My San Felipe Is Your San Felipe

San Felipe, should I even try to explain this place? Only a few years ago a sleepy fishing village with excellent Sports Fishing and a sustainable Shrimping industry. Today; dreams of becoming the next Cabo San Lucas as The Golf Scene & Golf Course Resorts, Custom Homes & High Rise Condos begin to dot landscapes & beaches. Silver Jewelry...tasteless Tee Shirts. Sport Fishing is still great. An occasional hot day...an occasional cool day. Better than average sewage systems keep the Shrimp industry sustainable. Old guys with white ponytails, dark tans & huaraches sandals....Shakers & Movers investing millions of development money in pristine beach front property. Off Road Racing, Regular Carnivals & Circuses...Lions, & Tigers, & Bears..Oh My! Fire Works, Mariachi Bands, Fish Tacos, Cerveza, & Tequila....Click here for more on San Felipe

a public service announcement for fishermen

“We have 9 people wanting to go on the fishing trip with Tony Reyes Jr fishing tours. We need 12 minimum. I put a bulletin on the weather page, but maybe that’s not the best one. Could someone put a bulletin on the front page for last minute sign-ups. I have to call Tony today or tomorrow and let him know we may have to cancel. Anyone wanting to get in on a short, pre-season, 3-day fishing trip on Tony Reyes’ boat come March 30-April 1 for $300 dollars, e-mail info sanfelipe@gmail.com. Deadline for sign-ups is March 14th."

Up date from Sean in Mexico for friends old and new

Hola Amigos

Been pretty hectic down here in San Felipe where the economic downturn has hit pretty hard. They have a saying, "When the US gets a cold, Mexico gets Pneumonia". Well it looks like the US of A has Pneumonia, so here in San Felipe we are experiencing by some accounts an over 85% drop in tourism. The swine flu scare didn't help... haven't hear of but a case or two in all of Baja, and nobody understands that the drug violence in Tijuana is mostly drug dealers killing drug dealers, with the occasional poor bastard who got in the way... Tijuana is a 4 hour drive and a world away from San Felipe.

Real Estate sales are in the practically nonexistent and have been for nearly two years. So whats a guy to do? No I am not being negative, that is just the way it is, so one needs to roll with the punches and I am trying to do just that by going native.

I have setup a couple of home businesses that are part of the local economy. Allowing me to work from home and to do business with the locals while allowing me to keep my fingers in the real estate market place for when the new market for San Felipe appears. (it might be soon and it might look alot like people escaping from the US with what they've got). And of course you really can live well for less. Not dirt cheap but much cheaper than anywhere I would want to live in California.

I have attached pictures of the Home base biz in San Felipe. Just a three minute walk to the Malecon and downtown beach where the tourist go and many of the city based activities take place.

The house came with a Salon that had been operating for years and was ready to go so it was just a question of getting some gals to operate it. Berthy (Sean and Berthy on the Beach last July) has found a few great gals and they keep the salon open from 9 am -9pm 7days a week. The property also had a new small retail like space with good frontage on a fairly busy street in a good neighborhood that shouted internet cafe. A partner helped with the Internet cafe and video games, bringing down some big screens and gaming equipment and additional computers. I must admit that my Internet cafe plan in my mind was more of a quite operation with folks who didn't have Internet or a computer at home quietly checking their email and chating with friend and family...I had no idea what video games had become. I now need to listen to music on head phones just to isolate myself and my work from the gun fire and explosions of "Modern Warfare" and those Trophy Trucks and Race Cars on "Dirt" can really drowned out a good high powered weapons skirmish. I am thinking I will be moving my office outside as we get busier to help me keep what sanity I have left. Pictures of the salon & Internet Cafe

The restaurant/cafe an outdoor sidewalk cafe is next on the list to be brought to reality and I hope to have that up and running in a few weeks. There is also a small room that we have turned into a massage room. Taking an advanced course in Massage Therapy was my first step in setting up my old business "The Back Shop" in Monterey California..(one of my other lives).
Also a huge backyard will allow me to continue my Segunda (an outdoor second hand store specializing in consignment sale of excess stuff Americans have brought here, including Segunda Motors) and a veggie garden First round of plantings have just begun to sprout) There is also a very large second bedroom which will probably end up as a photo studio and combined that and the salon and do some Glamor shots after they get dolled up in the salon. While my job titles aren't what they used to be it is more or less on my own terms and none of really feels like work.

All in all I am happy to be living in San Felipe. Things haven't worked out as planned but it is not like that hasn't happened before. "Be careful of what you want...you might get it" I am enjoying the challenges of making a new life in a different country and experiencing a different culture. I am still in the throws of collecting a settlement from a Real Estate developer for earnings so all of this is done on a shoe string budget, and a wore out shoe string at that, but after 50 years the majority of it in California, wasn't interested in doing it anymore.

Change is good

My Favorite pictures I have taken while in San Felipe

More Pictures
--
Sean Harrington
San Felipe South Beach Properties website under construction

760 592-8254 from the US
686 179-1849 Mexico

Early October, The Weather Couldn't Be Nicer.

Early October, The Weather Couldn't Be Nicer.
Click Picture to enlarge

Yesterday Berthy and I made some pleasant use of the mild weather and took a drive south to La Hacienda. Looking back on San Felipe the blue of the water against the colors of our little beach town, the scene was tranquil and inspiring. San Felipe is a beautiful place.

On our way back into town we stopped at the Marina So Berthy could get fish for her restaurant, The Back Street Patio Grill. Speaking Spanish Berthy has the advantage in getting the freshest fish from the fish vendors on the dock. When she indicated she was looking for restaurant quantities of fish we were quickly ushered to the side of the dock. The tide was out so the Panga fishing boat was some 20 feet below and under the dock. The fishermen proudly displayed their catch of Corbina, Sierra and Blue Shrimp...Still in the nets. It doesn't get any fresher than that.

I went back to the truck to russel up a couple of bags and sent them down to the boat to be filled. After a few minutes loading the bags with fish & shrimp one of the fisherman struggled to climb up the pier clutching both the pier and the bags heavily laden with fish to get up to us were an exchange of pesos for fish would complete our transaction. We rushed our catch to the restaurant and iced them down.

If your in town this evening why don't you plan on stopping into The Back Street Bar to have dinner at The Back Street Patio Grill. Their should be lots of activity in town with the racers and the Snow Birds slowly arriving.

Al is offering a free shot of his infamous...I mean Famous Home Made Tequila...Snarlin Cholla with ever dinner...and the fish is fresh!

Click here for Dinner menu at Chef Berthy's Back Street Patio Grill

Clean Up San Felipe...On My Recycleable Soap Box Today

Click pic to enlarge picture

My first visit to San Felipe was only 5 years ago. Since I have now lived here full time for nearly 4 years, I obviously found attributes to San Felipe that made it possible for me to leave Carmel California for San Felipe. But on day one of my first visit to San Felipe I was appalled by the trash. In fact when I was told that there was a dump in San Felipe and that it was free I had to see it. I offered a friend to take some crap they had laying around to the dump to see what it was all about. For reference I ran a small business in Monterey Ca and routinely had to get rid of packaging materials and used beds that I would take away when I delivered a new bed. It cost me $40.00 to get rid of a king size bed in Monterey. Evey vehicle going into the dump was weighted and you paid accordingly. So I was just amazed that the dump in San Felipe was free and yet it was obvious that it wasn't being used to it's potential. People weren't making it all the way to the dump!


We have winds in San Felipe, and the dump itself is a source of blowing garbage. But after living in town for a few years I have seen a bigger problem that is tied into other problems. Some are cultural, some are financial, and we gringo's need not condemn but to educate and help find a solution to the problems. San Felipe has an other problem that needs to be and is being addressed by a small dedicated group of animal lovers, and that is the uncared for/street dog population.

Non existent laws for the containment of garbage. 55 gallon drums without lids as the predominant trash collection device...black plastic bags stacked against the drums when there is excess garbage. Loose dogs & street dogs,... doing as dogs will do, looking for food. San Felipe's love affair with plastic bags, garbage collectors who take little pride in their work, cars trucks and wind spreading the resulting loose garbage everywhere.

I see the problem as being intertwined. While the animal advocacy groups are doing their best to educate, spay and neuter, street dogs continue to produce more street dogs who find food in garbage, tipping over lidless cans and tearing open bags. Trash collectors, who's job description is veg at best and the winds create an endless cycle of blowing trash & street dogs. The perfect perpetual motion machine.

I have several ideas that can be put in motion that could Educate, (remember our commercials when we were younger, of an American Indian with the tears in his eyes over a trash filled pond)?, create new job opportunities and employment in San Felipe, make a huge impact in reducing the uncontrolled garbage in San Felipe and generating revenue for the animal advocates so they can continue to successfully deal with the dog population in the humane manor their charters dictate.

I will be clarifying these ideas and submitting them as proposals in the very near future. However as a first step I submit the idea; that the San Felipe trash collection process must be held responsible for their lax attitude to trash collection. Even if "they", through lack of resources, education, laws, and street dogs, are not responsible for the improper containment of garbage, They are assigned to collect what is offered up... if they are going to collect it take all of it ...Please.

This morning I helping the garbage collection guys pickup stuff,... up the street from me...to make sure it was all picked up. At their next stop I watched and photographed as they picked up some but left nearly a quarter can of garbage on the street. I cleaned it up in about 3 minutes with a rake and a scoop. I don't think it is to much to ask that the San Felipe Garbage Collection Service arm their employees with a rake, a scoop and a new job description. Pick up the damn garbage!

Some good news about safety in Mexico...

News Report Video. Describes how Spring Break Festivities in Cancun are going on without Drug War incidence.

Paranoia

Oakland California...4 Cops Shot 3 Dead...

Whoops Thought this was going to be an article about how unsafe Mexico was