of that ol,,,,maybe this will work ?

THE place to buy shrimp is right around the corner. Back on the Malecon at North Beach just walk south past the Puerto Viejo Hotel and it's ridiculously narrow staired entry way you'll see a blue Pescaderia...that ain't it....You'll also see a store with freezers along the wall that have all the product displayed. The guy will tell you which shrimp are farm raised and which are wild, He has Kilo bags or 5 kilo bags and in all sizes. He has Pulpo, Jaiba, some Pesca and it all fresh frozen. Ya know we quit the shrimp ladies, too expensive, no consistency and they seem to have a weird anti septic smell sometimes and what I know about it what everyone should know about it....FRESH seafood of any kind should have NO smell.

Lately we've given up on the Pino Suarez market. It's great fun to shop there but it can be really busy and sometimes it seems we've paid to much on certain days......mmmm.... so now we buy at the Juan Carrasco Market just 2 blocks off the Malecon in this same area, it's a block form PescaMaz. We like that they always have prices on the produce and the polo and carne guys have prices posted on a reader board, Today MP got everything for our version of ranchero sauce. # pounds of Tomatos, one huge onion, 3 poblano peppers , a head of garlic, a handful of cilantro and a jalapeno for bumps. Drizzle good olive oil over the pile and bake at 375 for a loooong time ( until you see some carmelization) then pulverize it real good and boy howdy....throw a tortilla down and pile that stuff up with a soft boiled egg on top and then sprinkle some panella cheese on top 😊... Bonus Tip in that market look for Comida Econimicaon the far side from the ocean. Luis is hard to peg down on the day but supposedly he has Mom's homemade Chili Relenos every other Friday. Oh man, they are good. They look absolutely perfect and are served in bowl with a light chili consomme so it's like a Chili releno soup... I ate one in 3 minutes.

MP buying....the rancheros cost 67 peso with a cantaloupe included, about 3 and half bucks..Her's pic of the before and after.

And when  you get down to the Juan Carrasco Market that we highly recommend say high to the deer guy for me...and give him some peso's, it's the energy and the locals that make his life of our so grand . Ya know in the heartland he'd be a 4 point but in Montana just a 2 point, whats with that ?

One last tip that you can rely on,,,All my buddies use this stuff when they get a knife slice or a tooth gouge from a fish or any scratch that could lead to an infection . An infection here is a serious deal and that is the  last thing you need when away from your own health care. I had no idea that penicillin could be used topical. This one here is penicillin and sulpha drug that was an old school infection fighter back in the day. SO...for my fishing buddies in Alaska I'll make ya a deal. If you'll comment on the blog and get me some dings on my google account I'll bring you one of these babies. Ya know years ago on my Monday day off from guiding I had to go to the clinic for a shot and then a follow up with fish poison on my left hand...gotta have all your fingers for the guitar ya know.

If you ain't teasing, you ain't fishing

I've called the jury in on that deal as I've fished the teaser now almost exclusively. Here is a close up of one I tied on 2/0 siwash hook. I use the loop knot just like you would for bottom fishing with multiple hooks and I like the teaser five feet or so from the swivel for my lure.

I started out using plain old coho flys like we use in Alaska for salmon but I've found out that white and glitter is the deal, maybe just a little blue flash abou or green in there won't hurt but the mainly white color looks most like a small sardine. Also you don't want your loop to far from the line as it will twist up more and you need to keep it a half a foot or so below your braid which is tied with an albright knot,,,,if the loop is long enough to reach the braid you can have a real shamoozle and straightening out the braid at O dark thirty will test your patience. Here is pic of my third or fourth cast the other morning...it pulled really hard and I thought huge pargo, well, it was a doublea...Pargo on the teaser and Toro on theMirro lure.

In the last 3 months the Toro come to the tease about 75 % of the time. I've had two fish on it an once about 20 times I'd say....but... there are issues. For one thing you need to keep it small so as to not catch to much air and overly effect your cast or the action of your lure. If you're fish lures or metal make sure you advise you financial dept. because what can happen when the tease is hit and not the metal you're dragging a 10 dollar lure through the rocks and if it gets snagged you can lose the lure and worst yet....lose the fish. Do my advice is this...use the teaser whenever looking for fish but if you're on a hot Toro bite take it off and fish normal or you're going to have trouble, for sure. Here's a matched set both on the teaser.

So it was still dark that morning when I stashed the Snappers on the deck to clean later and headed up the beach to get my 10,000 steps started. On the way I ran into sardines in the surf and caught maybe 15 Toro before I got this bonus Snook.  Shortly after I landed him I had another bigger one that spit just as hit the beach and then I had ANOTHER come off so close to me that I actually kicked at him to try and get him up the beach away from the surf. Those Robalo, the creme de le creme of surf fishers are darn tough to land. They have a kind of paper like side of the mouth and they really don't bite to hard, So far I've landed 6 and lost about 6....Now those Snapper are a different story, they know how to bite and never spit the hook.  It's like they fight with their mouths shut and most generally after you land one you have a hell of a time getting him to open his mouth to get the hook out.

That fish is soooo good to eat, especially the Snook. MP brought down a new batter for us called ' Pride of the West ' and used seltzer water instead of beer and for the first time ever the fish had a really good crunch. Keith introduced me to ' Shore Lunch ' batter many years ago and it has always been our standard until we found this new stuff...or maybe I just finally learned how to cook it after all these years , ya suppose Keith ?

On Saturday it was blowing and low tide but the beach was deserted so I put Pandora on the Red Dirt sound station and pulled up my gator and went fishing. Walla, I landed these two Snook in the first 1/2 hour and then played with the Toro's until they sawed my stuff of in the rock. I was using a feather jig so no biggy but you gotta be smarter with the Krocidiles and Mirro Lures. Not only are they expensive but they're hard to find here which is really not that big a deal as we're always looking for something to do.

Monday is always a tough day to get my fishing time in. Our maid Lorena comes at 9:30 so I have to be home to pre clean the house and hide all the fishing tackle so she doesn't get a hook in her. Then we have to go somewhere so it's usually off to the grocery store for protein and liquids....So I didn't get a real chance until late afternoon when I hoofed it up the beach thinking I had a pattern going...well I did, I caught Toro after Toro until something really heavy hit right next to the beach. I pulled in this nice snapper and had a small Grouper on the teaser. I kinda got a freezer full of fish so I was half way to releasing this guy when an old friend came along. Arturo is a vendor I first met at the Mayan Palace years ago. I used to give him Toro' s so I decided he'd like a good fish and boy howdy did he. I asked him if he new how to clean it and all and he said that he didn't...." but my wife does and I'm going home right now ". Years ago I gave Arturo an Ugly Stick and a Daiwa reel and I had the feeling he needed $$$ and sold it so it felt good to be of help again.

So today at low tide when the walking is easy me and MP go a couple miles up the beach for a hand holder. I always take the rod just in case I see something but today we mostly just talked and walked. A guy approaches me and asks if  I'd caught anything and I said no and  he says " a local guy caught 2 huge Snapper here just a couple of days ago, you gotta have a feather looking thing and cast into that white water, the fish are really close to shore ".....Man oh man, that's our fish culture, add 5 pounds and pass it on just like everywhere ! 😎

Old is New

Yup, sometimes it is. I'm usually a pretty reliable blogger so I know I'm late but I was waiting for the fishing to get better and something exciting to happen. well both have.

It's time for the snook here I guess . I rang in the New Year with two Robalo landed and I lost a huge one the other day when it spit the hook the second it went dry on the beach...heart breaker.  Just this morning Ernie caught an unassisted ( I was resting from our trip ) 9 pounder so for all you Team Xers on the way...it might not be the peak of the run as us salmon guys say but it's a hell of a lot better than it's been. I think all these gorgeous sardines we're seeing in the last pic account for it.

AND THIS IS WHERE WE WENT

We met Marrisol at a Christmas sale and we didn't buy any painted rocks from her but we did buy a two day one night trip to a small town and archaeological site about five hours south of  here near Tepic. It is some of the most northerly evidence of the Meso America civilizations here between before the time Christ, long time ago that is. 

We left on the bus with about 30 people like us, well sort of like us if you know what I mean and we arrived in the town of Ixtlan Del Rio a little late, just time for a taco stand and a Bud Light. MP and I woke up from our Hotel smack dab in this way smaller than Mazatlan town and went to adventure the Sunday morning markets and energy of the best day in Mexico. This is the view up the street and down the street from the nicest place in town, the Plaza Hidalgo Hotel at 7:00 a.m.

Our room was #118 which was on the second floor, a Mexico deal. It was clean but spartan and for 30 bucks a night it was just right . We had a little Jeffroism occur when somebody told me that the water wasn't all cold you just had to let it run for ten minutes before you shower. So...that's what I did as I attended to other things when MP let out that yelp I've heard many a time. We had water all the way out in the bedroom from a blocked drain that has a deal on it that you remove before use ( obviously if you know about that ). The drain plug is engineered to keep cock roaches from climbing out of the pipe...mmmm... I think we'd of rather had a few cock roaches than a full blown flood. But we squeegeed it back from where it came and carried on.

Of course being Ixtlan Del Rio I had to find the Rio. A short walk and the help of Google Maps we come across the river....well...I guess it's like everywhere, in some places and with some people it was taken care of . And in other places , well it ain't habitat for ol slimey, let me put it that way.

Everyone was setting up for the Sunday Market as we walked through first . Friendly, friendly and friendly is all I can say. The locals here are way less used to seeing Americano's than in Mazatlan. The Juarez Sunday Market here is famous and huge, this one  was different. It was smaller but way more spread out, it was the entire downtown and the stuff that was crafted in Nayarit were things we'd not seen before.... we helped the economy. I got new Levi's, MP got a hat, some shoes, a blanket we/ never seen and some fresh blueberry's. The first booth we saw had the usual cool old stuff and he was selling money, what a great idea !

You can tell it's winter when the dog has to wear to coats...It was cold here, it's all relative to where you're at but I think it was relatively a lot colder at Mile 14 of the Kenai river....Sorry friends, the ice dams sound terrible, hope the cold streak ends for you all.

Some people think Mexico is dirty...I like to think it's just well used. We came across a laboratory like clean Tortilla factory. Spotless clean, you could tell the the guys liked their lives, and me.

As we like to do we sat at a counter and ate breakfast in this food court. It's new and modern. MP had eggs with Machaca and I had Pozole with Papa which means 'paw' but they were really pieces of hoof like I routinely see in my Sunday menudo. It was really good, red chili based broth with a lot of hominy and bone and marrow. The man in the first pic is selling the most meaty chicaroons we've ever seen.

By this point of the morning I've resigned myself to going off diet....it;s starting to get a little Anthony Bourdainesk and it got more so as the day went on. We had breakfast desert with the mother of all Churro's...pass the milk. 

MP took a shot of your now land locked guide. I was just a few bites away from weighing two extra pounds...

Noonish we arrive at what the locals call Las Toriles which is derived from the word Toro for bull. This 80 acre site was discovered by a cattle rancher who was excavating a unused plateau on his land and came across a crypt with artifacts and long dead people. The artifacts created an obvious urge to investigate as they were typical of 3 other mesoamerican civilizations with Los Toriles being the northern most. The crypt was lost but it was recreated for the site as close as could be done, everything else is as found accept a few places where repairs were made.

On Marrisol's promotion page there were just a couple pics of pretty modest structures so I wasn't expecting so much. The 80 acres are groomed for you to roam anywhere you want and only a few delicate structures are fenced off to walking and climbing. This is the first structure you come across,

The guy giving the info was so cool. On his left is Marrisol and you can see MP with keen interest in her face in the background. He explains the community is 2500 years old and went on about the use of the structures for ceremony and houses etc. Of course every crowd has that Jack Ass that knows everything and has to ask the 'smart ' questions....well we had that guy, oh they bore me, always have.

He explained how the structure pictured below is very rare and only one of four so far discovered in Central America. It is by far the most impressive structure in the place and it would be easy to think that all the cross shaped opening were christian and brought by the Spanish when they conquered Mexico but obviously that could not be as they predate the conquest my thousands of years. Instead it is supposed the crosses the elements of life, earth,wind, fire and water all abundant right here at Los Toriles. They are not called petrogyths but some of the rocks have been worked to create snakes and the other animals they lived with.

It was explained that 40 structures have been uncovered and they have identified 50 more that someday will be revealed. As the neighboring property is under use he said that even though they are certain it wasn't contained to just this place that everyday life has erassed the trail. The rocks were used for homes in the modern era and remains of walls were plowed over to make fields, But in it's day with the current evidence they community population was around 6 to 10 thousand. Here's picture of the grounds. We walked the entire perimeter and I wish everyone with us could have but it was hot and some of the folks just weren't able to see it all.

I watched across the circle as MP took it all in....I could tell she was thinking. Thinking about our place in the world and the flash that is our time here,

And as she was thinking I was thinking....how lucky we are to have this lifestyle and especially each other. Thinking how all the work and focus pays off when you can walk 21,000 steps in a day and still feel good....but I did sleep pretty deep. I was thinking that if this place arouses the curious in me we gotta go further south, venture farther and harder to see more anitquity and how and why we're here, that's what I was thinking.

So it was taking some of the folks a bit to get back off the plateau so we found a shaded spot for a picnic. We had good cheese and sausage, some olive / tuna pate with crackers and a ....Tecate, yup no Pacifico.

 

the bus driver suggested a stop at a lake for Mariscos.put us a bit behind schedule and the possibility of getting to Mazatlan for the end of the SeaHawk game was gone . ( I did manage to get it on my phone so I saw the season painfully end for us ). But Lake Santa Maria De Oro was fantastic. It's water filled volcanic crater that is rumored to be bottom less. C'mon I told our friends, if that were true that would mean there's hole in the earth. The place is undeveloped and wild. Continueing our food fest we had Shrimp Ceviche tostados again, so good.

Here's a pic of us four traveling friends, us and Ruben and Candace Dressler...thanks for the fun times you guys.

And if you ever get here take a hard look before you let your kids swing in this baby....things are bit different south of the border.

I'm gonna take a chance here and post one finale pic, me at 186 pounds, Ya know I'm comfortable in my own skin and it feels good to be closing in on that goal I've had for years....see you guys next week or so....