Mom Life in the PNW

Day 3: Public Beaches in Mazatlan

Day 3: Public Beaches in Mazatlan

Today, we pretty much decided we wanted to spend some time relaxing out on the beach that was across the marina. We had to take a shuttle boat over there but it was very quick since it was basically 500 feet across from the resort.

What I didn’t expect when I got there was to be hounded by the sales people trying to sell stuff to you. It’s a public beach so they’re allowed to do this. It’s all new to me since this was my first time in Mexico. Kind of left a bad taste in my mouth because I just wanted to enjoy my day relaxing on a beach chair, enjoying a margarita or 3 and playing in the ocean, not telling multiple sellers, multiple times no thanks every time they made their rounds every 5 minutes.

Other than that, I did enjoy my time there with Federico, the greatest beach server ever! He liked us so much, he said he would give us all-day happy hour prices if we came back the next day. The margaritas were a bit on the salty side, but we started ordering them on the rocks with no salt which helped. We also brought our flasks full of Tequila so that we could add more if they were a little too weak.

After I had had enough of the pushy sellers annoying me, I decided I was going to grab my bag and head to the ocean. My husband and friends decided to go out towards the waves. I, however, stayed to about my hips since I’m not a very good swimmer and I didn’t trust that I could swim very well if a wave crashed into me and pulled me under or out further. The water wasn’t as clear or as blue as I thought it would be, so having no vision of what’s in the water is kind of scary too. We’ve all seen Jaws! LOL, Yes, I am silly.

When we got back from playing in the ocean, I go to sit down and realize a bird had crapped on my towel I had left behind. Not anyone else’s; just mine! So I decided to take a pic of the possible culprit. Yep, that beady eyed bird was eyeing me like he wanted to gouge my eyes out. I swear these birds are racist. I had multiple birds trying to dive bomb me at the pool yesterday. Then today, shitting on my towel. They really dislike gingers in Mexico. lol

After we were finished at the beach, we went back to our rooms, showered and got ready to go find some dinner. We didn’t really know where we wanted to go, so we decided to just randomly pick a spot. We ended up deciding upon El Parador since it had a nice outdoor seating area which seemed to be empty.

My husband and I shared a seafood pasta plate which was decent, and our friends had some Americanized food which one didn’t really care for. I mean, we’re in Mexico after all. The seafood so far had been great, so that’s what we stuck with since we’re on the coast.

We paid the bill and expected them to return with the change. Nope. No one came back for at least 10-15 minutes so we assumed they thought they were going to keep the rest as a tip. Mazatlan tourism places seem to be lacking in professionalism and courtesy.  We tip you on your service, not what you think you should keep from the bill tab!

After that, we ventured off to find a good margarita and unfortunately didn’t really find one.

This is supposed to be Mexico, the land of good margaritas yo! Where they at!?

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Day 2 at El Cid Marina in Mazatlan, Mexico

Day 2 at El Cid Marina in Mazatlan, Mexico

We immediately woke up and went to have brunch at the El Cid Marina Resort. The food was okay but wasn’t my favorite. The service is always decent though.

After that, we went and chilled in one of the El Cid Marina pools. It had a cool cave inside that was a lot bigger than I thought which was pretty awesome.

 

We kind of had a mellow day at the pool all day long. Then before sunset, we made it to one of the other resorts and found a beach, so we checked it out for a little bit since it was our first time actually getting out onto the beach.

After we were done at the beach, we headed somewhere to eat, I can’t remember the place. The thing with the restaurants in Mexico is some are catered to be more Americanized, which makes them not that appealing. If you see locals at a restaurant, you know it’s good, so stop there. Avoid empty places on the strip as much as possible!

It’s kind of weird going on vacation and ending your night before 10 pm. Almost every single night we were there, we were ready for bed before then.

We must be getting old.

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Vacationing in Mazatlan, Mexico

Vacationing in Mazatlan, Mexico

One of my husband’s friends had a timeshare that he booked and asked us to come along with him and his g/f and of course we had to go!

I must say, I was a little bit nervous to fly to Mazatlan since it would be the longest time I’ve ever been in the air. Granted, we made a little stop in Phoenix to switch planes, but still, it was about 4 hours and 20 minutes and I’m only used to 2 hours from Portland to Vegas. LOL, It was fine though.

I was a little nervous about customs once we arrived in Mexico, but surprisingly it was a breeze. They do this weird thing where they have you press a big red button. If you get a red, you get all of your bags searched regardless if they’ve already been scanned thru the machines or not. If it’s green, you get to proceed. Well lucky us got red. Thankfully I didn’t have anything too risque in my bag other than a lingerie piece. It was annoying, to say the least. You’d think they’d want to make the process a lot speedier than that. But, what can ya do?

After getting out of the airports, we got on our free bus to the El Cid Marina Resort where the timeshare people try to up sell you stuff. Thankfully, the owner of the time share got there an hour earlier than us ( we shared a 2 room suite), and we told them that we had no idea what their plans were and that we’d talk to them when we got to the resort. We were never really bothered again after that.

This was my first time in Mexico and I must say, it’s an entirely different experience than what I am used to. There was tons of graffiti everywhere. I’m thinking it’s more of an art form and not so much seen as vandalism because some of them were very creative pieces. Kids were riding in the back of trucks (don’t you remember doing that back in the day?), people didn’t wear seat belts and didn’t obey the same traffic laws we do since they drive down the road on the middle lines and don’t use blinkers. Honestly, it was kind of scary. I can’t even imagine driving in Mexico… I think I will forever stick to a taxi whenever we visit. LOL

Once we got to the Resort, we found our friends and then went up to the room to put our bags up.

El Cid Marina room and view

After we checked out everything in the room, we decided it was time to go get some food since we were starving as we only had a breakfast burrito and a half a sandwich while at the airport from 6:30 am to 4 pm.

So we set out on our adventure while using the free shuttle at the resort and ended up stumbling upon this place called F.I.S.H. You know it should be good when locals are eating there, so we decided to take the chance. Service was kind of slow, but once we got our food, our taste buds were in heaven. It was certainly worth the wait!

My husband had the shrimp taco, calamari tacos, and something else. We both thought the shrimp tacos were the best. I had a burrito with calamari that was decent, but I think I enjoyed that one small bite of my husband’s shrimp taco a little bit more.

Overall, it was a nice first day in Mazatlan!

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Zaycon Foods: Providing Families with Farm Fresh Milk

Zaycon Foods: Providing Families with Farm Fresh Milk

zaycon milk review

I had worked with Zaycon Foods before and they gave me a chance to work with them again, but instead of trying out their chicken, I got to try their farm fresh milk. Normally my husband and I drink the store bought 2% milk since that’s what we’ve been used to over the years. So as you can imagine, tasting farm fresh milk was going to be a new experience for us.

We noticed upon removal of the seal that there was a thick layer on top, but that was easily removed by putting the cap back on and giving it a good shake. When we tasted it, it kind of reminded me of the powdered milk taste or what I remember of it as a kid. It’s thick, and almost has sort of a sweet taste. I am not sure I am particularly fond of the taste, but I did mix it with breakfast smoothies to help alter that. My 3 and 5-year-old nieces enjoyed it without complaints and even asked for this over juice or kool-aid, which was surprising to us.

If you are born and raised on farm fresh milk, then you probably won’t have any problems drinking this milk that comes from a small family farm in Spokane, Washington, but if you’re used to store-bought milk for most if not all your life, then it might be a weird transition, but a healthy one that I’m willing to make.

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Seahawks Superbowl Party 2014

Did you see that blow out of a game? I don’t think I anticipated that much of a beat down but I am glad it happened the way it did so people can take the Seahawks seriously now. I told you, or my husband told you, that they haven’t played against a real defense so we knew they wouldn’t be able to handle the Seahawks D.

Seahawks Super bowl Party 2014

We had fun though and I could have decorated the house a little bit more but my husband was like don’t we have enough decorations? Hell no! He kept telling everyone I was going overboard, but you might as well go big or go home right? Or at least try to. I could have done some streamers everywhere and had balloons, maybe even painted the walls blue, but this was mellow for me.

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