semana santa

everyone in mexico gets semana santa free from work (except those of us at CEDO, i should say), and a lot of people from sonora and the states travel to peñasco. the malecon in the old part of town is usually a fairly touristy spot - lots of restaurants, bars, and the tienditas with curios that only tourists buy.

but during semana santa, everyone packs up a cooler of beer and heads out to the malecon. they actually close off the entire area to cars so that everyone can just mill around. it's also the time of the bandas. in general, i don't really like banda music, as it's usually blasting out of someone's car speakers, buuuuut during semana santa heaps of bandas are all over the malecon, and people hire them to play for them. it's outrageously expensive, something like $200 pesos/song or a few thousand for an hour - and people save up all year for it.







you just have to imagine everyone in peñasco congregating in the malecon, with at least 20 different bands, all playing at the same time - beers in hand, dancing, talking.





it was just fabulous. a big group of us headed out with the obligatory beers in hand and people-watched and danced for a few hours. man, i am loving dancing here (and i have never liked to dance). but one, banda is ridiculously easy to dance to, and two, all the guys here know how to dance which makes it about 8000 times easier. now i just need to learn how to salsa :)

i tried to take a few videos, here's the best one:





how excellent to get some culture here in peñasco. so much of the time it's dominated by tourists, and really this wasn't at all.
[and with my little point-and-shoot camera, basically impossible to capture in photographs, so i apologize for the very poor quality of these photos.]

when it starts sinking in like quicksand

a fact of life here is that you get your car stuck in the sand. it just happens. there is no avoiding it. there is a lot of sand here.

for example, my first day in peñasco, before i'd even arrived at CEDO, i got stuck in the sand. i drove past the turn-off to CEDO, and while turning around, decided that it would be fine to drive through some sand. and i had to stop, because a car was coming. and then, surprise surprise, couldn't get going again. my dad was just shaking his head at me, "i told you to be careful in the sand". i'm not even here yet and i'm doing stupid things.

and then a man from town drove by, came back, and hauled me out with a rope. "stupid gringa"

haha.

so ... on saturday, pia and i went with club ecologico to an ejido an hour plus from here to visit one of the other esteros in the area, all piled into CEDO's 15-passenger van. it's pretty secluded, but really stunning. you're just driving through the desert, sand dunes, blah blah blah and then come to this overlook





and there just past estero san francisquito, is isla san jorge. it's refuge and over 3000 sea lions live there and hopefully i'll be going there in two weeks with a group to go snorkeling! how exciting! but i digress. it's stunning, yes? both pia and i were like, "whoooaaaa" the kids were not nearly as impressed.

we drove along this dirt/sand road right along the coast, and stopped to check out a huge flock of birds - mostly cormorants and pelicans who were hanging out just off shore.





and then we decided to head back to the estuary to do some various activities. and on the way back, we got stuck. and i mean really stuck.







in a way, it was actually quite amusing. i mean, there we are pretty literally in the middle of no where stuck in the sand. and we tried everything - digging, cardboard under the tires, throwing water under the tires to try to create traction, letting air out, pushing, reversing, back and forth and nothing worked. we are extremely lucky that we got stuck close to a building that some fishermen in the area use and they came over with their truck to try to pull us out. after three hours or so, we were out. and then they got stuck. and then we got stuck trying to help pull them out. and finally a huge truck full of fishermen drove by and pulled us all out.

it was actually pretty hilarious.

i think i'm going to keep cardboard in my car from now on. just in case.