Mazatlan

**Travel Tips for Mazatlan, Mexico:**

 * Mazatlan Wikitravel Website:** []
 * Mazatlan Wikitravel Website:** []

-- The airport in Mazatlan is easy to use (Website: [] ). This airport is about a 25 minutes drive (15 miles) from hotels in the “Golden Zone” or "Zona Dorada". Check with your hotel. Most hotels along the “Golden Zone” offer free shuttle service between the hotel and the airport. You will find many different ways to travel from this airport to your hotel. One method is by pulmonias (literally, “pneumonia”), which are Jeep-like open-air vehicles which can carry up to three passengers. Usually, they are slightly cheaper than taxis, but you should settle on a price before boarding. Both taxis and collectivo minivans run from the airport to hotels. The collectivo is a shared taxi cab with a price considerably lower than a private cab. The problem with the collectivo is that drivers often try to overload the vehicle, putting two passengers in the single front seat. For this reason, the best seats are in the back. Four people sharing a private cab can often do as well as a collectrivo on a short trip. Taxis cost twice as much as the collectivo, which runs from $8 to $15, depending of the location of your hotel. Finally, buses, few with of which have air-conditioning, cover most of the city; fares are about 50¢ for local routes. The “Sabalo Centro” line connects Zona Dorada with downtown (very often crowded). It runs from the Gold Zone along the waterfront to downtown near the market and the central plaza. Another route, the “Sabalo Cocos”, runs through the Gold Zone, heads inland to the bus station and on to downtown by back route instead of the waterfront. If you're interested in some tours while in Mazatlan, here's a nice website that offers a wide variety of tours: []. Here's another tour website: []. A fun tour in Mazatlan is the Pacifico Brewery Tour. While we were there, Thursday's were for us English speaking individuals. It's free, but long pants were required and no pictures can be taken in the plant, although you can take pictures from the hospitality room at the end of the tour (top of the building) great views. We stayed in Mazatlan for ten days renting a small apartment. We decided to get out and explore this almost 500 year old city during our stay. Mazatlán, whose name means "land of the deer" in the Aztec language, has a complex history going back thousands of years to when the area was populated by indigenous peoples who practiced hunting, gathering, and agriculture. In 1531, Spanish Conquistadors arrived and founded a settlement at Mazatlán. It soon became an important conduit for gold and silver from Spain's far-flung colonies. Pirates frequently raided Mazatlán, and during the mid-19th century both French and American troops occupied the city. A good place to begin exploring Mazatlán is the Plaza Revolución, the city's main square. A handsome cathedral built in the late 1800s towers over the plaza. This Moorish edifice boasts unusual yellow-tiled steeples and a labyrinthine interior with columns and sweeping arches. Across the street from the cathedral is the very popular Panamá Restaurant and Pasteleria "Bakery" (Review Website: [] ) home of the best pastries in Mazatlán. Palm trees surround the Plaza Revolución, and a wrought-iron bandstand graces its center. Beneath the elevated bandstand is a small cafeteria. Its outdoor tables with large umbrellas are ideal spots for taking a break from the tropical heat. The Mercado Pino Suárez north of the cathedral sprawls inside a Victorian building modeled after the work of French architect, Alfred Eiffel, who designed the Eiffel Tower in Paris. This steel structure reportedly once served as a bullring. The matadors have all left, however, and today it houses a maze of stalls and shops selling everything from freshly caught shrimp to //huaraches//(leather sandals). Decaying old mansions reflecting a mélange of architectural styles, including Neoclassic, Art Nouveau, and Art Deco can be found on streets west of the market. Walking south from Plaza Revolución will bring you to Plazuela Machado (Website: [] ) (Map: [] ), once the social hub of Mazatlán and still heart of annual //Carnaval// celebrations. During recent years, attractive 19th-century buildings ringing this cozy square have been extensively restored. Many of them now house lively cafés and restaurants that are usually filled with both locals and tourists late into the night. The neoclassical Teatro Angela Peralta next to the Plazuela Machado dates back to 1860 and is Mazatlán's principle cultural venue. Step inside this beautifully refurbished opera house, and you will be transported into a world of marble statues, elegant woodwork, loges, and sumptuous red velvet curtains. A museum on the upper floor has old black and white photographs and displays chronicling the theater's history and reconstruction. Another museum is the Mazatlan Archeological Museum (Website: [] ). Old Mazatlán's main beach, called Olas Altas, rings a cove only a short stroll from the museums. Mazatlán's tourism industry began here during the 1950s, and this district's faded seaside hotels and unpretentious restaurants evoke the romance of that era. Olas Altas may not be the best swimming beach in town, but it is refreshingly uncrowded and free of wandering touts. Children splash among the waves or play soccer on the sand, and the evening's principal entertainment consists of watching the spectacular sunsets for which Mazatlán is justly famous. From Olas Altas beach, the main road winds up a steep hill from which you can take in panoramic vistas of both old and new Mazatlán spreading northward along the Pacific coast. You can also see El Faro, a lighthouse perched atop a haystack-shaped island at the tip of a rocky promontory. At over 500 feet above sea level, El Faro is said to be the second highest lighthouse in the world after the one in Gibraltar. Mazatlán's large sport fishing fleet and the ferry which transports cars and passengers to the city of La Paz on the Baja Peninsula are also visible from the hilltop. Mazatlan isn't just beaches and margaritas; it's got a lot of fun history that we were happy to explore!

If your staying in Mazatlan for a week or more try this local culinary experience, which is a great tip for having some shrim: Buy the fresh shrimp from the fishermen's wives downtown. Any taxi or pulmonia driver will know exactly how to find the shrimp ladies. Bus drivers also know the location, and if your bus is headed to the central Pino Suarez market, it will drive down Aquiles Serdan, right by the shrimp ladies. If you choose to drive your own car from the Golden Zone, stay on the main waterfront road, Avenida del Mar, until you come to the Fisherman's Monument. Just past the monument, turn left onto Aquiles Serdan, and follow it until you see the shrimp ladies' umbrellas. Stretched along Aquiles Serdan, between Luis Zuniga and Alejandro Quijano, the shrimp ladies are impossible to miss. A sea of colorful umbrellas shade the open air "shops", which consist of iced tubs of fresh shrimp and other seafood, as well as the persuasive ladies who sell them. The shrimp are sold by the kilogram, and are sorted by type, color and size into different tubs. Prices are relatively fixed, although it pays to wander among the vendors and compare asking prices for similar shrimp. The prized large blue shrimp command the highest prices, but one is not likely to be disappointed with any choice. Freshness is the key consideration, and this can be confirmed by smelling the shrimp. It's also important to watch the weighing and packaging of your order. You can reject partials or unattractive shrimp, and you can select the ones you want. The shrimp ladies are expert at weighing their shrimp, with or without their antique-looking scales. The shrimp ladies' scales are not certified by any department of weights and measures, but a recent unofficial test, using a postal scale, found that virtually all of the ladies could measure out a precise kilo by hand. That same test found that the kilos were running about ten percent shy before the postal scale was introduced. On the other hand, the prices are fair enough to compensate for any small errors in weight. The ladies will put your shrimp into an iced plastic bag, so you can continue shopping. Just be sure to discard the ice and wash the shrimp with purified water before cooking them. You can take the shrimp around the corner to any restaurant that will cook them any way you like. My wife and I bought 2 kilos (too much) and had half of it cooked in garlic and half of it breaded. Visit some of the sites of old Mazatlan before or after enjoying the shrimp.

We enjoyed a restaurant called Casa Loma (Website: [] ) near the Golden Zone (Golden Zone Website: [] ) is a very nice place to visit for a farewell meal. ---