Rain

Happy Thanksgiving to all the readers in/from the United States, hope you all have a great day. It has been cloudy here the last few days, which is unusual for us. Last night I woke up to the sound of fairly heavy rain. This morning it is wet and muddy looking. Odd weather for this time of year for us.
Nothing exciting going on, just the usual everyday round of errands, etc..
Roys computer gave up on working a few days ago, it is now in the hospital and we may hear something today about it.
This rose is blooming today. It looks pretty with the raindrops still on it. It has the most beautiful scent, just lovely and it was tough enough to survive the summer.

Handicap Access

They have added a handicap access ramp at the Palacio Municipal. It was supposed to be in place on the 12th of November. When we were there on the 15th, sure enough it was in place. According to the newspaper, El Vigia, it was installed at a cost of 65 thousand pesos. It is on the left side entrance to the building. The building is designated as historic by the National Institute of Anthropology and History.
We went out to San Carlos the other day, so on our way by I took a picture of the wind powered generator. It wasn't turning when we went into town; but on our way out it was working.

Upcoming Cruise Ships

There was an article in La Voz del Puerto newspaper on November 19th stating that the most expensive cruise ship in the world, The World , will be coming to Guaymas on March 21, 2010. It will have a stay of 36 hrs. in the port.

Guaymas At Night And Other Things

The Palacio Municipal lit up at night.

The Iglesia de San Fernando also lit up for the evening.

Fountain at the Iglesia de San Fernando.

Just an old building that I like for some reason. It is the second floor of a building. The first floor is brick; but for some reason the second floor is built out of wood. It is rotting away and not safe looking.

They had these photo stands all over the malecon when the first cruise ship came in and also the evening of the Festival of the Calaca. I love the expressions on the various faces.

Wind Generated Power

On November 19th the first wind generated electrical tower was put into use in Guaymas. According to La Voz del Puerto newspaper, Guaymas is the first municipality to produce their own wind power. This tower will produce 6 kilowatts and moves with winds of 12 meters per second, at a cost of 600 thousand pesos. They are looking at an investment of 1 million 400 thousand pesos, for equipment and research to be undertaken over a period of nine months.
It will illuminate some 60 lights (2 miles of a boulevard) and is part of a bigger wind farm project which will produce 10 megawatts per year and cost 10 million dollars. With this project, the municipality would be self-sufficient in energy for lighting and the cost would be paid in five years, given that currently the township spends two million dollars a year to cover the cost of the electricity that it pays to CFE for street lighting , Plazas and other public spaces.
Involved in the project, in addition to UNISON, the city, the Institute of Technology Monterrey and the National Council for Science and Technology (CONACyT).
The tower is located between kilometers 1 and 2 on the scenic boulevard in San Carlos, and is equipped with a generator (Proven), of English origin but bought in South Africa.
The next step will be the location of three points on which to locate an equal number of rigs to 30, 40 and 50 meters in height, to monitor the behavior of the air, reported Dr. Roman Miguel Moreno, director of the Center for Energy Saving of the Technological Institute of Monterrey. This task will take at least one year and will serve to locate the exact sites where they would create so-called "wind farms", which would give the town "the cheapest energy in the world," said the specialist.

Cristo Rey de Guaymas

On November 19th the Bishop of the Diocese of Ciudad Obregon, Juan Manuel Sanchez Mancillas and the priest Manuel Santos Santoyo David, of the Church of San Fernando announced that they will be building Cristo Rey de Guaymas. It will be built north of the city near the farm San German. It will be over 25 meters high according to the newspaper, according to the local TV news the base will be 6 meters high and the statue will be 28 meter high. Also according to the TV news it will be the biggest one in Mexico. Right now at the place where this will be built is a little cement plaza and a 5 meter cross on a pedestal.

Photo from the newspaper El Vigia.

Charity Fundraiser

Sundays are usually pretty quiet for us as Roy likes to watch american football and it seems to be on ALL day. I decided to go down to the Plaza de Tres Presidentes, I had read in the paper that the family of a handicapped boy were holding a fundraiser for him. I blogged about when we had gone to a Kermés (Charity Fair) for him in August.
It was much quieter in the plazas on Sunday than it had been just the day before when the cruise ship came in. The vendors were still set up in the plaza and there were some people shopping/looking at the wares. I must say it is easier to see their offerings in this set up than it is in the crowded confines of the old mercado building.
There was a band that was just finishing playing and there was a stage set up where nothing was happening while I was there. Some fellows were wandering around all dressed up in their mariachi outfits; but not too much was going on.







The family had a little booth set up and after I was done there I decided to head over to the 13 de Julio Park and see if anything was going on over there. Quiet there also, with the old men sitting and visiting on the park benches.
I had nothing better to do so I wandered over to the malecon turistico. Pretty quiet there also. There were a few people gathered at the dock for the Pirate Ship boat rides/tours as the next one was due in 15 minutes. They had some specials on that day and we could have gotten a 1hr. ride for a reduced price. Being as Roy wasn't with me and I didn't want to go by myself I headed home to see, you got it more football.

More Photos Of The Cruise Ship Events

When the cruise ship arrived on Saturday the city put on lots of entertainment for the cruisers as well as the people of the city.

On one stage at the Plaza de Pescador there were dancers.

On another stage on the Malecon Turistico, there were mariachi bands and other bands/groups. This is also where the shrimp festival was being held. The motorcycle police also put on an exhibition of their stunt riding. We didn't see much of it; but later saw a video of them and they are excellent.

There were lots of venders on several sides of the Plaza de Tres Presidentes.

The Day of the Dead calacas were on display at the Palacio Municipal, as well there were displays of fossils and paintings.

In the 13 de Julio Park there were 2 stages set up, there was only entertainment happening on one of them when we were there though. The Yaqui, Seri and Mayo Indians were supposed to have food booths set up and entertainment also; but the only ones we saw were the Mayos. It looked like the other two did not show up; but maybe we just missed them.

There was supposed to be an art exhibition at the old jail; but we did not go over there to have a look.

We wandered around for about 3 hrs. with our friends S. and G., did some eating at the shrimp festival and later stopped for a drink at a restaurant where we could sit and relax in the shade. We had a good afternoon and hope that the cruisers did also.

The Second Cruise Ship Arrives

On Saturday the second cruise ship arrived in Guaymas. According to the newspaper El Vigia there were 1,258 passengers from 11 countries: Australia, Bermuda, Canada, Germany, Holland, Philippines, Poland, Switzerland, England, USA and 4 from Mexico plus 559 crew members. The city put on many events again as they had done for the first arrival. The city also hosted the Shrimp Festival on this day, this is an annual event that usually takes place in San Carlos.
The plazas around centro all had things going on, from food to dancers to art exhibits. There were a lot of people wandering around taking in the sights and sounds.
The cruise ship.

The pirate ship was doing tours of the bay.

The land traffic was also hectic.

This little fellows grandpa saw me taking pictures of the bay and set him up on the seawall for me to take a picture of him. After I took it, he just took the little boy down, smiled, thanked me and walked away without waiting to see the photo.

Festival De La Calaca Part Three

Here are the last photos from the Festival de la Calaca held on November 1st here in Guaymas.
Young lady dressed up in the parade.

Little dancers on one of the stages.

Cut paper banners on all the streets. Very intricate and pretty.

Bloggers Meet

Yesterday we met up with Croft and his wife Norma for lunch at La Barca restaurant. When Roy and I arrived at the restaurant it was closed. This was strange as they are usually open for breakfast. We waited around for awhile and a fellow came out and when he saw us waiting he went back in. Shortly thereafter another one of the guys came out and said they were having some problems and would open in 1/2 hr.. We waited for a bit and then the lady came out and told us that we could wait inside if we wanted. We had just seen Croft and Norma drive up so when they got to us we went inside to wait. We got the menus and drinks and they apologised some more for not being ready. Apparently their cook was sick and they were awaiting another one. Eventually someone came and we ordered, got our food and ate. Lunch was good and the company was better.
After lunch we decided to walk down a few blocks as Croft was looking for a cell phone. The store was closed for siesta, so we decided to show them the Casa de la Cultura. There was nothing going on there so we headed onward to the old jail. I have blogged about the old jail several times, here and also here so if you want to see pictures you can go to the links. I didn't take any yesterday. They did give us a tour of the jail, in spanish which I badly attempted to translate, we wandered around and then sat outside to rest up before heading back. While we were relaxing a fellow came out and began to talk to us in english. He was a very interesting fellow having spent 35 yrs. in the merchant marine and he had been to Canada during this time. We chatted with him for awhile before we headed back. Croft and Norma headed back to San Carlos and after getting a few groceries we headed home. A nice time with new friends, thanks guys.

New Fountain

Here is a video of the new fountain that is much better than mine was. This video also includes the opening speech from our mayor, if you don't want to listen to that you can forward to about 2:30 min. of the tape and just watch the fountain.


Today we are going out for lunch to meet some new people who staying in San Carlos for a few days. They are passing through on their way further south, they are from Campbell River, British Columbia. Should be a fun lunch.

Festival De La Calaca Part Two

More of the Calacas that were set up for the festival on November 1st for Day of the Dead.

Lucha Libre. There were lots of people looking and commenting on this one.

What I've Been Up To Lately

For me, as a bit of an introvert, it has been quite a social week. Some friends have arrived back in San Carlos for the winter, so on Tuesday I met S., her husband G., their son and grandma for lunch before our Spanish class. S. came to the Spanish class with me last year and has started again now that she is here for the winter.
On Wednesday I met up with fellow bloggers, Holly and Errin . They both have adorable little boys and we had a nice chat over a drink. It was great to finally meet them after reading their blogs now for several months or more.
Thursday and Friday were spent during errands and just relaxing.
Fellow blogger Ale had invited Bliss, Cynthia and Mike and I for a shrimp buffet lunch on Saturday. Roy and Bliss' husband decided to forgo this bloggers marathon and really missed out on a good time. We had a lovely lunch, with shrimp prepared in about 5 different ways. Thank you very much Ale and Ulisses for a lovely lunch and visit. I didn't take my camera but Cynthia has a photo on her blog so you can head over there if you want to see it.

Yesterday S. and her husband G. came over to see if Roys computer was indeed dead or could be resuscitated. They brought along their dog who is a good friend of ours and we loved seeing him again. He immediately remembered where we used to put his ice cubes/water when we looked after him last Christmas and then ensconced himself in my recliner.

G. spent a few hours repairing and then re-installing on Roys computer and it is now functioning but we need to get a new disc from the cable company to get him back on the Internet, as the disc we already have seems to only have been good for one usage. We then went out for a nice shrimp dinner. A nice day of visiting, eating and computing.

Shortly after they left Roy and I headed uptown. They have built a new fountain on the malecon turistico in centro at a cost of 9 millones, 475 mil, 188 pesos or about $947,518.80. They were inaugurating it last night. It is apparently the only one of its kind in Sonora. The water works in sync with lights and music and is lovely. They played popular songs such as La Barca de Guaymas, Sonora Querida, México Lindo y Querido and others and the crowd of more than 15 thousand people (according to the city site) loved it all.

The pirate boat was cruising around the harbor and at one point there were some fireworks which I think were set off from the boat. It was a great evening.

My camera is not very good at taking photos at night but here is what I got.

Repairing The Street

After Tropical Storm Julio went through here on about August 24th this summer our road was in a bit of a mess. I had posted some pictures of it here.
Compared to some of the streets in Guaymas though it was in pretty good shape so it wasn't looked at by the city for immediate repair. Two of the landlords sons had filled in the ditch left on our street by the water and traffic resumed. The street to the north of us had a very deep ditch dug into the side of it and some people had to jump this ditch to get to their homes and couldn't park their cars there safely.
Roy and I wondered about what would happen when the grader would come as our water supply line from the cities water supply to the house and apartment was lying on top of the road, as you can see in the photo below, it is the blue line. We could see a broken waterline in our future.


Yesterday morning a grader showed up along with a fellow whose job it seemed was to supervise. Our landlord explained to them about the waterline and the grader man very carefully covered it up with no breakage. He certainly is good at manoeuvring his machine.


Working at covering the waterline.





While they were here our landlady asked them to cut down the height of our parking area to the street, so for a small renumeration they did this also.
When they got our street looking good, they headed up the street behind us to survey the damage. After looking at it for awhile they called for a couple of truck loads of gravel and the grader operator proceeded with the repairs.


Apparently they decided that if they cleaned off part of the incline on the hill side of the street it might help the flow of run off in later storms. So the grader proceeded to clean it up a bit, you can see how much he cut the hill beside the road.
Below, one of our neighbors goofing off for the camera.

He did a nice job of cleaning it up and then they were gone for the day leaving a couple of piles of debris to be picked up. This morning a front end loader and truck came along and they proceeded to load up the piles from yesterday.

Result, two streets that look much better and are easier for the cars to drive on. Mission accomplished.
Grader working on cutting the hillside a bit.

Festival De La Calaca Part One

On November 1st they had a celebration in centro for the Day of the Dead, it was called the Festival of the Calaca. Here are some photos of the Calacas that were set up to meet and greet the people attending the festival.