The translation for monigote is a ridiculous doll or figure or a poorly made statue. Every year a few weeks before Carnival, figures are made from paper mache, wire rods, paint and other materials and placed along the malecon. Over the years these monigotes have evolved and cannot be considered trashy. Each year the monigotes are designed and made according to that year’s Carnaval theme. This year, the 126th Carnaval, the theme is Eclipse Barroco. It’s a combination of celebrating the eclipse on April 8th and in honor of the baroque era. There will be 22 stages for bands and the music will be mostly classical. In fact, a band is practicing some wonderful music in the stadium behind us for the first coronation tonight. There will be another coronation tomorrow and another the next night in the stadium. The music we have heard so far is just beautiful.
It took us 4 or 5 outings to get a picture of all the monigote statues. We walked to as many as we could, got one picture from a taxi, then took a bus to get farther down the malecon and walked to 4 more. Yesterday Steve drove and I took most of the rest as drive-by shots.
We drove through Olas Altas yesterday and this is where a lot of the music and fireworks will be. I would give anything to see the naval battle depiction with fireworks but not crammed into the streets with 80,000 people jostling everyone. There have been warnings not to carry a wallet or purse. Plus, the fireworks don’t begin until 11 pm. The parade on the malecon Sunday evening includes 32 floats this year. Last year we stayed on our balcony to watch the parade but were too high up to get full enjoyment so our plan this year is to try and get a seat down by the pool.
Pacifico is the official beer for Carnaval and there are many yellow Pacifico beer stands and stages in the Olas Altas area. The tall building is the Best Western Freeman hotel in Olas Altas. One of these years I want to reserve a room for the following year to watch the fireworks. There is a bar and pool at the top. It’s open to the public and the views are some of the best in Mazatlan. Olas Altas is my favorite part of Mazatlan. It was walking distance from the apartment we first rented and we miss having such easy access to this area with the beach and sidewalk restaurants and just generally a very nice ambience, especially at night.So many new condo towers going up. I am just gobsmacked every time we drive the malecon at all the changes.
We don’t get visitors from the north very often. Members of my family came more often when we lived in San Carlos. My mother has had a number of health problems preventing her from visiting us in Mazatlan. Most of them have cleared up except that now she has momentarily blips of unconsciousness and wakes up just as she hits the floor. Her house has nice thick carpeting but we only have hard tile. She sure loves Mexico so I hope she can visit us again. She is now 94. Some of my long time readers might remember when I drove the two of us in our RV from Colorado to Nayarit back in December 2012. She was 83 then and so brave.
Anyway, my daughter flew down and we wanted to show her as much as possible in a short five days. She was interested in seeing the aquarium, purported to be one of the largest in Latin American. There has always been an aquarium here but this a new grand aquarium opened in the spring in Parque Central which is behind our condo towers. A museum is also planned for the park and looks to be impressive from the pictures I have seen. We received a discount for being residents of Mazatlan and for being old.
I liked this fishless waterfall best of all
This is just a small sample of what there is and I think we missed some. The aquarium needs to provide a map (I asked and there aren’t any) as the layout is confusing and there are other structures in the park-like setting. Lauren developed a blister on her foot right away and we had to stop exploring.
Afterwards, we went to the El Sinaloense restaurant where I have been wanting to go just for this dish. It’s called the Carnival de Camerones. Steve and I ordered it to share and Lauren had shrimp fajitas and also several of our shrimps. And we still couldn’t finish it all. Absolutely fantastic and that restaurant is going to be our go-to place for seafood from here on out.
We had planned to go to the Observatorio Mazatlan with a funicular ride up a hill for the views, a museum, a cactus garden, aviary, and skybar. But the day before, we were eating at Casa Hindie Tea House and the man at the next table chatted with us and said he thought the restaurant La Marea was a better choice for the money. So we went there and will go to the Observatorio at another time. It’s half off for seniors on Thursdays anyway and Lauren wasn’t here on a Thursday.
We took a very reasonably priced Didi cab as there is minimal parking here.
The evening sunset light gave Lauren such a nice glow!
El Faro lighthouse is one of the highest in the world and is a very popular walk/climb in Mazatlan. We haven’t done the climb and I don’t know if I can manage it anymore. My feet and legs are not what they used to be.
But now I am on a mission to photograph all the statues called Manigotes for Carnival that have recently gone up along the Malecon. So far I have five and I think there might be about 12 total but I’m really not sure.
This one is in front of our building and you can see they are quite tall.
Another nice sunset on just another day in paradise.
Our only reason for spending the month of August in Ajijic was to take a break from the Mazatlan summer heat. However, we liked being in the heart of the village of Ajijic so much, and being able to walk everywhere, that we reserved an apartment again for next summer in the same little apartment building. It’s much easier to find a vacation place in the off season of summer, it’s the rainy and green time of year, and restaurants aren’t crowded.
I mentioned in my previous post how so many of the buildings are painted with murals and that I would show you a few pictures. So before I go on, here are a few:
Before we bought our condo in Mazatlan, we rented a small apartment near the center of the city. We could walk to restaurants, the big mercado (market), doctors, dentists, beauty shops, bakeries, you name it, and so we got out every day without having to drive anywhere.
Then we bought a condo on the long malecon facing the ocean. There are no shops to walk to and no good restaurants near us. But that’s not the real problem. It’s the noise. Daytimes are peaceful but when the sun goes down, the revelers come out in force. I thought that buying a condo on the 11th floor, actually the 14th, because there are 3 levels of garages above ground, would be quiet. On top of that, the previous owners had upgraded the windows, and put in two sets of rolling storm shutters on each front window. There are swarms of a certain type of motorcycle that only appear at night that have made modifications so that they are extremely loud and make popping noises. Then there are several places that rent off road Rzr type vehicles with loud sound systems. To make matters worse, cars with enormous speakers park behind our building at night and have street parties. The police do chase them off at 11:00. It is so loud that there is no place in our condo to escape the noise. The walls feel like they are shaking. Carnaval week is known to be loud but it’s nothing compared to what I just mentioned. We loved having a front row seat to Carnaval in February and look forward to it again soon. But then there is motorcycle week in April when a few thousand bikers party on the malecon all night long. We were told that it’s best to leave town during that event and we did. But then truck week caught us by surprise when there was a battle of the Banda type music bands playing in the Central Park behind us with their bass turned as low as it could go. That was #1 the worst.
I don’t mean to be a complainer but it’s hard enough to sleep when we get older and this turns us into do-nothing zombies the next day. I don’t know what we are going to do but can’t envision spending the rest of our lives suffering with the noise.
It’s frustrating because I adore our condo and it’s the easiest place we have ever lived in. It’s difficult to find a 3 bedroom roomy condo but we did. Listening to ocean waves 24/7 is priceless. This place is so well managed and maintained and the pool is one of the biggest and nicest in Mazatlan. We have spent the past year painting, buying all new appliances, repairing what didn’t work, buying sound blocking curtains (not effective), upgrading bedroom windows to double paned laminate windows (not effective) and next month the glass company is going to insert another pane making them triple paned. After that, we are at a loss.
Oh yes, and there is a baseball stadium behind us. Baseball games in the US are rather quiet. Not here. They have loud music before the game, every time someone picks up a ball, bats a ball, catches a ball, drops a ball. Ok, I am exaggerating. But we love the fireworks that occur usually once a week. And baseball season doesn’t last forever.
Wanderlets 