Plazuela Machado for dinner Friday night.

Thursday was kind of put things together day and find things we had tucked away so they could travel okay. We did go out to dinner Thursday night at the Villa Italia in the Golden Zone. Excellent meal as always. Another in bed by 9:30 night. 

Friday we were still puttering around inside and outside, but planned on going to the Plazuela Machado for dinner and to listen to Rafael sing and play. Forgot how heavy Friday night traffic could be. Heading along the Malecon to Centro Historico. Lots of lights. And a lot of people walking and biking along the Malecon. Good to see that. Last year it was so empty here. 

Parked a block from the Machado. I love the old buildings here. I guess trees can grow anywhere,. 

The decorations for Day of the Dead were still up so had to walk around and take pictures. You can climb the steps and be part of the butterfly. 

The back of one of the decorations. 

Her front. She was quite tall. 

Not sure where the door led, didn't go to look. Lots and lots of  people some with masks and some without.

More decorations, this one was pretty big. too. 

She was hard to get a good picture of as the lights kept changing color or brightness. This is her back.

Her front

The gazebo also had decorations, but couldn't get a good picture of them. So glad we got to see them before they were taken down. 

Here is Bill and our friends John and Shirley from Idaho. We met up with them in San Carlos. They are on their way further south to Aticama. 

We had dinner at the Italian restaurant in the Plaza. Just a shot of the crowd and the buildings. A while later the restaurant was full. Don't ever remember seeing that many people eating there. It was the first Friday of the month and Art Walk night so lots of people there. 

We went mostly to listen to Rafael sing and play. And to go out on a beautiful night. Though it was still to warm and humid for me to walk around much. Did notice there were some new vendors set up around the plaza. Will have to check them out next time we go. 

Short video - turn your sound on. There is some background noise but hope you can hear him okay. 

Yesterday, Saturday, we stayed home. Worked on getting the Internet set up, registered and working. And boy does it work - fast and can be used all over Mexico. Wireless router with Telcel. $20US a month for 100 GBs. Also RV tech Eric came and did some work on John's 5th wheel and fixed our two drawers that got screwed up when the water heater fixer took them out. The sliders got pulled loose. He also checked why our front door sticks - hinges are loose. Will return one day to fix it. Didn't even go out to eat! To hot and humid to go out and walk around much. No plans for today yet. 

Mazatlan at last Got here Wednesday afternoon.

Got here Wednesday afternoon. Pulled into our space and set things up. Glad to know we won't be moving for a few months. After resting a little and cleaning up we went across the street to Torres for dinner. They really went out for Day of The Dead. Lots of displays. This particular one was for past employees of the resort. A person from the financial off stopped and told us about all the pictures of the employees. We recognized a couple of the names.Always nice to be here. It is so pretty. Right now they are doing some construction to the grounds. So we came in from the south side walkways. 

Bill at our favorite table in La Palapa. Felt like coming home. In fact, the waiters welcomed us "home." Actually I am combining two days here - this was at breakfast the next morning. 

Some big waves coming in. 

The grass right up by the sea wall was still covered in sand from the storms. 

Back to Wednesday night. We were enjoying our meal in the inside room of the restaurant when much to our happy surprise Rafael came in and set up. Always a pleasure to see and listen to him sing and play.  A great end to a rather miserable day. Bill had "some of the best" chicken fajitas he's ever had and I had a great salad. We were both in bed by 9:00.

Some work around our site the next day. Bill stringing his lights. Not quite as many this year. Also we got a new load of gravel. (Bill and Marilyn - you could get handfuls and we wouldn't even know.)

The banana plants are doing good. And all four bougainvillea are alive and three are blooming.  

They just need a little bit of TLC.

So we are slowly getting settled in for the winter. There have been a lot of changes around the RV park. Will take pictures another day. We also got our Internet up and running thanks to Rafael's daughter. She went to TelCel and picked up a wireless modem and set up the account for us. Now that we figured out we had to register it and how to do it it is running great and fast. 

Last night, Friday, we went to the Plazuela Machado for dinner and entertainment. Have never seen the restaurants so full. Will get back in blog writing rhythm soon I hope. All is great.

Another post below this one about last day on road. 

Horrid horriud drive from los Mochis to Mazatlan

Well for some reason the Internet came on this morning so will try to get this catch up post done. It didn't last long though. 

I HATE the drive from Los Mochis to Mazatlan. It is 240 miles more or less - seems like thousands. (Never again!) And it is very expensive in tolls. All toll booths are open, in fact I think there was a new one - and collecting tolls. We spent for RV and car 1054 in tolls this section alone. We left Los Mochis about 10 a.m. and got to Mazatlan at 2:45.

They should pay us to drive those roads. Some construction off and on. The roads were "kind of okay", "bad", and "HORRIBLE." This stretch okay. 

Here you drive half on the shoulder as on coming traffic is in the left lane. 

We did most of our driving in the left lane as it was marginally better than the right lane. Of course the cars coming up behind us didn't like that and when they would finally pass they would cut back RIGHT in front of us.

Believe it or not the other lane was worse. I thought we'd be leaving parts of the RV  and car along the road.

Of course they wanted their tolls. Each booth had vendors in the road before them. Some wanting to    wash your windshield. When you say no they squirt water on it anyway. 

Some only had one lane open so every one was backed up. 

Some one pulled off for some problem.

Lots of fires along the way again. 

That pole is on fire. No one seems to care. 

A few detours because of bridge repair. 

And here we are almost home. End of a long long day. 

Never bee so glad to get stopped in my whole life. 

A short ride along video

Might post again later today of what we've  been doing. Depends on Internet. Did not check this for errors.