You Don't Need a Weatherman

I love the rainy season. An emerald blanket covers the hills, dramatic skies of boiling clouds relieve the eternal azure. The rivers are running, the fish are biting and the birds are nesting.

Rains have come sparsely and late in recent years. The practice of the ages held that the corn was planted by May 15, because that's when the rains should start. But Mother Earth has little thought for vanities such as the calendar and too many harvests have been bleak.

May 15 is, however, the official start of Hurricane Season, although this Hidden Port typically receives its harshest storms during the latter part of the season. But even a normal, early-summer squall can be impressive.

The rainy season also brings the gift of the Awesome Surf. Life is good. Pray for (frequent and gentle) rain.
- - Warren Sharpe, Sr. Ed

Calendar

It would also be a very big deal for the Mexican surfer who wins the right to compete with the 45 best surfers in the world. This second part of the elimination takes place on Zicatela; part one was held a week earlier at Barra de Santa Cruz, on the other side of Huatulco, where the real deal will be held, June 20 - July 1. (And you thought . . .)

Tuesday May 23
Student's Day
Special programs and a day off for the kids, so a busy day on the beach.

Tuesday 23 - Wed 24
Annual Fiesta
La Luz, Tutútepec & Cuixtla Dates and program were not confirmed as we went to press.

Saturday 27 - Sun 28
3rd Annual Children's Surf Festival
The hospitable water of the beautiful Carrizalillo Bay is the venue for the third running of this splendid two-day surfing festival open to all kids aged 4 to 15. See Page 15 for more.

Tuesday May 30
Smoke Out
Trying to quit? A worldwide effort to get people to just say no to tobacco.

Saturday June 3
Dance & Rodeo
The local rodeo here is called Jaripeo. It consists of bull riding contests, lots of hype and loud music, often followed by dancing. Lately, our excellent rodeo arena, La Costeñita has paired exciting professional rodeo with nationally (and sometimes internationally) famous musical acts. This month is norteña flavors with Sergio Vega, El Shaka, Los Primos de Durango and Banda Amigo Tickets: $130 in advance, $150 at the box office, kids $50

Monday June 5
Birthday of Pancho Villa
The brilliant military strategist, hero of the Revolution and thorn in the side of Gen. Pershing, was born Doroteo Arango, in the state of Durango on June 5, 1877. His military victories earned him the epithet of Centaur of the North.

Sunday 11 - Tue 13
Festival of San Antonio de Padua
A traditional coast fiesta featuring parades, dances, a rodeo and the lighting of the castillo, a tower affixed with fireworks in a traditional display of pyrotechnic magic.

San Antonio is located on the main coast highway to Pochutla at the road that leads to Mazunte, site of the Mexican Turtle Center. Other towns and neighborhoods in the region named for this saint will also celebrate during these days.

Sunday 18
Father's Day
Mrs. Sonora Smart Dodd of Spokane, Washington first proposed a day to honor her father, a civil War veteran, in 1909 and it quickly took root. And in 1924, Pres. Calvin Coolidge proclaimed June 19 a national celebration for all the dads. In 1966, Pres. Lyndon Johnson signed a proclamation making its observance the third Sunday in June, as it is in México. Call home!

Wednesday June 21
377th Anniversary of San Pedro Mixtepec
The administrative center of the county (municipio) that includes most of Puerto Escondido celebrates the 377th anniversary of its founding today with a civic ceremony and cultural program. It's a picturesque community in the Sierra foothills just 20 minutes from Puerto Escondido on the road to Oaxaca via Sola de Vega. This month San Pedro celebrates the 376th anniversary of its founding, as well as the festivities to honor its patron saint, St. Peter the Apostle (San Pedro Apóstol).

Mixtepec comes from the Nahuatl meaning Hill of Clouds or Cloudy Hill -- mixtli cloud and tpetl hill. It is believed that it once had a Zapotec name, Danicahue, which has the same meaning.

San Pedro Mixtepec is an important town in this region. For one thing, it is the administrative center of a county (municipio) that includes most of Puerto Escondido.

According to the archives, on June 21, 1629, Don Juan de Peralta, in return for 1000 arrobas of cotton (a weight equivalent to 25 pounds) and 1000 pesos, ceded the lands to the people living there. The ceremony was witnessed by the colonial authorities and San Pedro Mixtepec officially became a county.

The 377th anniversary of this milestone will be marked with a civic and cultural program, including a community meal at 6 p.m. in and around the municipal government building.

San Pedro is a pleasant, well-ordered and clean community that sits on a river and is surrounded by densely wooded and frequently cloudy peaks. It boasts a spectacular tourist attraction: the awesome El Chorro waterfall near the small town of La Reforma. This trip used to be just for the adventurous and the energetic. To get there you had to first take the dirt road (off to the right just past the sign welcoming you to San Pedro Mixtepec) for the half-hour drive to La Reforma. From there it was a two-hour plus walk to get to the falls.

Now there is a passable road (depending on the weather, and the level of the river) almost all the way out to El Chorro. You can still walk or rent a horse to enjoy the beautiful scenery as you follow the path of the river, which you will cross five or six times before arriving at a series of deep, sweet-water pools.

It's the perfect spot for a picnic and a swim before you venture up stream to the main falls, a magnificent, thunderous cascade of water that plummets from a height of some 130 feet into a cool fresh water pool, irresistible for swimming.

First Day of Summer
It officially begins at 7:26 a.m.

Thursday 22 - Sat 24
Festival of Saint John the Baptist
A major fiesta in Santos Reyes Nopala, important center of Chatino culture. It's always an interesting place to visit, especially during one of its traditional mayordomia fiestas in which a festival mayordomo or sponsor, named by the town authorities the year before, is responsible for throwing the party, which means providing food and entertainment for all who show up. Neighbors help out, but it is a huge financial burden and also a great honor for the mayordomo.

It's quite a sight to see the women tending huge cauldrons of beans, mountains of tortillas and vast sides of beef. There's also lots of tepache, fermented cane juice and champurrada, hot chocolate with corn atole. This one is a horse fiesta, which includes horseback processions and horse racing that has roots in pre-Colombian religious rituals. The object is to capture the live chicken strung up by its feet above the track.

Nopala sits on a hilltop surrounded by even loftier peaks thick with trees. The views are spectacular: steep, narrow alleyways drop away to reveal mosaics of tiled roofs and patios (where the beans are sun dried), the river valley dotted with hillocks and the mountains.

It's great town to explore: the churches, the market (Nopala has a traditional Indian market on Sundays) and small restaurants where you can sometimes find venison, quail or crayfish on the menu.

You can see archeological remains dating from around 600 to 800 AD of the ancient culture in the municipal palace, the kiosk in the main plaza, and in some private homes.

You can visit a coffee plantation or see how the traditional trapiche works. This is a wooden mill, powered by oxen to crush sugar cane for the juice that is used to produce panela, a raw sugar and tepache, fermented cane juice, essential to any celebration in the region.

Another ancient production process can be seen in nearby Santa Magdalena Tiltepec, where the women make all kinds of pots and vases, clay figurines and the comal, the ungreased clay griddles essential to Oaxacan cooking.

This is the Annual Fair also in San Andres Copala and in the colonia Tamarindo in Puerto Escondido. Details were unavailable as we went to press.

Tuesday June 20 - July 1
Rip Curl Pro Search
This is the first time the ASP has sponsored a WCT (World Championship Tour) contest on the coast of Oaxaca. Unfortunately, the site for the Rip Curl International Pro Search, a high stakes ($280,000 dlrs.) competition, won't be Puerto, but Barra de la Cruz, so Huatulco will reap the rewards. Qualifying rounds to select the nine best Mexican surfers, for the chance to compete with the best world-ranked surfers were held in Barra and Puerto last month. The winners from the Barra round were: 1st Place: Roberto Salinas; 2nd Heriberto Ramírez; 3rd Raúl Noyola.

More on Rip Curl next month.

Read This Month's Feature Articles:
Weather
Surfing Kids
Return of the Ants
Lila Downs New Release
Birds Around Puerto