Big carnival parade in Puerto del Rosario

The parade was a week ago already, but somehow there was no time to write it up before.

After extremely photogenic Achipencos I was looking forward to this parade. (Though, unlike Achipencos, carnival parade is not something specific to Fuerteventura, obviously).

I am certainly no connoisseur, but I've watched and photographed some carnivals in the UK, and so far Luton remains my firm favorite, what with all the feather-clad samba dancers and majorettes. Puerto del Rosario grand procession is somewhat short on dancers in feathers - there were three ladies dressed as the one above, but that was all, I think. It reminded me of very tame Saffron Walden take on the same event - dressed up people enjoying themselves on the floats (I saw a few floats with on-board BBQ), amateur samba bands of all ages and so on.

But it can boast an amazing level of participation - the procession was very long for such a small town, and it looked like at least half of the viewers were dressed up somehow. It was like one half of the inhabitants are in the procession and another standing along the route.

Achipencos 2012

Carnival started in Puerto del Rosario, capital of Fuerteventura, a few days ago. Big carnival parade will be next week and I am quite looking forward to it; today though there was something rather special. It's called Regata de Achipencos, Regata Achipencos, or just Achipencos. I won't pretend I understand what the word means,  probably nothing. The idea is that a few quite obviously sea-unnworthy vessels take to water in the Puerto del Rosario, crewed by strangely and/or cross-dressed people.

The  theme of the carnival in Puerto del Rosario was "fantasies"; that should have given the participants a lot of choice of how to dress. Given that, the number of Smurfs-crewed floats was rather surprising.

Puerto del Rosario - cow on the roof, new dress and my lens's still missing

We went to Puerto del Rosario again on saturday; Timur, who is very unlike Yuri in this respect, demanded some new clothes. I also bought myself some stuff, including rather funny little dress below (photo taken by Kirill). In my defense I can say it was on sale, plus our container is still out there somewhere (!), so we have to survive with a very limited wardrobe.

Fuerteventura looks and lens that is no more with us

Today we went to Puerto del Rosario and I've parted with my faulty lens and some money. It will be sent to Barcelona and they'll call us and tell if it's reparable, and if yes, how much it'll be. The guy we spoke to in canon center didn't speak a word of english, but funnily enough, I understood what he said, without catching any particular keywords in his speech - probably because it was of a highly predictable content. It will be "un mes, mas or menos". I am feeling sort of post-lens depressed, me.

Meanwhile while we were planning the move and making the move, Timur definitely turned from a being of unbearable cuteness to a being of unspeakable coolness. At least in his own eyes.

market at Puerto del Rosario and plants

Today we finally went to the "La Biosfera" market at Puerto del Rosario. It's on Saturdays, an the first floor of their enormous bus station. I don't know what was the original plan for the station, but normally it feels very empty and causes you to think about whether humankind is lonely in the universe and things of that nature. On Saturdays it's somewhat busier, but only somewhat. Truth to be told, we overslept, and came there by almost midday. Maybe the market was a lot busier before, but not at that point. There were vegetables, cheese and ham, bread, and one stall with plants. Guess what I bought then :)
Plants were surprisingly cheap, I paid just a euro for this little crassula plant. We also were looking at a cactus with absolutely huge thorns, but decided against it, as our intention was to shop some more. The stall holder handed us the plant, said "mil de euro" and giggled at his own joke. I tried to ask in a very shaky spanish if he's there every saturday (we really set our hearts on that cactus), to which he cheerfully replied at machine-gun type of speed. Hm, thought I, I take it as a yes.

Puerto del Rosario - colors

Pictures from Puerto del Rosario - this time with more color in them. The shoes I bought yesterday I tried today at salsa class, btw - they are a bit stiff in a way new shoes tend to be, but work fine, good balance.

I find this yellow of postman (and postwoman) scooters very touching

Puerto del Rosario - white hot

We went to Puerto del Rosario today, to get more bits of paperwork done. We haven't done what we intended, but got forms, a list of docs to bring over next time and an assurance that we are not needed there all four of us, just one representative will do. So we considered it a success.

When we started from home, it was a bit overcast. It started to heat up when we walked to a bit - in the direction of the shopping center (Las Rotondas), because I needed some dancing shoes. Inside the center it was cool and on the darkish side, and easy to forget how hot it is outside. Which it was