There are always lots of projects going on around town.  I thought I’d show you a few, and tell you about a few others.

To start with, the good news.  The Mansion of the Garcias, that I have written about before  – most recently here and before that here. The picture below is a picture of the building before work began:

The picture below is now.

We walked by about a week ago when a crane was delivering some huge steel roof beams.  They are installed now. There has been a curb cut installed on Mariano Escobedo that opens into a very large parking area.  All of the exterior cement work has been redone.  The “remuddled” patio off the back has been removed.  It is just gorgeous!  A couple of guys working on the project told me that it was going to be a restaurant, and just the other day I heard that it’s actually going to be two restaurants.  There is still a lot of work to be done inside, but so far it is fantastic.

This building is on the other end of the block from a number of excellent restaurants – Lorna, La Mona, and others.  So there will be quite the restaurant row on Niños Heroes between Constitución and Mariano Escobedo.

I reported a while back that the Haas house on Heriberto Frias had been donated by the family to the city to be used as a Carnaval museum.  Construction began about 9 months ago (I think) and INAH, the historic preservation society that polices work in Centro Historico shut them down when they opened a doorway on a side wall without authorization.  All the historic buildings must adhere to INAH’s rules, one of which – and the most important one – is DO NOT CHANGE THE LOOK FROM THE STREET.

So what do you think I see when walking on the adjacent street the other day?  These terrible, hideous beams that change the whole look of the place.  (Picture below)  They have also closed off the historic main door and are intending to use the new side door as the main entrance.  The newspaper wrote a piece the other day about what an terrible impact this will have in Centro.

These beams are on both sides of the building and just make no sense to me whatsoever.

INAH has also shut down another project – this time at the Lion Park on Angel Flores.  It appears that the city started removing the paved surface, and INAH objected.  Seems strange to me that they would leave this large heap of tiles in the way for several weeks now.  There is about a one foot cleared area so you can get by.

The Zaragoza park project is ongoing still.  Our understanding from newspaper reports is that the local architecture society donated plans for the remodel of the park that included a kiosko designed to be compatible with Centro Historico.  When the contractors (from Culiacán) were brought in, they weren’t given the plans and just created their own.  The kiosko that has been partially erected seems of a fairly modern style, and the work is proceeding quite slowly.  There have been articles in the paper discussing the missed opportunity on this one.  Once the work is done I’ll do a photo essay.

The main mercado in Mazatlán is undergoing a renovation, also.  There have been lots of issues that have to be dealt with – old wiring, bad drainage, too many gas tanks, and the need to reveal the beautiful ironwork structure.  Most of the mercado is still open and functioning but there is major work being done on all the surrounding streets that has been creating a lot of congestion for the last couple of months.  I’ll take you on a tour once the work there is complete, too, which is expected to be mid-August.

Last Saturday night was a really wonderful night here in Mazatlán.  It was Dia de La Musica, and there were five stages set up all around Centro Historico, each with a different musical genre.  Each stage had a variety of performers who played around an hour each so all in all there were about 30 groups represented.  It was a fantastic night, enjoyed by many thousand year-round Mazatlán residents. There even was a student public art exhibit – photos are here.

The performance schedule has three pages – here, here and here, if you would like to see what terrific performers we saw that night.  Mazatlán is a really amazing city with a very vibrant cultural life, and I feel very lucky to live here.

A few months ago I posted a video of a walk along the malecon from Olas Altas to the Pulmonia Monument. Well, yesterday was the day that I jumped on my new bike and took you from the Pulmonia Monument to Valentino’s. I hope you enjoy it!  (3 min 52 sec)

Well, it has been just over one year since we planted all the pots on our upstairs patio.  They had been growing quite happily when the tropical storm season hit and they were mauled by both a tropical depression and non-hurricane Rick.  All’s well that ends well, though, as you can see!

First, here is what it looked like right after we finished planting:

and the other direction:

We’ve done a lot of rearranging and have even bumped a few plants to other patios where they are happier with a little less sun.  We also decided that there were too many plants in the middle by the chaise lounges.  We’ve grouped more together, and it actually creates little micro-climates that keep them a little cooler, I think.

Another change is that we moved the white plastic tables and chairs downstairs and brought up the heavy wood table and chairs.  The size is better up here and it can take the sun better, too.

The patio is wonderful at both ends of the day the entire year – we love to have coffee up there in the morning and to enjoy a glass of wine in the evening.  Midday is just too sunny for hanging out for very long, but in the wintertime I’ve been known to take a chaise lounge siesta in the weaker winter sun.

The next picture pretty much is from the same place as the top picture.

The umbrella plant at the top left is very happy.  In the right front is the triangle palm, which has been relocated next to the lounge chairs.  The red oleander loves it there, and you can see the yellow shrimp plant is blooming like crazy.  The plumeria against the wall is blooming, too.

Facing South.  The bananas in the right corner are doing great.  To the left of the banana is a very happy ginger that I plan on dividing soon.  There’s another oleander in the far left corner and a handkerchief plant that has been going nuts blooming next to it. The datura is right next to the far lounger – it bloomed for several weeks and now seems to be losing and regrowing its leaves.   Can you see over the top of the wall the new green paint?  There will be one more “new paint” post, and you’ll see this one again.

This group is a star palm on the right, and in the center an orchid tree.  It has lovely purple blossoms that the hummingbirds love!  After it bloomed it lost all its ginko-like leaves and now has all new leaves!  Next to it is a lovely fragrant star jasmine and a poinsettia.  Over by the banana is a desert rose that I pruned after it finished blooming a few weeks ago and it is covered with little bumps where the new leaves are coming out.

We love this patio and between all the plants, the umbrella and furniture it is a wonderful place to enjoy.  We get comments from neighbors about how much they like to see the flowering plants (including two alamandas I didn’t show you) hanging over the top of the wall facing the street.

Now cross your fingers that there are no violent storms to set them back this season!