I got to the airport a little late, thanks to my misremembering when my flight was due to leave. Is it still a “senior moment” when I’ve always done it? But over an hour before a domestic flight (even if it connects to an international one) is OK, right? So, really, not early but not terribly late.

The line was not too long, didn’t move too slow, and I was at the head, waiting for the next check-in agent in no time. Which was when the computer system for the whole airline industry crashed on me. Well, OK, not on me personally. And not really the whole industry, but Sabre does cover most of it. Check-in stopped. Flights stopped — taking off; I assume the ones in the air kept on going. I was left standing at the head of the queue with nowhere to go.

It only took them a half hour or so to get it back up again. (A company with so obviously a phallic symbol name as Sabre really aught to know how to get it up and keep it up, I mean really!) Meanwhile, the check-in people were reassuring everyone that the flights were being delayed too, and they wouldn’t miss anything.

I checked in my bag (full of boat parts) and headed to the gate. Since all of check-in was off-line for a half hour, security was completely empty, so that went quickly. I didn’t have TSA Pre, so it was a shoeless, beltless, try-to-feel-dignified-while-they-pat-you-down pass through security, but no waiting.

Got to the gate, and they were in final boarding for an on-time departure. I told them the people up front were telling everyone the flight was delayed to wait for them, but they just shrugged. Anyway, I got on maybe ten minutes before they closed the door. Then we sat at the gate for twenty minutes due to more computer slowness. Meanwhile (we heard from someone with a cell phone and friends outside), the delayed passengers were on the other side of the door and not happy about it. The pilot reassured us that they would get on the next flight.

In the next airport, I originally had a fifty minute connection, now turned into a thirty minute connection. Luckily, my arriving flight was at gate 65B, and my departing flight was at 64A. After pausing for a moment at a pair of signs saying 64B and up this way, and 63 and lower that way, I finally found where they’d hid 64A. Final boarding, no sir, you don’t have time to go to the bathroom before boarding, door closing in six minutes.

Got on, got my seat, and they delayed departure for twenty minutes to wait for a connecting flight from Seattle. But then we were off, and I even got to buy some lunch.

After landing, immigration and customs was a breeze. But now I know the answer to a long-standing mystery: In immigration, then often make you push a button as you go through, which lights up a green light. Why? Is it taking your fingerprint? Testing that you’re actually a physical human, not a hologram? Adding to the festive mood of the immigration line? Always seemed sort of pointless, but now I know why they do it. Every once in a while, it lights up a red light instead, and you have to put you bags through a scanner. The button is just a random number generator.

Now for ground transportation. The airport taxis have a monopoly here, so no Uber. Instead you get a choice between a regular taxi ($25) and a shuttle ($8). I went for the shuttle. But they need a minimum of three people for a shuttle, and they won’t even sell you the ticket until three people show up. But show up, they did. And a fourth too. And rather than the spacious van I was envisioning, given the title “shuttle”, they crammed us into a regular compact taxi.

All of the other three passengers spoke Spanish. In fact, the woman who got the front seat (I got there first but gave it up to her, being chivalrous and all, if that’s still PC to do), was having an animated conversation for the whole ride. Based on the hand gestures, I believe they were discussing the best route to take.

Shortly after leaving the airport, we came to slow down in traffic, to which the driver exclaimed, “Aya!”, and turned onto a side street. Then onto a more obscure side street. Then onto a dirt road. Then onto a dirt road with lots of potholes. The woman in front said something in Spanish, which I believe translated to “too much traffic, short cut.”

Did I mention that Mexican music was blaring from the radio the whole time?

The driver was seldom happy with the speed of the cars ahead of him, and was fairly creative in ways to get around them. But a motorcycle got the better of him, riding up onto the sidewalk, around the corner, and coming out ahead of us. And I once again experienced the now familiar Mexican speed bump phenomenon: drivers go well over the limit, then hit the brakes hard as the once-every-three-blocks speed bump approaches, go over the bump at 2 MPH, then accelerate back up again.

By some happy coincidence, the El Cid Marina Hotel, where our boat is, was the first stop. As I got out, saying “buenos tardes” to my fellow passengers, and entered the hotel portion of El Cid, the doorman asked, “You’re checking in, right?”

“No,” I said, “I have a boat here. I’m coming home.”

Luck put us in Mazatlan just in time for Canaval. And Mazatlan has one of the biggest Carnavals in the world.

A major part takes place in a baseball stadium, with music and speakers and crowning of the King, Queen, and Child Queen. We skipped that, though, and got right to the fun part: fireworks! On the night of March 2nd, we joined the crews of Ramble On Rose, Rejoice and Wild Spirit for a night out, including dinner, and then the evening’s two pyrotechnic events.

The first was the Quema del Mal Humor, or Bad Mood Burning. They pick a figure (this year it was the previous president of Mexico; last year, it was Trump), and burn them in effigy. Actually, “burn in effigy” rather understates the activity, since it’s a sort of exploding piñata. It’s supposed to get rid of all the bad feelings.

Unfortunately, I didn’t get any good pictures of the exploding part. But not to worry, on the same night was the Combate Naval, or Naval Combat Fireworks, in memory of the defense of Mazatlan during the French Colonial invasion of 1864.

But first, more people arrived…

Then there was some waiting.

Then there was more waiting.

Then it was time for the fireworks.

But first, there was some more waiting.

And just as Suzana said, “I hope the fireworks are really good, to make it worth all this waiting,” there they were.

What’s hard to imagine from the photos is how immersive the event was. The fireworks came from barges on the water (like most fireworks shows), but they also came from on shore, maybe twenty feet from the crowd. And many of them exploded directly overhead. You felt like you were in the fireworks. So much so that we were rained on by bits from the explosions, some of which were still burning on the way down…

Not something you’d experience in the US. Too much potential liability…

And besides the fireworks were spouts of flame, right next to us.

The following day was the parade, which also attracted huge crowds. Unfortunately, I was experiencing some back issues that kept us on the boat that day.

But on the 5th, there was a second parade that retraces the same route with most of the same floats. It was not nearly as crowded as the main parade.

But just as pretty.

I hadn’t been to a parade since I was a kid — well, unless you count DisneyLand…

And following the parade (and a quick dinner at a temporary roadside diner — well actually an in-the-parking-lot temporary diner), as we walked home, we ran across a family of raccoons being fed by passers by…