The Ying and Yang

 Pardon me if I deviate from the whimsical for just one edition of Mile 14 Southern Bureau. I've been wanting to write this for some time now and to tell you the truth as I start to type I have no idea how it it is going to turn out....what can I say that makes sense about the people of Mazatlan who love so much and hurt so much at the same time. 

As MPeasy and I walk the streets and watch the town awake on our especially cool Sunday mornings we bump into it all. It's obvious. Great joy everywhere like this young Lady telling us ' I can do anything through Christ '.

Or these three guys who were gut chuckling their way along Cameron Sabalo and gave us big a buenos dias and asked how we were. When I asked if I could get their picture for the blog they said of course, of course you can.

Or the kids playing soccer on the beach. Their folks get them to this wonderful place and they do exactly what they'd do at home but barefoot and carefree. I watched them play and well, all of us know the joy of youth.

These two  sold us an anniversary silver pendant at Rubio Jewelry for MP on our wedding anniversary. We had a wonderful talk about silver and then about marriage. This young woman in her 30's told us of her  5 lifelong best friends of which 3 of them are divorced , she and us shared marriage success stories. 

But then  this...We were so excited when we first arrived to do our Sunday ' up and over ' hike. We take in the views, have breakfast on the beach and then on our way to the Mercado to get the bus we walk through Revolution Plaza that borders the seat of Government and  come across this.

Dozens and dozens of people laying out homemade posters looking for information on loved one that have disappeared in the ongoing Cartel war. The missing are  all young men . It's quiet and when I ask if it's O.K. to look and take a few pics a woman told me ' please do '....it was solemn . 

At first I thought it was a memorial, a remembrance and out pouring of grief . But no it wasn't that at all, it was people doing all they could to find lost ones and at the very least put the effort forward keep hope alive....Maybe somebody knows that their son just decided to leave for Mexico City for a while to look for work...maybe...

Just a day later  we went to sunset with friends at the start of the Malecon in front of Valentino's . It's usually a place of energy , people having Cerveza, taking pictures in front of the Mazatlan sign with family....and at the same time looking for those disappeared. The very next day we passed here on the bus and as we approached I tell MP that I'd bet anything that it's been taken down and it was. Sadness, joy, optimism, grief and  desperation and beauty all at the same place, at the same time. 

Everybody is used to seeing the Military. All of our years in Mazatlan we see convoys and police trucks with armed men but now it's different. The National Guard now patrol and you can tell it's not just routine, the soldiers are looking, paying attention . Now they walk the Malecon in security teams and are part of everything...everything. Hundreds of soldiers . 

We did one of our ' staycations' at the La Siesta . amongst the sunset crowd I took this pic. The soldiers act like it's normal and they even say hi and smile....and of course I always say thank you . 

So...So....Without going into this deal and try to sort out the cause, the right and wrong, the zig and zag , I'll just say this. The human spirit is alive and well in Mazatlan Mexico. Love will win, it always does . One thing I've learned in my life is that nothing is lineal, there are no straight lines, no easy answers . And while you look for those things you carry on, looking for love.

Just like the old days

That fish there got me excited. It was fairly low tide the other day and I was walking and watching. The water  is warm so I'm thinking if I spot Rooster fish chasing bait well maybe I'll catch the first one in about 3 or 4 years. I caught my first Rooster in 2007 from the beach and it was in March so I thought I'd do exactly what I would do back then....walk and watch, when you see them you can catch them. I put a popper on and just 1/4 Mile up the beach from the house I see the bait jumping free of the water and running parallel with the waves, something big chasing. Well I duck hooked that cast and made several more in the area before continuing up the Playa. And low and behold , another 3/4 of a mile and right in front of Dan Stewart's house I see it again. The chasing is out in front of me so I cast hard and long at about a 45 degree angle from where I'm standing and instantly when it hits the water I have a strong slimey on ! My adrenaline gets going , I'm thinking Pez Guyo so I go easy and 10 minutes in I ride this guy up on the perfect wave and as you can see ....Toro...kind of a ' budget Guyo " but what an exciting one. There's a guy nearby that comes to look and get this pic and swipe the dirt off of him as I return him to the sea...It was an old / new experience, just what I needed. Although we're on 'final approach ' for re entry to N.O.B. we have still have 2 weeks don't be surprised if I still catch the Rooster.

There's a gorgeous green area up the road from us where I've routinely seen school graduates and wedding pictures being taken . I always cross the street to give them space and I always get a kick out of the pageantry that is Mexico. Well, across the street I bump into this young woman being posed and as cool as it was I have NO idea what it was about. Maybe the ultimate picnic, maybe she's a Carnaval Queen contestant , maybe she liked pink and wanted this pic, I'll never know.

People ask me if it's dangerous in Mazatlan. Yes it is . And this right here is the most dangerous thing . The sidewalk end right at the property line and if you're not watching...ouch...

Now the second most dangerous thing could easily be the new zip line from the top of the Faro to the observatorio. This is one looooong extremely high zip line . When it gets close to the end it has some belly in it so that the riders who slow down when it gets smoking fast run out of momentum and don't make it all the way to the end. So the poor guy is dangling there and one of the employees pulls himself out on another cable and snaps a strap to the customer and then inverts upside down so he ' walk ' his feet along yet another cable back to the safety of the zip line terminal....jeez Louise....you gotta be outa your gourd to do that. The second pic is the downhill station with the uphill way up the mountain.

We went shopping to the point the other day at just the right time. The Panga guys had sold all the lobster the restaurant needed and were trying to get rid of the rest. Well I got the two biggest lobster's I've ever bought for 25 bucks Americano. They weighed at least a kilo a piece. We ate our fill and still had leftovers for an omelette the next morning....Now I don't usually do food pics but hey, rules are made to be broken right ? 

We gotta run into to town to get some t-shirts that I had special ordered so hows about I end this mini Mile 14 with a sunset and mini song. These guys are the music I prefer here in Mexico.

Sometimes....

 It feels a bit like an alternate universe here in Mazatlan, you know the old parallel worlds deal. I've often told people that the coolest thing about Mexico is that there's no doubt that it doesn't even  TRY to be like the USA and for me....that's a good thing . 

I shoot that pic through window this morning at a place we came across on our Saturday morning walk / talk / eat trip . We've found the most wonderful breakfast spot called La Laguna which is at a point in the wetlands that run parallel with the Malecon. Great food and the vibe is like you were in Paris dining along the Seine. As we ate this morning we watched this guy circumnavigate the Lagoon, expertly throwing his cast net as he moved along .....Pretty cool. 

But I digress. I was gonna tell a story about beer...Pacific of course is brewed right here in Mazatlan and it fuels the town, no doubt about it . Well the other day we're at our new favorite and recently discovered taco stand Epa Epa. Now we had to look for a new place as Tacos Martin which had the wonderful beef tongue (lengua ) that I love mysteriously went out of business . Epa has Happy hour all day, 2 Pacificos for 50 peso, $2.50 in gringo. So,for every beer a frugal person will order two, right ? I looked that word frugal up in the Thesaurus and the first word for it came up  was ' miserly ' ....well I don't think I'm that but I can stretch a buck....so where's this story going you ask...  So we get our two beers and order taco's El pastor and a crazy potato. When it comes we order two more Pacifico's even though MP doesn't really want another but I'm ready for one and as we eat I drink it and then 'help' MP with hers. Well about this time a Mexican man with his family leaves table and goes out to his car and comes back with 2 Pacifico's and I figure that he's bringing his own beer in which you see all the time and is acceptable in Mexico. But nope, he walks over to our table and says he'd like to treat us as they're jumping the jet  for Tijuana soon and have to empty their cooler. So in the spirit of International co operation I say thank you and now we have a 6 beer lunch, kinda like your basic 3 martini lunch on Wall Street ...and me...well....I've got my first early day burner ( as Tom O'mara would say ) going in looooooong time. Took a nap when we got home. 

And fishing....yup we're still pounding the water. Most of Team X convenes every morning over at Mar Rosa and the reports have been kinda slow and with the Water Taxi refusing to let non El Cid people aboard I've been fishing closer to home. AND, it's been sooo cold in the morning that I've kinda changed that pattern and lately I walk in the morning asnf fish in the afternoon...Dan Sterchi said to me one morning years ago " I don't know why the hell we gotta get up so early for , I mean the fish DO live here don't they "! so I invented a pattern where I fish in the pool troughs just off shore at low tide. I use my ultra light outfit as I only cast 20 or 30 feet and then let a really really small rubber swimfish just kind float and dodge along and low and behold there's snappers in those pools. I've caught many like this and the other day a gorgeous yellow one. They're slol close you'd think you can see them but you can't.

Behind me you can see the shallow sand I wade out on and then cast parallel with the beach up and down the trough. Nuttin to it .

Now here's a gorgeous thing . They other day we went to the movie and as MP like everybody else in town has been cold she see's this unique  coats that I guess I'd call a shawl . What a cool store, they have things we've never seen before with an atmosphere to match. So if any of you wanna see the coolest clothing in the coolest store at the Galleria's this is it .

And finally in the ' we've got culture ' department we ran into these dancers on the Malecon this morning. What a great place to walk and visit and you never know what or who you're going to run into. You can stop for a coconut, you can get a cold Michelada or you can just belong, it's really cool.

Mexi-cold

50 degrees Fahrenheit at 6:00 a.m....now that might not sound cold to all of you that are N.O.B. but here in Mazatlan that's plain frigid . If you kinda look close or enlarge you can make out Alejandro warming his hands over a large Sterno stove . As you've heard me say many times , there's things in life that ya gotta want to do and getting out in the dark for a few Poleta like this is one of those things for me.

That's actually a pretty good sized one. Unlike their bigger cousin the Robalo they only get this big and we get them in the semi dark with a little feather jig called a Pluma close to shore and they're great eating. Team Xer Tim Lockwood arrived about a week ago and holy moly he caught a Robalo of at 5 kilo 3 days in a row....yikes....this is like the Mazatlan shore fishing equivalent of Joe Dimaggio's 56 game hitting streak back in 1941. Just like Joe he knows exactly what he's doing but ya know old #003 knows the fishing on the Playa a bit and that 3 day streak is even more impressive by the fact that I didn't think there were that many fish around....until now that is ! Good job Tim !

Ya know I'm kind of an ambassadeur for sport fishing . Team X is kinda my way of keeping the faith with all the wonderful people I've shared fishing with through the years. I meet new friends daily . We have an acronym ...FTF friends through fish . The other day I met these two Mexican men who were fishing bait. They stopped me to ask what the fish was as they thought it was Toro but as we chatted about the nice and rare Pompano they had caught the other guy has a bite and pulls in the very biggest Bottete I have ever seen. We had a good laugh....FTF...

Mac and I became friends 7 or 8 years ago. In fact he was with me when I tried to break my neck recovering a Poleta from the slippery rocks that cost me a trip to the emergency room...We both agreed that in the year 2025 we'd be using the ol grey matter  a bit more and let the impetus part rest for a while...like the rest of our lives.

Now this Team Xer was throwing his hand line on a blustery mid day low tide and I'd have given him little chance of success with. Well he walked up next to me as I casted knowing conditions were impossible and threw the Cameron into 18 inches of water and reared back with a bite landing a nice supper sized Cocanaco Snapper. Guy looks like he was taking a break from his job at the bank eh ? FTF.

I guess I can say that I've caught just about every kind of fish there is to catch surf fishing in Mazatlan Mexico. I'm fairly good at it and of course 20 years of doing it increases your odds.....so....it was really cool to catch something new, something I've never seen , my first Barracuda . AND it wasn't one of the smaller Pacific Barracuda I have seen on commercial boats but was a gorgeous Great Barracuda that swam away to grow and prosper.

Thank goodness there was nobody around to help me a get a pic. I might have been tempted to hold him for the photo and his teeth  were kinda intimidating and he was kinda snapping them a bit....see there, using the ol grey matter.

And here's a big ol Colorado Snapper that my fellow Alaskan Kiki caught out fishing with the famous Chalio's son Alex. I met Kiki and Chalio 20 years ago and we fished Alaska, we fished the Playa, we fished Marmol in the panga, I caught my first Rooster fish with these guys. Chalio left the planet this last winter and Mazatlan has a hole in it's heart....and Kiko....well, he just keeps fishing . FTF .

Some how or another as I was minding my own business watching the Sunset I got stung by a bee. Of course I'm highly allergic so it was kinda weird that I didn't know about it until by toe started turning several shades of purple. No mistaking it . That's what it looks like . I had several stings above my eye brows a few years back that blackened my eyes and was responsible for the only time in my 37 year guide career that I canceled any trips . So 3 days of Magnum Prednisone doses and we're good to go/

And oh....the Sunseta from our Casa. Ain' t that purty.

How's about I end this edition of Mile 14 with a song ? Alaska's best friend Hobo Jim Varsos co wrote this song with Russell Smith of The Amazing Rhythm Aces fame. George Jones made this song a #1 country hit....now how in the world could you write a song this beautiful and not be multi millionaire . We all love and miss you Jim .