RichAndNancy

Wednesday, January 1, 2014

Feliz Ano 2014!

Happy 2014!

On New Year's Eve, we decided to take a little walk to see all the activities for the big New Year's Eve celebration.

At San Francisco Market, business was brisk for the dummy bodies and the masks, as well as for the completed dummies.

Families build/buy these dummies to represent something they'd like to eliminate or change in the new year. Then, the dummies are burned at midnight...out with the old, in with the new.

Our friend had told us his neighborhood Church would begin staging for their parade at the Square.

We were a little early, just a couple floats, some horses and children. His neighborhood is one of the biggest ones, and the parade organizers were planning on about 2200 children taking part. We missed most of the staging and the parade, but we're sure it was a huge success!

Dummies in storefronts were all over.

We wish everyone a happy, healthy and prosperous 2014!

Wednesday, December 25, 2013

Christmas Season in Cuenca, 2013

Merry Christmas!

Parades are a Very-Big-Deal here during the Holiday Season. We saw our very first one this Season late November and we're sure we haven't seen the last!

Cuenca is known for the GrandDaddy of all Parades on Christmas Eve. We love to attend each year!
This Parade goes on for hours...the planning and organization must be tremendous. To the uneducated eye, this year's Parade went off seamlessly, as they always seem to. Congratulations, Cuenca!

Taking a break in the shade.

This year, once again, thousands of participants, including many children and adults, with vehicles and animals and many Baby Jesuses, marched through the streets of the City.

Each year it gets bigger, according to officials. We read somewhere that just about every child in Cuenca dressed up and joined in, to give you an idea of the sheer size!

Folks come from far and wide to watch. All flights and hotels booked up early, as usual.

Actually, the Big Parade is made up of many smaller ones, each representing a Community, Church, School, Family. Each has a Baby Jesús.

The smaller groups come together each year for the Big One, as well as march on different days as their own. In past years, we've seen smaller Parades right up into February, so all can participate.

Here are more pictures as we roamed the City this Holiday Season.

Right down Av Solano.

At a neighborhood Church.

Our first Parade of the Season.

Last minute instructions for the drummers.

----------------------

We are in our Summer now. Hot for Cuenca (almost 80 degrees F on Christmas Eve!). Windy most afternoons.

Beautiful skies this time of the year.
Intense sunshine.

The skies are so beautiful, we are planning on washing the windows soon. Can you imagine even thinking of washing windows in December?!? No snow here!

Flowers are doing really well.

We're sure we'll have more pictures of the Season later, so stay tuned.

Saturday, December 21, 2013

Nativity at Las Conceptas Museum

We went with friends to the Las Conceptas museum, primarily to see the special, historic nativity scene on display this year.

We have been to the museum before and loved it -- not too big, not too small, just right, with lots of treasures! We love the old architecture and history, too. This complex is the oldest colonial in Cuenca, restored in the mid-1980's.

The museum occupies a small portion of the block-size building. The rest of the property is still home to cloistered nuns and not open to the public.

There is a modest entrance fee for the museum. We mention this, in case you want to check it out. Not free like most museums in Cuenca, but still a bargain! -- about $3

The day we were there, photos were allowed of the inside, but no flash. We did our best. But, no comparison to seeing the art ín person'! Also, the printed info at the exhibits is in Spanish, English and French now.

For a previous visit and more info, see
http://richandnancy.blogspot.com/2010/01/museo-de-las-conceptas.HTML

Pretty courtyard in bloom.

This museum houses one of the most special collections of old religious art, some dating back to the beginning of the convent, 1600's. Much of the art was donated by the wealthy families of Old Cuenca.