Mom Life in the PNW

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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Bonneville Hot Springs Resort & Spa Review

Since my boyfriends family is from the Columbia gorge area, we knew we wanted to try the Bonneville Hot Springs Resort & Spa at some point as it’s only about a 40 minute drive from where we currently live now. My husbands brother had a free night certificate for working with the resort for business and decided to give it to us as a wedding gift along with a $50 gift card for anything in the resort. Good thing, because I wouldn’t have paid for their ridiculous $200-$250 nightly fee otherwise.

Upon pulling up and walking inside, it looks nice and cozy. Something you imagine a resort to look like in the gorge or mountain area. But the rooms for a resort need quite a bit of updating, especially with the price they charge. To me, it doesn’t feel like a resort, but I guess I have nothing else to compare it to because I’ve never actually been to one. The natural hot springs hot tub on the deck was nice, but the hot tub was far too small to be relaxing with anymore than 2 adults. His brothers and nephews stopped by to use the hot tub after work, which was fine, but there’s no way all of us could have fit.  I like that they don’t use chemicals that cause your skin to dry out and feel tight after sitting in there for a half an hour to an hour. And we got a nice view of the parking lot from our deck, which I figured would ruin any romantic gestures.

The bed was fine and comfortable, and the TV was a regular tube style TV. For a resort, that should be the first thing that’s upgraded. I compare the rooms to a shilo inn, but nothing that qualifies it to be called a resort other than the fact it has a spa room that charges an arm and a leg for a simple massage and beauty applications. We did not partake in that, since we didn’t really need it.

We decided to head down to the restaurant for dinner and noticed that the menu had about 6 things on it, none of which appeared appetizing to my husband. He asked the waitress if that was all they had and they said yes, but there was an additional menu for the bar area. I wouldn’t have minded having the salmon dinner in the dining room but we headed over to the bar after he decided that he’d much rather prefer something on their menu. The waitress kindly told me that I could order the salmon over there, but I didn’t want to make it too difficult for them, so I just stuck with the halibut and fries, which BTW were not cooked at the right temperature in the deep fryer since they were soggy and lacked flavor. My husband ordered the Bonneville bacon burger and he shared a bite with me and I was kicking myself for not ordering that or my salmon as I originally intended. The burger had so much flavor and was mouth watering. Probably one of the best burgers I’ve tasted and I am not even kidding! When we pass through the area to go visit his family, we’ll definitely be stopping there for lunch just to have a burger. YUM!

I didn’t get a chance to try out the pool that’s also filled with natural hot springs because check in time is after 4pm and we didn’t get there until 6, in which we had dinner and then enjoyed the hot tub in our room on the deck. I hear it’s really great, but not exactly big enough to accommodate a busy resort.

I was also hoping that the miniature golf would be under a covered area since it rains in the pacific northwest about 9 months out of the year. You’d think this would be a no brainer, but I guess they wanted it to feel authentic and outdoorsy in a wooded area. So unfortunately, since it was pouring buckets, we didn’t get to play.

Other than that, the experience was fine and I am grateful that I got a chance to try it out even if it didn’t exactly fit my standards of a resort. Guess that’s what happens when you’ve stayed in luxury hotels in Vegas.


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