No gunfights at the Mexican border

We crossed the border in Nogales and luckily although it is hyped as a "dangerous border", it's the same old Mexico that we know and love, nothing has changed. The border crossing may have been uneventful but later on dealing with all the paperwork hassles was another story altogether.
It took 2 hours of going from one spot to the other, a total of 9 counters and very "Kafkaesque" all in all with us dutifully going from one to the other and back again. Apparently there was a purpose to this madness if a total lack of efficiency. It turns out that if you've been to Mexico with your car before it's more of a problem. You have to fill out endless forms, get copies go from one counter to the other to get more copies and this avalanche of useless papers can be quite frustrating. After we got
copy number X we were told to bring out car around, cross over to the other side, as though we're going back to Nogales, and give a guy the requisite two pieces of paper. He then takes our old sticker off the dash and takes a picture of our vin number. He then sends us back to the other side to fill out more paper work, pay for the license to drive across all of Mexico and finally get our new sticker. It's hard to understand why they would insist on cancelling a previous permit, acquired two years ago and which is, in effect, NO LONGER VALID.
Yes, it's crazy loco that way but "asi es Mexico" you got to love it.
The driving on the quotas was fine, not much traffic except when so-called highways go through major cities and then it's not for the faint of heart. We stayed in a lovely town called San Carlos, near Guyamas, it wasn't hot enough to swim and we got there quite late around 5 P.m.
We left San Carlos bright and early and drove for almost 12 hours to Mazatlan.
We're staying at The Belmar, this totally funky hotel, parts of which are literally falling apart. They renovate as the need arises. We have a room with a splendid view of the ocean. It's not the Ritz but it certainly has a million dollar view. The door to our balcony came off its hinges because the wood was so rotten. Yep, that's the kind of place this is and I'm trying to score a better discount than the one we already got. So far we have a 10% discount and I'm holding out for another 5%. The water is never hot, only tepid but it's fine since the weather is warn enough for a cool shower. The room is clean and big and there's even a pool. I will post some pictures of it. The architect must have been on some weird shit to come up with this construction. Obviously he was a lover of art deco, plenty of tile work some in better state than others. It's totally cool. Apparently there are 20% more tourists here than last year but nobody believes it as it doesn't really translate in sales.
There is a tribute concert to John Lennon in a lovely plaza not far from here and we're going. We will be here one week so I won't be posting much unless something phenomenal happens. It's going to be beach time and relaxing time, no car for a while and that will be a relief. I had my first pina colada yesterday and it was wonderful.