{"id":3683,"date":"2011-11-18T17:53:40","date_gmt":"2011-11-18T17:53:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jeffreygeorge13.wordpress.com\/?p=61"},"modified":"2011-11-18T17:53:40","modified_gmt":"2011-11-18T17:53:40","slug":"the-looney-bean","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/finearchitecturalillustration.com\/index.php\/2011\/11\/18\/the-looney-bean\/","title":{"rendered":"The Looney Bean"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/finearchitecturalillustration.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/11\/mazatlan-043.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-62 lazyload\" title=\"OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA\" data-src=\"https:\/\/finearchitecturalillustration.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/11\/mazatlan-043.jpg?w=300\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 300px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 300\/225;\" \/><\/a>Did you ever have a certain spot you visited on vacation where your mind seems to drift from time to time when you return home&#8230;. ?\u00a0 For\u00a0us that would be a small cafe in Mazatlan, Mexico&#8230;.The Looney\u00a0Bean&#8230;.Nothing special&#8211;just a neighborhood coffee-house&#8211;a hole-in-the-wall, or actually one in a series of holes-in-the-wall that stretch down a sandy stretch of shops, empty storefronts, and restaurants that make up a &#8220;Mexican strip-mall&#8221; at the end of the Playa Bruja\u00a0area north of Mazatlan&#8230;.This is &#8220;down and dirty&#8221; Mexico&#8211;and I don&#8217;t mean that pejoratively&#8211;this is\u00a0just a practical, modest neighborhood shopping and eating area&#8230;.I&#8217;m just trying to paint you a picture here&#8230;.one that&#8217;s accurate, and captures the true charm of this place&#8230;.No fountains with plazas&#8230;.No valet parking&#8230;.No landscaping&#8211;unless you consider the occasional palm weed or Bougainvillea\u00a0bush coming up through the cracks in the sidewalk&#8230;.So I think you&#8217;ve got the picture&#8230;.If not,\u00a0above is a snapshot I took of the seafood restaurant at the end of the shopping center, which overlooks the Ocean&#8230;.And in case you&#8217;re still romanticizing\u00a0this place&#8211;it&#8217;s sandy sidewalks, tarps for roof repair, and a lot of duct tape on all the small fishing boats in sight&#8230;.But then that&#8217;s the charm&#8211;at least for us and\u00a0everyone else\u00a0who enjoy something for what it is&#8211;not what it&#8217;s trying to be&#8230;.<\/p>\n<p>So back to the Looney Bean&#8230;.Our Favorite Coffee Shop&#8230;.Like all of the shops, it opens onto a tile-roof-covered walking arcade&#8211;All OPEN&#8230;.just a big garage door to close off the shop at night&#8230;.Each day when they open for business, they open up the big garage door and pull out the coffee tables, chairs, and rocking chairs&#8230;.So you can sit and enjoy your coffee under the covered arcade&#8230;.The Owner is great&#8230;.she&#8217;s American&#8230;.and she comes down each year from Klamath Falls for the season&#8211;I think from September until March or so&#8230;.She&#8217;s done a great job fixing up the place so it&#8217;s clean and comfortable&#8230;.a relaxed, happy atmosphere&#8230;.But probably the best part is what they do for the community&#8230;.They are involved with a local church, and they provide higher education in exchange for jobs for the local kids&#8211;high school age and older&#8230;.So you will be served by a local kid who is getting an education funded by the coffee you just bought from them&#8230;.That makes the whole experience even better!<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/finearchitecturalillustration.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/11\/mazatlan-046.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-63 lazyload\" title=\"OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA\" data-src=\"https:\/\/finearchitecturalillustration.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/11\/mazatlan-046.jpg?w=300\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml;base64,PHN2ZyB3aWR0aD0iMSIgaGVpZ2h0PSIxIiB4bWxucz0iaHR0cDovL3d3dy53My5vcmcvMjAwMC9zdmciPjwvc3ZnPg==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 300px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 300\/225;\" \/><\/a>The Looney Bean is the halfway stop in our morning walk when we are in Mazatlan&#8230;.It takes us about 45 minutes walking at a pretty good pace to get there&#8230;.we usually open up the place&#8230;.enjoy our morning coffee, relax, talk with the owner, relax some more&#8230;.and then head back&#8230;.Aaaaaah, Vacation&#8230;.That&#8217;s one of the best things about vacations&#8211;You can close your eyes, take a deep breath, and take yourself back there&#8230;.at least for a few minutes&#8230;.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Did you ever have a certain spot you visited on vacation where your mind seems to drift from time to time when you return home&#8230;. ?\u00a0 For\u00a0us that would be a small cafe in Mazatlan, Mexico&#8230;.The Looney\u00a0Bean&#8230;.Nothing special&#8211;just a neighborhood coffee-house&#8211;a hole-in-the-wall, or actually one in a series of holes-in-the-wall that stretch down a sandy [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[34,44,62],"class_list":["post-3683","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-personal-fun-stuff","tag-coffee","tag-fun","tag-mazatlan"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/finearchitecturalillustration.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3683","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/finearchitecturalillustration.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/finearchitecturalillustration.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finearchitecturalillustration.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finearchitecturalillustration.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3683"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/finearchitecturalillustration.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3683\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/finearchitecturalillustration.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3683"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finearchitecturalillustration.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3683"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/finearchitecturalillustration.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3683"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}