In Many Parts of Puerto Rico the Christmas Season extends to Jan 6th, which is called 3 Kings Day, or The Epiphany, or Fiesta de Los Reyes Magos. Tree Lighting Festivals start as early as Thanksgiving. This year, because of the damaging earthquakes on Jan 6 and 7, as well as storms on Jan 11th, Christmas festivities in my little enclave, Boqueron, continued until almost the 20th of January. A local bar has had a Christmas Tree erected on it's roof all year, but only lit it on occassion in December and January. Here's a short video of a dog on the roof.
2 events I couldn't fit into my schedule this year were: La Cueva Iluminada (a cave in Vega Alta with a restaurant and garden built into it, which is charmingly illuminated over the holidays) and Hatillo's Festival de las Mascaras, which is a collection of groups wearing Masks in "parades" throughout the countryside & mostly ending up in the town square by dinner time. Masks are called Mascaras! I love languages!
&I love my Grandson combining 2 charachters in a costume for Easter of all things.
About 2 blocks from my house, is a tiny triangular park called Plaza Roberto Cofresi. In Dec, on a concrete platform about 4 feet off the ground, a nativity backdrop was erected. On it were performed many holiday festivals. Including an orchestra playing Jingle Bells in 85 degree heat!
This set remains on site as of Feb 10, 2020. Since the various celebrations of the Magi have finally ended, it has also been used for public announcements/presentations about Earthquake Safety and Tsunami Safety.
It was erected specifically for celebrations of the "Adoracion of the Reyes Magos de Boqueron". Also called The Epiphany, this event marks the parade of the three Kings/Magi who brought gifts from across the world for the newborn Jesus. In Puerto Rico, for many families, this is the big "gifting" event of the Christmas season. The celebrations include performances, processions and parades... PARADES not just at 7pm and 3pm, but also before sunrise!
After the performance at 7pm on Sat Jan 5, a procession began that involved very loud music, police escorts to protect against traffic, and lots of pick up trucks decorated with lights as well as a few horses and many pedestrians. It passed my house just about 9:45pm, but the music from my neighbors, as loud as any outdoor bar, continued until about 4:30 am.
Then at 5am, the entertainment started again, as the procession began coming down the street infront of my house.At that time, it was many more pedestrians and horses, Can you see the guys on horses here are in the costumes of the Magi?
In the pre-dawn procession, I think the only motorized vehicle was the one that carried the band. Thats my little 2door car parked in the driveway. Across the street one neighbor's house was all lit up as they were all there (and many visitors) to watch the parade. Under the street light on the right is a vacation Cabin rental complex. We're maybe 350 yards from the waters edge, so it's def a tourist town.
This video is of a terribly poor quality, but I include it because of the sounds.
This is a community event. Though there are tourists here, many of them are simply related to people who do live here all year round. And many of them grew up here.
A recent tourist, who's parents still live here, told me the land where my house is (it's pretty new) is part of the property where Freddie Prinze grew up. Apparently he was the hometown hero in the 70s.
pedestrian wise (but with much less traffic passing)
One of the unique parts of PR life, is the horse-owning and horse-riding culture. There are horseback riding clubs in every community, and the one in Cabo Rojo has an Epiphany Procession during daylight hours thru the Cabo Rojo Pueblo (remember, Pueblo is referring to the town of Cabo Rojo, as opposed to the municipality of CR which, like a 'county', has many Pueblos). It was a surprise to me, as I stumbled upon it while on an errand of curiosity to see if the Earthquake had caused any visible damage in town. (At that time, it had not).
Around noon, on Jan 6th, I turned a corner by a gas station where I was shocked to see multitudes of people on horseback. This was in front of a gas station where people were actually using the automated car wash stall to wash their horses! If only I'd been quick enough to get a picture of that. As I continued down the road I was arrested by many more horse/riders and took more pics and a decent video.. I'll put them on a new post. They're so interesting, to me.
I will also make a separate post about the earthquakes of Jan 2020. We're still having tremors and/or aftershocks, though they've been very small and I don't want to make too much drama out of them. The biggest amount of damage they've done is to the economy, by hurting the winter tourism from outside of PR, which is a very difficult statement to make, as it belies the tangible tragedies of the two deaths which occurred, and the thousands of people who've lost a safe roof over their heads.
 |
| He was fine! Despite the worriers like me, watching him. |
2 events I couldn't fit into my schedule this year were: La Cueva Iluminada (a cave in Vega Alta with a restaurant and garden built into it, which is charmingly illuminated over the holidays) and Hatillo's Festival de las Mascaras, which is a collection of groups wearing Masks in "parades" throughout the countryside & mostly ending up in the town square by dinner time. Masks are called Mascaras! I love languages!
&I love my Grandson combining 2 charachters in a costume for Easter of all things.
About 2 blocks from my house, is a tiny triangular park called Plaza Roberto Cofresi. In Dec, on a concrete platform about 4 feet off the ground, a nativity backdrop was erected. On it were performed many holiday festivals. Including an orchestra playing Jingle Bells in 85 degree heat!This set remains on site as of Feb 10, 2020. Since the various celebrations of the Magi have finally ended, it has also been used for public announcements/presentations about Earthquake Safety and Tsunami Safety.
After the performance at 7pm on Sat Jan 5, a procession began that involved very loud music, police escorts to protect against traffic, and lots of pick up trucks decorated with lights as well as a few horses and many pedestrians. It passed my house just about 9:45pm, but the music from my neighbors, as loud as any outdoor bar, continued until about 4:30 am.
In the pre-dawn procession, I think the only motorized vehicle was the one that carried the band. Thats my little 2door car parked in the driveway. Across the street one neighbor's house was all lit up as they were all there (and many visitors) to watch the parade. Under the street light on the right is a vacation Cabin rental complex. We're maybe 350 yards from the waters edge, so it's def a tourist town.This video is of a terribly poor quality, but I include it because of the sounds.
This is a community event. Though there are tourists here, many of them are simply related to people who do live here all year round. And many of them grew up here.
A recent tourist, who's parents still live here, told me the land where my house is (it's pretty new) is part of the property where Freddie Prinze grew up. Apparently he was the hometown hero in the 70s.
pedestrian wise (but with much less traffic passing)
One of the unique parts of PR life, is the horse-owning and horse-riding culture. There are horseback riding clubs in every community, and the one in Cabo Rojo has an Epiphany Procession during daylight hours thru the Cabo Rojo Pueblo (remember, Pueblo is referring to the town of Cabo Rojo, as opposed to the municipality of CR which, like a 'county', has many Pueblos). It was a surprise to me, as I stumbled upon it while on an errand of curiosity to see if the Earthquake had caused any visible damage in town. (At that time, it had not).
I will also make a separate post about the earthquakes of Jan 2020. We're still having tremors and/or aftershocks, though they've been very small and I don't want to make too much drama out of them. The biggest amount of damage they've done is to the economy, by hurting the winter tourism from outside of PR, which is a very difficult statement to make, as it belies the tangible tragedies of the two deaths which occurred, and the thousands of people who've lost a safe roof over their heads.
