Got to Love Arizona!!

There are few places on the planet that one day you can be on the beach in shorts fishing and the next day in the pines with snow on the ground hunting....all within a 5 to 6 hour drive. These shots are from my elk hunting trip the weekend after Thanksgiving near Alpine, Arizona.


I can not remember the last time I had driven in snow so it added to the fun of the trip.

We did see elk on Thursday (three of them right when the sun had set)....but not on Friday, or the rest of the week end. In hind sight the animals must have been down in the lower elevations and we just did not hunt those zones. All in all a great time and got to see a part of the state I rarely go and see in the winter.

Thanksgiving Weekend

The Thanksgiving weekend was a odd one this year. Lourdes had things to do at home and Vincent was working so it ended up being my Mom and dad as well as Matthew at the beach house for the holiday. We had dinner on Thursday and left the house early on Friday for a three day week end. As was the norm, the weather was great. The trip down was very uneventful. We made the trip door to door in less then four hours. The new truck again did great and averaged around 20 mpg (sweet). We got a glimpse of the new lanes they are adding to the port of entry....looks like two new lanes. The crowd has really slowed since the hay day of 2006-2007 when a wait of over 2 hours happened quite often on a Sunday. But it will get back to those levels someday, and better to have the infrastructure now then having to wait for it to be built later, and I guess they had to hire an architect and a contractor for it!!!!...god bless the government (maybe??).....back to the trip.

Reef zone Matt caught his fish on our last trip.

Matt fishing.

We arrived around noon. Had some lunch and then Matt, my Dad, and I sent off to the estuary to see if Matt could show us where we had caught his fish last time. Although the tide was up Matt was convinced that he could just show up, toss in a line and catch fish....he learned that timing is important and we did not catch a thing. It is a good spot to fish, but not when the tide is in. That night was an easy one. We made up some carne on the grill, a couple of gin and tonics and got to see one of the best sun sets.

Great Sunset!

Carne on the grill

The next day I got couple quick things done around the house and we headed over to the beach by El Golfo. As we did the year before, we made the run over there to explore and see the old stomping ground. The temperature on Saturday was close to 75 deg and very dry. We got to the beach around 11 am as the drive from the house is a little over an hour. We aired down the tires and rolled out onto the beach. Unlike last year, for this day trip we did not have anyone on the beach but Mexican fishermen. The day was great looking for shells, and just hanging out. We drove all the way out to the reef near the second light house.

Air those tires down...like the good old days!

Mom, dad and Matt on the salt flat.

No one on the beach.

The reef.

Matt fishing on the reef.

Matt and I tried fishing again (again due to the time of day it was close to high tide) with no luck, but it was fun to be out there with no one around, in late November in shorts...can not beat it. While we were getting a drink at the truck, two vehicles passed us and I thought the guy driving was in a suit and the girl was in a dress. We got the truck packed and I wanted to see where they were off to. Around the corner by where the estuary creates a canal by the light house they were taking wedding photos!!! Made for a nice way to end our day at the beach.

Wedding Photos on the beach.

Matt eating a snack.

Mom and Dad relaxing.

We got back to RP around 4:30. We aired up the tires at Pemex and ran down to the fish market to get some shrimp for the night. The fishermen are out in force right now and all of the seafood was very fresh. For 3 pounds of medium shrimp, all cleaned and de-veined we paid $12.00. I cooked them up that night on the grill with some peppers and butter. I was beat and by 9:00 pm I was off to bed. Matt stayed up a little longer and watched TV, but he looked like he had a full day as well. The next day I took a nice long walk on the beach and then had to get a few projects done at the house. With those complete, we packed a few snacks, got the truck packed and headed back home to Phoenix. The boarder was not busy at all for a Sunday and we had a 10 minute wait, and we were able to make the trip back in less the 4 hours again.

Manny's Closed!!

For many, Manny's Beach Club was a throw back to the good old times of Rocky Point. For me this place (and JJ's which is still open) were the quintessential Mexico party bars. I have seen a number of drunk people there and in fact have tossed back a few myself....it always was a party and a good spot for people watching. The last few times the crowd had been smaller then in the past, and the hard times have finally taken its toll on this establishment. Check out the article in the Rocky Point Tides.....a sad day if I say so myself.

http://rptides.blogspot.com/

January Jam-----RCPM

Just checked the web site and the date for the January Jam at JJ's for 2011 has been posted!! January 29th is the day. Always a good time.....Roger and the gang did not let me down.

Now to talk to the boys about the trip!!

More information to follow......

Matt's First Fish!!!

As I wrote in a prior post, when Matt was in Mexico last Josh took him out fishing at the estuary where he ended up catching his first fish. I did not get a shot of it when he got back to the house....but Josh did get some photos right when he landed it.....so here you go! Very cool. And thanks to Josh for being ready with the camera!!

Day off....get some work done on the house.

With the month of November getting busy I decided to take a Friday off and do some work on the house. Lourdes had been down during a big storm event about 2 weeks ago and we ended up with some water under the exterior wood doors and a leak at the round skylight (we fixed the roof last February!!!). Also, with elk hunting coming up in December, the ATV needed some work and I really needed to have it in Phoenix so that could be accomplished before the hunt.

With a list of things to do (sounds like a RCPM tune...list of things to do "fiesta number one, siesta number two!!") I took the the boys to school and got out of Phoenix at 8:00 in the morning on Friday. The drive down was nice...less the four hours door to door, including a couple of stops. I got to the house around 11:45, unloaded the truck and made a quick lunch then got to work. I started with the doors off the first floor patio. I purchased some stain and hoped it would match...and it ended up being perfect. As I have wrote about before, the salt environment here has got to be one the toughest in the world as anything outside gets abused, and the stained doors had been needing some attention. Also, the cheap door sweeps that the Mexican builder installed sucked, as they did not really seal the bottom of the doors. So I pulled the doors off, cut the bottom of the door to allow for a real aluminum door bottom and sweep, stain the doors and then reinstall them. All went well...but I had to keep moving to get all of that done, let the doors dry, and get the doors back on before dark. By 5:30 I was beat. I had a couple of beers while I got the work done, but I was ready to eat by 6:00. I made some cheese crisp on the grill, and fixed a gin and tonic. I finished the drink and food, turned on the TV for the Sun's game.....and fell asleep on the couch. Woke up to find the game in overtime!

New stain on the front door frame and trim

The morning sun.

Patio was nice.

The next morning was one of the those nice quiet morning's on the beach. The light at that time of day has a rosy color, and with the crisp air it was nice to sit on the patio drinking coffee and watch the day roll in. The plan was to get the last of the trim staining done, do some other odds and ends repairs done around the house, get the roof patch done last then take a nap before I had to get back to Phoenix. As it turned out I had enough stain to complete all of the wood door frames at the beach side of the house as well as the door frame on the front door. As I started on the roof work, this crappy red truck pulled up below the house and four workers get out. They started to work on the house in front of mine using an old generator to power up a grinder so they could sand the steel garage door of the the house they were working on. I got my work done, but it was so loud from the generator that a nap was not going to happen. I goofed around the house and decided to get the ATV packed up for the trip home and leave a little sooner then planned.

POS generator....messed up my nap plans!!!

With the ATV packed I got the house cleaned up, took a quick shower, and got rolling. The drive home was a quiet one, with some RCPM on in the truck the desert highway moved along in front of me. The new truck was great for the trip.

Mexican highway!

"Ashes of San Miguel"....love that song.

New truck with the ATV all loaded.

El Golfo

I was talking about Mexico with one of my staff today, and low and behold she has been on the beach there camping before. Her jeep had an issue with a broken shock mount and when they were fixing that they discovered how rusted the exhaust system was. We talked about speeding down the beach on the hard pack, and just how out of the way that place is.....miss those times. I never really missed the "sleeping" on the beach, but those days of running the beach all day, looking for shells, and then a cold beer and a camp fire in the evening were great.

I need to dig up some of those old photos and post them. (Chris...if you read this and have some good old shots those would be good!!) We hope that we can make the run down there again this Thanksgiving....last year was a wonderful time and I hope I can make that a tradition.