Visit to Gringoland

No worries we're still in Mazatlan but we presently reside in old Mazatlan in the centre of this historic city with some freshly renovated buildings and some crumbling ones as well,many are too far gone and are beyond repair. New Mazatlan which is much further down the malequon (beach promenade) is home to most of the newly minted condos and the ever present all inclusives. This is where most of the tourists end up for their one or two week stays. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that, it's just not for us. We took a bus to see if there were many of them around and sadly, for Mexico and workers from the area, the answer is not very many. The beach was almost deserted, it's a huge beach, plenty of sand and sea but not too many bodies. The problem is there are so many of these spots in Mexico and only so many gringos to go around.

Furthermore Cancun and Puerto Vallarta have eclipsed Mazatlan in recent years. They are perceived, wrongly in my estimate, as having more panache and more allure thus their appeal to tourists who might not know any better. In the end it doesn't really matter. As far as I'm concerned all inclusives are probably all alike regardless of their location. They offer the same pre-packaged antiseptic types of environment, free of germs, lots of food and booze and easily recognizable signposts which scream "nothing threatening here". For Mexico's sake it would have been nice to see more white bodies on the beach, the vendadores walking from one end to the other are looking mighty lonely with nobody to sell their holiday trinkets to.

Today Sunday was a big day in Mexico. It was 400 years ago that the Virgin of Guadeloupe appeared to a poor peasant just out of Mexico city. She is venerated across Mexico and people traveled all the way to Mexico City to request her favours, not really sure it's working but faith is important in this country, they believe with a lot of fervor.
We went to the Cathedral to check things out and the party to celebrate the Virgin's arrival was in full swing with the usual attendant chaos.
All the childrens and there were many of them were dressed in traditional Indian costumes, cute as buttons, down to the littlest babies. There was also a concert going on with incredibly bad singers, nobody was getting paid, this was all pro bono, which party explains the lack of quality. Nobody seemed to mind with the crowd happily singing along. There was the usual array of vendors of all stripes and colors and lots of finger food to be had. It's going to be a royal mess tomorrow to clean up, nothing unusual about that. At one end of the plaza there is a huge fake Christmas tree courtesy of Coke, coke logos are everywhere on it, even the star at the top is a coke logo. Coke dollars hard at work in Mexico and they do love their Coke, they drink it by the bucket even early in the morning.
We didn't go swimming today. It was windy and the sea was rough plus the water
still hasn't warmed up that much. We're holding out for Melaque, it's further south and it should be warmer by the time we get there. Tomorrow is our last day here. I'll try and post some pictures some time next week. Was able to buy some postcards, strangely enough, not an easy proposition. I don't think people write too many of these anymore. They weren't the prettiest but they will have to do. We've really enjoyed our time here. It's been mellow and relaxed but time to move on. No worries we'll be back Mazatlan.