Happy New Year!

So around October or so Liz and I decided to start making plans for the new year. Living in the middle of 'tool central', we decided that we definitely needed to make our way out of town. So where to go? Not enough time for somewhere super exotic -- but Ensenada, B.C. seemed to fit the bill! Perfecto Garcia!

Liz was so excited when we arrived that she could hardly hold back her exitement! They have Thrifty's icecream!

Night one! Hussongs Cantina. Given the 75 retail stores selling shirts and assorted branded clothing, I gave this place less than 50 percent chance. Man, was I wrong...this place was actually a local place. The guy to my right in the picture is about as local as they get.

Fast forward to New Year's Eve - day time. In just about every cruise ship's excursion list, La Bufadora is included as the one thing to do or see in town. So we trudged out, mainly because we had to indulge in the pure kitsch factor. Turns out for a crevase in the rocks, it was mildly entertaining. And excellent people watching.

And Happy New Year! We plopped our asses into a few seats at "El Patio" which actually was the first bar that I ever did belly-up to in college (as a wee lad of 18). Small place with many tv's we were fortunate enough to have had one of them tuned to central time -- allowing us to watch the ball drop at 11pm. So with that out of the way we proceeded to drink until around 11:50, when we remembered that our hotel was having a party in their bar that had been scoped out previously as a possibility. With not much happening at El Patio, we walked back across the street to our hotel and entered what can only be described as a "From Dusk Til Dawn" type of feeling, but extremely friendly...Liz could probably describe it better. We quickly ordered two drinks, and with drinks in hand counted down the new year in Spanish with a motley crowd of locals -- no college kids or assorted American tools. We were probably the only two gringos in the place. I am immediately accosted by some Mexican middle aged woman with a firm "Feliz Ano!" and subsequent friendly hug, even before I could get to Liz! Needless to say, it was a pretty cool and surreal experience.