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Thursday, January 28, 2016

Mexico City Trip Day 1 & 2

As part of our pre planning for our trip to the South Pacific, we want to get a long stay (1 year) visa for French Polynesia. So we found out that we had to go to Mexico City to the French Embassy to do so, because we are residents of Mexico. (oh darn! NOT). Lucky for us our friend's daughter, Valentina, lives in Coyoacan, which is a neighborhood in the south end of the City. We staid in her room in her 3 bedroom apartment and enjoyed meeting her roommates, Anna and Carlos, who were both so helpful in us finding our way around.
We arrived early on Thursday with a spectacular view of the volcanoes and city. We spent most of the day exploring the local neighborhood. The Coyoacan (means Coyotes) area used to be where all the city folks had country homes. The area is quite old, and both the homes and trees are quite large for being in the city these days. We went to the "Blue House", home of Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, with in walking distance from the apartment. If you do not know who these artists are, look them up, as they are national treasures of Mexico, even having their photos on the money. Frida contracted Polio at age 6 and was later in a devastating accident which caused her incredible pain and the need to wear braces under her clothing. Much of her art is a bit disturbing, showing the pain she was in both physical and mental. Most of my photos are not of that. They both being artists also collected lots of art themselves. The house was quite impressive.
Many of the big busy streets all have parks down the middle with trees and sidewalks for pedestrians. It makes for lovely green areas all throughout the city. In Coyoacan, we saw a double decker tourist bus and thought that would be a great way to see the city and get a lay of the land, so to speak, perfect for day 2.
The tour bus had 4 different routes and we were on the southern one. After we jumped on, we transferred to the Centro one. This took us all around the downtown sites of the big Mexico City. When I say big, I mean it is huge. Largest population in the western hemisphere, at 21 million people.
The first notable thing about the city, is the variety of old and new. Second is how clean it is. They have really reduced their smog levels with mass transportation of an underground metro and free bikes you can ride from one place and leave in another part of the city. People were friendly and helpful, and we met other tourists from all over the world (South America, Europe and Asia).
I took a lot of photos of the gold statue Angel of Independence. This was the photo on the cover of my high school Spanish book, of which I did not study so well. Mrs. Anderson would be proud of my Spanish now!
The tour bus stopped at the Anthropology Musem which was where we wanted to go, but with the horrible Friday traffic, it was only open for another hour by the time we got there. So we figured we would come back on Monday after our appointment at the French Embassy and spend the whole day there.
Back on the bus, I asked the guide where our transfer stop was to get back on the South tour to get home. He said "oh no, you will not make it. We finish before we will get to that stop with this traffic. You will have to take the Metro." "Uhhh, we are not familiar how to do that and we are not city folk. Can you help us?" Some other folks on the tour said they were going there and we could tag along with them. Feeling better already, we asked them where they were from. "La Paz, Bolivia". "NO way, we are from La Paz, BCS Mexico!!" They spoke English too. We were saved! The one son, lived in Aguascaliente, also in Mexcio, but his brother, Dad, step mom and little brother were all from Bolivia. On a Friday night there are a lot of those 21 million people out and about. The Metro was packed like sardines. We all held on to each other like a train, while the dad carried the 2 year old. We had to change from one train line to another to get back to Coyoacan. They were so sweet to take care of us. I hope they get to read this, to know how much we appreciate what they did for us!!

Popocatepetl and Iztaccihuatl Volcanos

Huge expanse of city from the plane with volcanos

Zaragosa street, Coyoacan

Avenida Francis Sota

Mike by big tree on Francis Sota

Arched door

A huge bakery where we bought pastries

The Blue House

Frida painting

Frida portrait

Frida's kitchen

Frida work studio including wheelchair

Frida's bed with overhead mirror

Blue house yard

Diego and Frida

Middle walk (not sidewalk) down center of busy street

Old building heading downtown

comfortable ride on top of scrap metal in Friday traffic jam

cool old architecture

La Angel de Independencia

Golden Angel

Stock Exchange

Crazy lizard statue

Modern architecture

Katrina, queen of Day of the Dead

curved building

fork in the road building

Palacio de Bella Artes

Palace of National Theater Arts building

modern and old on the same street

Old government building

carvings around the arched windows

Dragon entry lanterns

Benito Juarez monument

monument at sunset

Angel of Independence in the sunset

Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Bonus Photos

Here are a few photos that did not make it into the previous posts.

Sophie Sleeping in the aft head on the laundry

What you talking to me?

Sophie: If I wedge myself in like this I don't feel the motion of the boat so much. Sure looks uncomfortable to me!!

At Christmas dinner, Sophie was trying to hide in the big canvas bag from the fireworks noise.

Mike and Edy shopping at the Shrimp ladies stands in Mazatlan.

Avatar with a bone in her teeth, flying the popular Bubbles Spinnaker, while racing in the Bandaras Bay Blast.

Tuesday, January 12, 2016

Christmas 2015 in Mazatlan

We had two days of beating to weather (tacking against the wind) to get up the coast from Bandaras Bay to Mazatlan. It is not the most comfortable point of sail, but we were on a mission to be with friends for Christmas. Sophie did not like the bouncing up and down too much either. She found her favorite spot to be on the floor of the aft head where she could wedge herself in from the motion of the boat. And thank God we had the full enclosure around the cockpit as some waves were quite big in the 20 plus knots of wind and splashed all the way over the cockpit to the aft deck! Wet and Wild was Mike's description of the trip. When we got close to Mazatlan there were lots of shrimp boats out fishing and we had to weave and dodge our way around them. The tallest lighthouse on the Pacific coast of North America can be seen from about 25 miles out, guiding us into Mazatlan. The entrance to the estuary where the marina's are located is quite exciting too. You aim strait for a beach in front of a hotel, then make a sharp left and sharp right and try not to run aground or into the dredge that is permanently anchored there to keep the channel clear from the moving sand. Mike decided to take up the challenge and sure enough we stopped short in the sand, but backed off easily. I yelled to the guys working to the dredge now they know where they need to work!! They watched us bump the bottom!
Thankfully, our old boss Ray, had pre-arranged for a slip for us at Marina Mazatlan, so we knew right where to go. Then we had to move to a new slip as there was no electricity available at that first one. Why be in a marina if you can't plug in your yellow umbilical cord for electricity?!? We got all checked in and soon after our buddy Edy came by to welcome us. He has worked for us in La Paz for the last 5 years and we could honestly not be sailing without his amazing help. He wanted to go home to Mazatlan and be with his family, so we helped to arrange for a job with the local marine repair guys. He loves the new job with benefits like health insurance for his wife and kids and he gets to drive a golf cart around the huge marina to get to what ever boat he is working on. Pretty cool!
We spent several nights at Ray's house enjoying his home, garden and yard. He just got a new big screen tv and he let us copy a lot of his CD music collection he had left over from working in the music industry. We spent two whole days making chocolate chip cookies trying a few different recipes. Of course the taste testing was the best part!
Mexican's celebrate Christmas on Christmas eve night, having a special dinner and opening the presents at midnight. Edy's parents, Ricardo and Margarita, had invited us to be with them on this special occasion, Edy's first Christmas home in 6 years!! We were quite honored to be there. We bought all the younger kids presents, not just Edy's. Margarita and younger sister Kimberly fixed up a delicious shrimp dinner (what else would you eat when you are from Mazatlan, the with the biggest shrimp fleet on the Pacific?). They let me help stir too! One of the older boys played guitar and we sang a few songs for fun. When his older sister Blanca and cousins showed up the feast was on. Margarita made a special desert too which is like a crispy sweet crunchy thing with cinnamon and sugar. Yummy.
Edy took us on a tour of old town Mazatlan along the steep hills where the cliff divers jump off and some fancy statues too. We had a bite to eat, and when we came out of the Tunnel (name of the restaurant) all of the Christmas lights were on. It was so pretty. Even the church was all lit up. On another occasion, just before we departed, Edy took us down to where the shrimp ladies sell their wares. You can buy shrimp of any size, from tiny to as big as your hand! You can buy them headed or not, peeled or not, what ever you like. Then we went to his house for a bon voyage dinner with Brenda his wife, and Itsyana, 4, and Joanna,2, their daughters. We had a fun time playing with them and the new toys they got for Christmas.
Sophie is not too fond of fireworks, so we decided to go anchor by Isla Venado (Deer Island) in front of the resort beach of Mazatlan for new years eve. It was a great idea, as we got to see the fireworks shows all over town from our view point and the noise was muffled from the distance. The next morning, new years day, we hoisted the anchor and started the bash back to La Paz. It was two more days of beating to weather again to get home, but we made it with out too much fuss, just uncomfortableness. We passed through the San Lorenzo Channel and decided to anchor out one more night to make the trip last one more day. By chance, our friend Pedro was out sailing on his boat Jade with his daughter Valentina. She lives in Mexico City and had not been out with him for over a year. They were so excited to see us, not knowing we would be in the same anchorage. Instead of taking a nap, we invited them over for steak dinner. We told stories and drank wine and thoroughly enjoyed that last night of the trip!! We made plans with Valentina to meet her in Mexico City later in January. But that will be the next story...........