Carnival in Mazatlán!

We have finally reached a spot where we have enough signal to upload pictures and post a blog update from our time in Mazatlán—and we spent a lot of time in Mazatlán. Tired from a rough start to our journey south this year and contented from finally arriving somewhere where the temperatures are consistently warm, we were in no hurry to go anywhere. We can’t even say with any degree of certainty (without doing some research into the matter), how long we were there. That’s the thing about living on “boat time”, the day of the week or the number of days or the time of day…none of it really matters until you are ready to hoist anchor. Even then it only matters as it relates to weather and sea conditions. Anyway, as we were enjoying being at anchor in the old Mazatlán harbor, we found out that Carnival was coming up and that Mazatlán’s Carnival is the third largest one in the world. We were enjoying the beauty and color the city offered and taking our time trying to decide whether or not to stay for their nearly week-long celebration…

…and before we knew it Carnival had arrived.

Hundreds of thousands of people and families from all around Mexico came to experience Mazatlán’s 122ndCarnival. It is a really big deal with dozens of cultural, artistic, and musical events throughout the week and is mostly a family friendly celebration (the nightly parties of drinking and dancing are the exception). There were two main events that we wanted to experience: Naval Combat Fireworks (a huge fireworks show and reenactment of Mazatlán’s battle with an invading French Naval ship) and the Inaugural Parade.

The fireworks were on a Saturday night. It is the most popular (and crowded), event where over 500,000 spectators fill the beach and street at Olas Altas. As there was a hill between our anchorage and Olas Altas, we wouldn’t have a decent view of the fireworks from our boat. So we decided to scope out the area in the morning to find a good viewing spot from the other side of that hill in hopes we could find a descent viewing spot without having to walk all the way to the beach thus avoiding some of the crowd. It is hard to imagine so many people fitting in this small of an area

Olas Altas

After finding our target spot, we decided to continue walking down past Olas Altas to walk along the Malecon. Earlier in the week while walking around town, we had seen what at the time we thought was a float that would be part of the parade, but while walking along the waterfront we came across the same sculpture and more. As part of the celebration these sculptures, or manegotes, are placed throughout the city (mostly on the Malecon). Here are the ones we saw for this year’s celebration.

Also, as part of the preparations for the Carnival celebration, stands for buying beer and water were stationed along the beachfront streets at about every 30 meters or less! (Lots of beer gets consumed in this pre-Lenten party!) And sanitizing stations were being set up at all the street entrances where everyone would walk through a mist of sanitizing spray to attend.

As we were walking along the Malecon we saw one of the funniest things we’d seen in a while. Some fishermen were cleaning their catch of the day (always a big attraction for the birds), and one of the bravest pelicans standing right by the fisherman was getting so excited waiting to consume the head and guts of the fish that it was jumping up and down, barely contain itself to the wait. It was hilarious to watch! And it was rewarded with its prize before being shooed away.

We spent the evening on our boat anxiously awaiting nightfall. The wind picked up, but we weren’t too concerned since the afternoon breezes thus far had been dying out as the sun set. The sun set. The breeze turned into a wind and continued to strengthen into quite a blow. (Of all the luck!) We were committed to attending the fireworks, so we all carefully loaded into the dinghy (not an easy task since the wind had caused quite a fetch to build up in the water). We untied the dinghy, and I pushed off as Jim began to row. We were still alongside our boat. Jim rowed harder and faster. Water was splashing up on us in the dinghy. We were still alongside our boat. It didn’t matter how hard Jim rowed; we couldn’t make any headway. So we grabbed hold of our boat and carefully got out of the dinghy—how disappointing! I stayed awake to at least hear the celebration and catch a glimpse of the tops of the fireworks. From a distance it seemed like we missed quite a spectacle. We were able to catch some fireworks during the Inaugural Parade.

The Inaugural Parade was Sunday. It travels north along the Malecon for about 7 miles where people line both sides of the street to watch. There was no way we were going to miss this event, so we came to town in the morning with the intention of hanging out all day and trying to find a good spot to view the parade—we weren’t the only ones with that idea! People and chairs were already lined up along the street. There were brass bands, street vendors and performers on the street and beach, and there was a definitely a strong “party vibe” to the air.

We walked around for several hours. Once it seemed like it was starting to get crowded, we decided it was time to find a place to sit. We were incredibly lucky to get a front row seat from one of many people who were renting chairs they lined up along the street. We paid 500 pesos for two chairs, and it was worth every cent to be able to sit down for the event after being on our feet all day. The pre-parade parade started before the sun set. It was quite an amazing scene. There were floats and bands and dancers. Free swag was being thrown out to spectators (we got a nice Pacifico hat, logo t-shirt for some tech company, and some food items). The pent-up emotional anticipation for the parade was being freely released by the screaming and cheering crowd.

Even Lily got caught up in the excitement.

It seemed like the pre-parade lasted a very long time. Then once it concluded street performers came out all along the street to entertain the crowds. And the venders made their passes with snacks “stuff” that lit up.

Once it was dark the crowd was pushed back further off the street to make a wider path, and the Inaugural Parade began. The floats, the bands, the dancers, the princesses…all incredible! We were in awe of the entire spectacle. We are so glad we were able to experience Mazatlán’s Carnival and highly recommend it. Here’s a few photos to give you a taste of the parade--and by few I mean a LOT, sorry.

The beautiful horses must signal the end of the parade because that is when everyone started to walk away. There was trash and confetti everywhere! But as an added obstacle of trying to navigate through the crowd to go home, there was a huge force of street cleaners with blowers and brooms and bags coming in the opposite direction from most of the people.

One last point of interest from Mazatlán before I finish this post. We also visited El Faro (the lighthouse), which was at the end of the road near the harbor where we were anchored. The lighthouse itself is nothing to see—a square cement box at the top of the hill. However, the walk to the top of the hill, in spite of being long, steep, and hot, offers some spectacular views of Mazatlán.

It is free, but for only 20 pesos per person you can walk out on "The Crystal Bridge" 3 hanging over a cliff at the top. Groups of about a dozen or so at a time are allowed a shoeless 3 minutes take pictures and enjoy the view. It was well worth the $1 US per person.

Thanks for reading! Next stop Mantenchen Bay...