Sunday-Monday December 23-24, 2012

Sunday-Monday December 23-24/12  update #322

Sunday was just a rest day and clean-up day in preparation for guests on Christmas Day.   We are going to be so busy for the next 2 days I don’t know how we are going to manage it.

The birds outside were making quite a ruckus so I looked out to see what was happening.  From my vantage point it looked like a fat baby had come out of the nest and the parents were just frantic.  I got a shot of the little guy, already way bigger than a sparrow, but looking exposed, vulnerable and afraid.   Later I went down and saw it cowering against the sidewalk 2 doors up but didn’t want to touch it.  On my return home I saw what appeared to be a dead sibling right in front of our place, poor thing.

Monday morning I looked out and was pleased to see the not-so-little bird being attended to by its parent so that was heartening.  First he was under cover but then went out into the open again, hopping and chirping away, so at least he appears healthy.  I do wish he would stay under cover though.   There aren’t many cats in the area but there are loads of dogs.

I went downtown for the Pase Del Nino parade in honour of the Baby Jesus.  I Googled to get the correct Spanish spelling of the event and my video from last year came up first!!  http://youtu.be/eBBjIU9XSPk     It will take me a long time to process the amount of photos I took today, so bear with me.

The parade is an eight hour extravaganza that is world famous, both for its pageantry, beauty, and length. The parade has some of the most colorful costumes, animals, horses decorated with food, dancing troupes, and many tributes to the baby Jesus on his birthday. The children are a huge part of the parade and are mesmerizing, so well behaved and so beautiful, as only children can be. The length of the parade took its toll on many of them, some even falling asleep in the saddle. I took 890 photos last year so you will get to see a few new ones this year. I also took 39 videos of the dance troupes last year that I have also uploaded to YouTube starting with http://youtu.be/GAHITn7JWpU

I was to be possibly joined on the parade route by Jay Shink and Paul Wolf but didn’t see either one as it took me some time to arrive at my intended starting point.  I did run across many people I knew during the day though.   I had caught a bus to near San Sebastian and the parade started earlier than scheduled so I ran into it almost immediately.   I hung around that area until the parade got bogged down, as it always does, then I headed west to avoid all the wait time.  I had hoped to cut down on the number of photos but instead just eliminated any movie taking.   And who can resist all those children with the incredible dark eyes?   So I only took 1,145 pictures today…….    Those you won’t see for a while unfortunately.

I found the end of the parade near Avenida De Las Americas around 4pm, and by that time I could barely walk so I just headed to Joe’s Secret Garden and gobbled down a couple of muscle relaxants and a 292 while I flopped in a chair for an hour.    It took about two hours before I could move freely again.   Bella joined me for the Christmas Eve feast of deep-fried turkey and Mark generously brought me another Christmas tie to wear.  We met some more Canadian visitors and generally had a great time, as usual.    I am only uploading the photos from Joe’s tonight.

That was today’s excitement.   Hugs to all.   Please see all photos at http://souvenircuenca.blogspot.com/