Welcome to our Slog (Sailing Log....get it?!) We will be keeping you up to date and hopefully posting a message every couple days or so here, so check back often! We hope to let you all experience through our eyes the dream of the open ocean and a sailing vessel, experiencing new cultures, new friends, new adventures, new possibilities of reward and contribution in our life. Come aboard, shed your shoes, dance barefoot across the decks, adrift upon Mother Ocean. Fair winds and following seas.
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Happy Thanksgiving Everyone! 11.27.08
I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! And there's no better time like the present to let you know that I'm so thankful to have you in my life. Thank you for checking in on us & I hope your day is beautiful, wherever you are.
We had an action packed day! As I told you before, Michael is in charge of the Thanksgiving Dinner for the cruisers. He has been working with Elvira, the Marina office manager, and Ray, the owner of Mazatlan Yachts who has helped put this event together for years. He also organized a core group of cruisers who helped with the entire event - setup, decoration, entertainment, clean-up, lighting, promotion, etc. The event is entirely cruiser run - there is no monetary help from the marina at all - so it will keep the costs low. Last year, the dinner was about $30/person. This year, because of Elvira's help and the labor of the cruisers...it is 175 pesos, or about $14/person. They had to put a cap on tickets at 180 as they could not fit any more tables & chairs outside in the lounge.
The first hurdle of the morning was when the tables & chairs were delivered. Pacifico (the local beer distributor) loans out tables & chairs for events. But when they arrived...they were FILTHY! No problem - the setup committee with about 20 volunteers got busy with buckets & rags and had them all cleaned up spic & span in about an hour! It was amazing to see so many people jump to work and knock it out! The food was excellent - turkey and all of the fixings. The evening went off with only a few little issues but everyone loved it.
In the morning, Father Horatio held mass and then jumped into the panga to provide a 'Blessing of the Fleet'. He had some palm fronds and holy water and went from boat to boat, throwing water & praying.
I stood on the bow of the boat and accepted the blessing as we can use all of it we can get! It was a wonderful detail of the day that Ray & Jeanette from Mazatlan Yachts organized.
Michael spent most of the evening helping with all of the details of the night and I mingled with several of the cruisers. Once the entertainment started, Michael was able to eat his dinner and enjoy the evening as well. The night ended around midnight and we crashed! Tomorrow starts the countdown - only 4 more days until we leave!
Here we are again, several days over my weekly blog. Oh well, I’m a cruiser, what do you expect?! Haha… Actually, I haven’t been online much at all because I picked up a computer virus from another cruiser and have had a hell of a time getting rid of it! It was a very bad one and has taken me several days to clean it from both the laptop and desktop. It was transferred via my flash drive and disabled my antivirus, firewall, & windows updates…allowing other viruses to spread. It’s a huge bummer and I believe I have it about 99% but am calling in the help of a 12 year old boy in the Marina named Casey on S/V 4-PACK today for help.
The past couple weeks have been action packed, as always. There’s always something to do and it’s amazing that time has flown so quickly! Here we are, about 6 days away from our leaving Mazatlan and we will still be down to the wire on a few items.
We have spent the past couple weeks reuniting with a bunch of cruisers who have made it down here from spending the summer up in the Sea of Cortez – Pat & Barry on S/V Pacific Voyager, our sister ship. And some additional friends from Ventura, Wally & Linda on S/V Andanzas came into Mazatlan after cruising down the Baja Peninsula during the Baja Haha. We’ve spent a few evenings with them and have enjoyed playing ‘cruise director’ showing them around Mazatlan.
We hiked up to El Faro with Linda and her son & friend, David & Aly
and Pat & Barry from Pacific Voyager
We had a wonderful hike and even stopped for 2 geocaches on the way up the hill! No one in the group had even heard of geocaching so we explained it and while looking for one of the caches, Linda was the one who found it! The day was gorgeous – sunny & warm, temps in the upper 80’s with just enough breeze coming off of the ocean to keep us cool. We weren’t as lucky this time as the lighthouse keeper would not allow us up inside (there were too many tourists around as there were 3 cruise ships in the harbor and lots of people filtering through!) even after giving him a candy treat. Oh well, next time. But we enjoyed the view of Mazatlan and the cool breezes and then hiked back down. Oh, and FYI….it is 340 steps up to the top! Once we were back down, we decided to walk the malecon over to old town so that we could visit my favorite shop in Mazatlan, Nid Art. This is the place I’ve written about before that makes the fantastic leather art. We had asked the owners if they would make a small sailboat over the summer for us. They have been so busy opening up a pottery school, they had no time to make it but assured me if I came in on Friday, she would have something started for me. I can’t wait to see it. Wanna check it out? Go to http://www.nidart.com/
So we made our way through downtown & jumped on a bus back to the Marina. We had just exited the bus when Ally looked at David and asked “Do you have my purse?” You guessed it, she had left it on the bus. Oh NO! They took off down the street after the bus, luckily it goes down the street and makes a U-turn and comes along the same route back in front of the marina. They finally found the bus and the bus driver said one of the passengers had taken it, but he had the cell phone # for the person and gave it to Ally. Multiple calls later to the cell phone, no one answered. So finally, she gave up and called to cancel her credit cards. I didn’t mention that they were flying home that evening….and her I.D was inside. Luckily her passport was on the boat so she could still fly home. She was mostly bummed for losing the purse! (Which I can relate to as I had my purse stolen while in Channel Islands and could care less about the contents, just wanted the purse back!!) They flew back to the States and on the radio net the next morning, someone asked if anyone knew an Ally! Turns out, the guy who found the purse came to the Marina and was asking around to some of the cruisers to find her. One of the cruisers took his info and told him it was a cruiser and he should bring it to the office tomorrow morning. Amazingly, the fellow showed up in the morning and gave the purse over to the Marina office. Nothing appears to be taken and it was safely, without reward, returned. Another ‘random act of kindness’.
We have continued with our social calendar – Dominoes Pizza Tuesdays (today we had 27 people!), dinners out, and just visiting with fellow cruisers. Last Saturday we had a group that went up to the Hotel Freeman for sunset and then down to old town for ‘street potatoes’. Yumm… John & Debby Dye from Lovely Reta, Linda & Wally from Andanzas
Mike & Julie on Slacker
Pat & Barry on Pacific Voyager and ourselves had a wonderful evening. When we were on the top of the Holiday Inn watching the sunset, we all remarked how the ocean was calling us and we just can’t wait to get out on the hook again.
Mac from S/V Effie held a ‘beaders anonymous’ meeting and 8 women attended and learned how to do a DNA stitch using a super tiny needle, thread, & seed beads. There were half newbies (me included!) and half experts who brought along some of the most amazing pieces of jewelry that I’ve ever seen! I’m in process of making a bracelet. It is a job! So much detail! In the 3 hour class, I finished about two inches of the bracelet so I’ve got some work to do but it is something I’ve wanted to learn forever so I’m glad that I had the chance to meet these wonderful ladies. That’s one great part about cruising – participating with others and learning all kinds of fun stuff!
We’ve been doing a little bit of Geocaching this past week. Aside from the 2 we found while hiking up to El Faro, we found 5 others with Debbie from Lovely Reta in tow. She loved it! We even let her find one of our first ones – one no one had found before – making it a First to Find! The owners had left a 10 pesos coin inside as a bonus, she was thrilled! There are a total of 12 in the Mazatlan area and I hope to find some of the others before we leave!
The boat is ready – all of the projects are done (or done enough!) except for one tiny detail. Since we returned, our dinghy engine has been running sluggish. We have had trouble getting up on a plane and even at full throttle, we’ve been passed by people with much smaller engines! We had an engine service over the summer so we asked Rick from Cape Star to take a look again. His guys pulled the engine apart and discovered we had one injector that was plugged. What is it with these injectors?! So he tore it apart & cleaned it up, but when he was putting it back together, realized he needed a new gasket as well. Turns out, we didn’t have a spare on board. Of course! How that happens with all of the spares we do have, I’ll never know but I guess it’s bound to happen. And of course, there is not one to be found in Mazatlan. Yep, welcome to cruising in Mexico. So we are having them make one for us and we’re crossing our fingers it will work. He gives it a 90% success rating, so we’re hoping! It is supposed to be made tomorrow. In the meantime, we’re having two of them shipped down from the States, but they won’t be here for several days to a week and we’re leaving on Monday.
I guess I let the cat out of the bag! I’ve been reporting before that we are planning to leave on Dec 1st and head down to Huatulco and then working our way back North to leave the boat in Mazatlan for the summer. Hang on to your seat….we changed our minds! We’re still leaving on Monday, the 1st but our plan is now to just go out to Stone Island, right outside Mazatlan for a couple days to just get out of the Marina & get back into the groove of things, then continue to slide down South, stopping at all of the places we can until we get to Zihuatenejo. We may be in Barra de Navidad for Christmas, we may not. We’re just going to take it one day at a time and have a good time. Cruiser plans are as solid as writings in the sand at low tide – bound to be erased. And it’s nice to be so flexible, it’s less stressful that way! We removed all of the foil window coverings from the windows and the fans will disappear in the next day or so. It’s time to go cruising!!
OH! I almost forgot! We went to a Baseball game the other day, the Mazatlan Venados vs the Guasave Algodoneros.
Baseball here in Mexico is very popular and the games are much more than simply the game!
First, as soon as you enter the park, there are Pacifico, Coca Cola, Lala, and every other girl you can imagine dressed in super sparkly, super tight outfits to greet you at the entrance.
Of course all the men just adored that part. Then there’s about everything imaginable to eat here. The downstairs concourse was filled with vendors – tacos, sausage, sushi, chicken, hot dogs, etc. Once you are in your seat, there was a beer vendor with two buckets of ice cold beers in each section who is responsible for all of the beer sales in that section. You don’t even have to get out of your seat to get a beer! Just holler or signal and he will pour you a cold one for 15 pesos and pass it down the row. There were a lot of mascots during the game – the TelCel Shark (the local cell phone company), the Mazatlan mascot is a deer and he was so animated, it was almost more fun to watch him that it was to watch the game!
In fact, the game was a bit boring until the 7th inning. The Venados were down 0-2 and it didn’t look good. But one pop fly and a missed catch and they were caught up and then got the go ahead run to win the game. As soon as the inning was called, every kid in the stands, and many adults too, jumped over the side walls and onto the field to help the players celebrate. It was amazing. The evening was so much fun. There were about 30 cruisers who attended, but only 10 of us stayed around for the end of the game and the win! About 4 times during the game, after an inning was called and before the next one started, folks would run out along the fences & throw promotional items out. There were water bottles, t-shirts, key rings, baseballs, etc. I caught one of the water bottles – a promotion from Burger King (haha!) and allllmost caught one of the baseballs but it glanced off my hand and went behind me. Bummer!
We have been working on getting our FM3’s, an immigration document that looks a lot like a passport that will allow us to stay in Mexico for 1 year instead of the tourist card that expires in 6 months. The submission process is pretty painless – take photos, make copies of your passport, complete the application forms and schedule your appointment to pick up the finished product. We were assured by everyone involved that the appointments would be scheduled 2 weeks later so we waited until two and a half weeks out to submit the paperwork. And of course, Murphy stepped in and the appointment was scheduled for December 4th – 4 days after we were hoping to leave! Doh! We went down to immigration with Elvira from the Marina and talked to them (read – begged!) to get an earlier appointment, which is scheduled for Friday, the 28th. After we get our FM3’s, we have to take them and the temporary import permit for the Jeep to Customs to get the permit extended to match our FM3’s. Sounds easy! Our only issue is that our appointment is at noon at immigration, and customs closes at 2pm! It will be a race to get everything done and we’re hoping Murphy is no where to be found today.
Our cushions are super clean and beautiful since the zippers and new foam was installed. I ended up taking the cushions up to the drycleaner and they removed the covers and drycleaned them for only 35 pesos each. We have dealt with our Fishing Licenses, although it was not as easy as it was supposed to be. It’s a nice easy process – go online, fill out the application, print two pieces of paper, take them to the bank, get your receipt, go back online and enter the code from the receipt and print the license. Simple! Mine worked without a hitch, printed beautifully. Michael’s…..not so much. The code just would not work! I tried & tried, took it up to the office and Elvira tried & tried! Well, long story short, they misspelled Michael’s name on the bank receipt and since it does not match, won’t work! We went back to the bank but since it was days later, they could not fix it and suggested we call the Conapesca office, but no one could help. So we are keeping our payment receipt and our application on Michael and if we are asked, will attempt to explain! We went to have some maintenance items taken care of in the last few days as well – haircuts & teeth cleanings! What a deal on a cleaning – only 350 pesos! Michael has been busy with the Thanksgiving Dinner preparations. There are lots of things to work out & coordinate and he’s doing a fantastic job. And of course we have been provisioning & stocking the freezer. We found some great frozen lasagna meals at Sam’s club which is an incredible find in Mexico, we stocked up on some meats from Henderson’s which is the best place for frozen meat we have found here (they flash freeze it & vacuum seal it in the U.S. and bring it down), cheeses, & misc items we know we won’t find further down the road.
Oh, I have to tell you how much fun some of the cruisers are here. As everywhere, there are several ‘jokesters’ and there are several here. One story that I have to tell you though is about “Jean Claude”. In the middle of one of the morning nets, someone (I won’t name names!) came interrupted the net with a very thick French accent and said he was just coming into Marina Mazatlan, was sick of cruising and was selling everything on his boat, including his boat for very cheap! Things like a dinghy for $50, including the engine, watermakers, lines, canvas, etc. All of the things a cruiser is on the lookout for! Even his boat he was going to sell for $500. He said to come to dock 5 in Marina Mazatlan and it was first come, first sold! What you should know about Marina Mazatlan is the numbering sequence is off – there’s dock 3, 4, 6, 7, 8….but no dock 5! Of course, he caught some cruisers hook, line, & sinker and there were even several boaters who were calling on the radio “Where is dock 5?”….. There were people from the other marina who even hopped in their dinghies and zoomed over here….all looking for dock 5 and “Jean Claude”. It was a classic. People are still looking for “Jean Claude” and all of the items he was selling. No one tells those people that there is no “Jean Claude” and it was all an elaborate joke. Haha…!!
I have failed in my attempt to write a once-a-week blog update again. Sorry!! It is so easy to find something else to do! But I’ll bring you all up to speed on what’s been going on lately. We’ve continued to work our way down the ‘list-o-things to get done before we can leave’ and have crossed several things out this week and as always, added a few as well.
Going down the list of completed items…the mainsail slides were sewn on and the mainsail was re-hung. All of the reef lines installed and most of the lines were whipped to prevent further fraying (something we should have done long ago!). All of the sails are up & ready to go! When the mainsail was up there was a slight amount of breeze and she was tugging at the docklines…she’s ready to get out sailing as much as we are. We had a chain plate on the starboard side that was leaking so it was re-bedded. The SSB antenna was reattached, the rudder post bearing was checked & Michael added nylock nuts to it. We checked the emergency tiller, just to be sure it still worked since replacing the rudder post – it works fine! The backing plate for the stanchion base was finally completed (the one we had the engine room all torn apart for) and we have 3 additional ones to install at all of the stanchions at the gates.
We had quite a scare the past few days as Sparky the Generator wouldn't start, a very, very bad thing.
We had Bob & Rafael from Total Yacht Works on the boat Saturday who thought it was a blocked injector (we don't have a spare, of course!) so he took it to clean it out. Monday morning Rafael returned with the news that the injector was fine. Oh great! We have had lots of problems with this #%@ generator and when it wouldn't start, figured it would have to be rebuilt again. It's a Phasor LP1 3.5KW generator that was purchased for about $5K and rebuilt for another $1K a year ago, when we could get all the parts shipped direct. We shuddered to think how much it would cost here in Mexico. Further inspection found the water impeller in pieces. It was replaced (thank goodness we had a spare one of that!) and it still wouldn't fire! About 3 hours later after tearing it mostly apart, the technician shot some oil through the injector straight into the head which lubricated the rings & piston, which increased the compression from about 80 to 230. It was put all back together….and it fired! Turns out the rings and/or piston must have been a little rusty? or possibly just 'stuck' and wasn't doing it's job. So thank GOODNESS it was a simple fix....or we hope! We haven't gotten the bill yet....haha.
After a stressful day dealing with the generator, we went out to dinner with some friends from Channel Islands that are taking off today heading further South, Milan & Adrian Ford aboard M/V Integrity and John & Debbie Dye on S/V Lovely Reta who are old work friends of Michael's. It was a place called 'Fat fish' and they had a special - two dinners (Ribs, Ribeye, or Shrimp) for 160 pesos (about $13) and two for one margaritas. It was a nice evening - Adrian's b-day was Sunday and someone gave her a huge chocolate cake so she brought it and everyone had a piece! Milan & Adrian left Mazatlan the next day, headed South for the season. We hope to run into them on our travels.
Oh, but back to work! Michael changed the oil on both the engine & generator, whipped more lines, continues to work with the aft shower, and has even begun writing in the mornings all about our adventures. You’re sure to see his additions to the website shortly! In fact, he sent out a mass e-mail to everyone in our address book with a reminder we are out here & what we did over the summer and we’ve been overjoyed with the response. Hearing from long lost friends is always such a treat.
The boat is being scrubbed down, top to bottom, on a daily basis. There are lots of nook & crannies that get scrubbed with a toothbrush, wood cleaned & oiled, brass polished, etc. The cushions in the main cabin are dirty after years of use and we’ve been pondering how to clean them up. A plea out to the cruisers & condo’ers did not turn up a steam machine so we decided to clean them ourselves. The problem is they were obviously a handmade job and did not include any way to remove the foam and clean the fabric. After much deliberation, we decided to have zippers installed in them so we can take them apart & clean them ourselves. Of course, talking to the upholstery guy, the inevitable happened….we decided to get new foam installed while he had them. The old foam was getting too soft & bottoming out so why not!? We’ve been without cushions for about 5 days now and should have them returned today just in time to take them apart & clean the fabric! He could do it while he had it…but at a cost of $10/cushion we decided I could do it cheaper.
We are in process of getting our FM3’s, an immigration document similar to a passport that will allow us to stay in Mexico for 1 year. Our temporary permits are only good for 6 months and we will be here until June, which is 8 months. There is an agent here in Mazatlan who does all of the paperwork & footwork for you and we decided to go this route for this initial submission. We went yesterday and got our requisite photos, very similar to a passport, and filled out all of the paperwork. We have also been working on getting our Mexican fishing license renewed. The renewal can be done online now at http://www.conapesca.sagarpa.gob.mx/wb/ and I have instructions if anyone is interested. We have printed out our receipts that we need to take to the bank to pay for the license, then return & print them out. As of January 2008, the requirement to have a license for everyone on board as well as the boat & dinghy has changed! Now you only have to have a license for the persons on board. We paid 447 pesos plus 35 pesos for the online transaction per license. Have I mentioned the dollar to peso conversion is very much on our side right now – it is averaging 12.5 – which is a welcome benefit!
Whew, all that work is making me tired just thinking about it! Haha. But of course we’re still having fun as well. Our Dominoes Tuesday Pizza nights are still in full swing, last night gathering 17 people! A group took off last Wednesday in our dinghys and zoomed out to Deer Island, just off the Mazatlan coast, for a few hours of soaking in the ocean, snorkeling, & relaxing. The day was gorgeous – sunny & warm, no wind to speak of. The island has a wonderful beach area and as we were pulling the dinghys onto the soft sand, we assisted with some young boys who live on the island. There were only about 20 or so others on the beach and the entire group of us spent some time just soaking in the water before donning our snorkeling gear & checking out what was underneath! The water was a bit murky, but once we swam around to the side of the island, large boulders provided a great area for vividly colorful fish, shells, & even a bloom of scallops. There were 3 dinghys – ours, Mike & Julie on S/V Slacker and Mike & Marilyn with Bianca in tow on S/V Lady Hawke.
The water was perfect in the 80’s it felt wonderful and we all had prune hands by the time we got out of the water. It was a quick trip – out & back in about 3 hours – but was fantastic.
Wednesday night, Rafael Rodriguez sings at Gus Gus, the restaurant at the top of our dock and we seem to catch his show every Wednesday. The food at Gus Gus is outstanding and inexpensive and Wednesday evenings they are packed with cruisers & condo folks.
Geez, is that it?! Nope, not quite. Mazatlan has always held a terrific Thanksgiving Day dinner and through sheer luck (or torture, we’re not sure which), Michael has been made the President of the committee this year. Was he nominated? Did he volunteer? Nope…he just happened to be at the right place at the right time and whala…he’s it. So for the last couple weeks he has been holding meetings, organizing the cruisers to ensure everything is taken care of, etc. Last year, there were 189 people in attendance! Luckily, there are several cruisers who have volunteered to help and so far the ticket sales are positive. The Marina Mazatlan manager, Elvira Lizarraga, has worked very hard to ensure everything is taken care of – has made the arrangements for the food, tables & chairs, beer, wine, soda, etc. It is a lot of work for everyone but it’s coming together nicely. The menu is turkey, gravy, mashed potatoes, yams, green bean casserole, stuffing, salad, cranberry sauce, croissants, carrot cake & after dinner coffee for 175 pesos per person – that’s only about $14! Plus, after dinner, Rafael Rodriguez who sings at Gus Gus will play for 4 hours. It should be a wonderful evening. We’re looking forward to it. Wanna come?! :-)
There are lots more cruisers in the marina now. There were probably 30 or so who checked into the net this morning and the marina is just humming with activity. There are exercise classes 3 days a week, daily Baja Rummy games, lots of work being done on boats daily, and that great camaraderie in the air. Everyone is getting excited to begin their journey, wherever it takes them! Hurricane season is almost over – November 15th is the magical date. It has been less hot here as well, temps in the upper 80’s during the day and today we’ve been blessed with a nice breeze that is cooling everything down. The evening temps have been fantastic – cool enough for us to turn off the A/C unit and only use the fans. Our plan it still to leave just after Thanksgiving and head down to Huatulco and then begin our trip North. But remember, cruiser plans are like nailing jello to the wall! Irregardless, only 2 more weeks until we take off - woohoo!!
Keep in touch! If you missed out on the mass e-mail and would like to be included, send us an e-mail to sailing@aheakali.com and we'll add you to the mailing list for our very occasional e-mail updates.
Rene
We had a friend come & visit on the dock the other day - posing for pics & being talked about!
Last night was the 'Day of the Dead' parade in downtown Mazatlan and a group of cruisers all went down for the festivities. We jumped on the ‘green’ Sabalo Centro air conditioned bus and exited at the Mercado, walking a few blocks to the center of the festivities, Plazuela Machado. The place was swarming with people, vendors selling jewelry, books, & goodies, and music. There were 11 of us – Mike & Julie from Slacker, Mike & Marilyn on Lady Hawke, Merry & BJ on Willow, Justin from Tao Min, two non-boaters Bianca & Sherri, and Michael & I. Roy & Darlene from Scrimshaw & Scott & Cindy on Beach House were also seen in the crowd. We started off at a restaurant, the majority of us ordering fish or shrimp tacos (yum…) and we timed it perfectly as once we finished with dinner, it was time for the parade!
What is the Day of the Dead all about you may ask? Well, to me it seems like a combination of Memorial Day, Halloween, & the 4th of July all wrapped up in one. The Day of the Dead is a big deal here in Mexico, often more celebrated than Christmas.
Every year, on November 1st (All Saints Day) and 2nd (All Souls Day), the Day of the Dead festivities take place. While it's strange for most of us to accept the fact that "death" and "festivities" can go hand-in-hand, for most Mexicans, the two are intricately entwined. It isn't difficult for foreigners to interpret dancing skeletons, candy skulls and general drunken revelry as disrespect for the dead and grief at human loss. Nothing could be further from the truth. For those accustomed to hushed voices, formal clothing, a solemn priest and an absence of children as fitting for the graveside, this festival flies in the face of propriety. Bright flowers, loud music, colorful decorations and seasonal sweets are characteristic of the first two days of November.
This all stems from the ancient indigenous peoples of Mexico who believed that the souls of the dead return each year to visit with their living relatives - to eat, drink and be merry. The living invite the spirits of the family to return home for a few hours of laughter, tears and memories. It is a time for remembering friends, family and ancestors. The cemeteries come alive and altars are created which are filled with flowers, candles, a selection of the deceased favorite food & drink and fresh water, photographs of the deceased and offerings. Even families with very limited budgets spare no expense when preparing the altar to honor their family.
They want their spirits to enjoy the offerings and to return each year to continue this special spiritual companionship. The spirits of the dead are expected to pay a holiday visit home and should be provided with an enticing repast and adequate sustenance for the journey. Frequently a wash basin and clean hand towel are provided so that visiting souls can freshen up before the feast. The offering may also include a pack of cigarettes for the after-dinner enjoyment of former smokers, or a selection of toys and extra sweets for deceased children. The smell of burning copal (incense) and the light of numerous candles are intended to help the departed find their way. While most altars are laden with the favorite foods, sweets, drinks, and harvest fruits of each family spirit, even the most basic altar includes these basic needs:
WATER to quench the thirst and for purification SALT to season the food and for purification BREAD to represent the food needed for survival
It is a time of lively reunions at family burial plots. Some bring along picnic baskets, bottles of tequila for toasting the departed or even a mariachi band to lead a heartfelt sing-along. To preserve the tradition, government and private institutions have recently increased promotion of commemorative altars displayed in museums, educational centers and other public venues.
Other symbols include the elaborately-decorated pan de muerto or ‘dead bread’,
skull-shaped candies and sweets
,
death figures
and paper maché skeletons and skulls. This may all seem morbid and somewhat ghoulish to those who are not part of that culture. But, for Mexicans who believe in the life/death/rebirth continuum, it's all very natural.
The festivities are the epitome of what I love about being in a different culture. By the time the parade began, there were thousands of people in the plaza. There was so much going on, every sensory was tingling. The parade was not what I would consider a parade, but more of a procession. There was a lead vehicle with spotlights shining onto the crowd and fireworks were shot out every few minutes.
The fireworks are a signal to help guide the spirits home. Behind the lead vehicle were thousands of people, who walked the entire parade route (about 20 blocks). Everyone sang & danced to music provided by brass bands evenly spaced out throughout the procession. This is a quick video showing the dark streets, the band, and if you listen, everyone singing.
There were also 3 burrow-drawn carriages decorated with flowers.
These carriages carried kegs of beer and a couple men whose job it was to keep the beer flowing. During the procession, you simply sidled up to the carriage and were poured a cup of beer (which sounds so much easier than it was!) and then continued to walk along the parade route.
You drank the beer in remembrance to those who have passed. Of course, the beer carriages were always surrounded and I think they had one guy specifically for pumping the keg alone! All ages were represented and it was not unusual to see an entire family walking along. Some participants were dressed in elaborate costumes,
but mostly everyone wore black & white of some sort.
At the end of the parade route, which took us right back to Plazuela Machado, students of the local ballet school performed “La Catrina dances, too” depicting death & rebirth.
We were even treated with a sample of the 'dead bread' by gals walking through the crowd. The entire evening was amazing. Incredibly, the entire group managed to meet back precisely when we were supposed to and all hopped into a pick-up taxi back to the Marina.
The festival reminded me of a favorite song of mine…
And the band played Songs that we have never heard But we danced anyway We never understood the words We just sang Oh, la la la la la la la la la And we danced anyway…
Nobel laureate Octavio Paz said, "The Mexican is familiar with death, jokes about it, caresses it, sleeps with it, celebrates it; it is one of his toys and his most steadfast love."
