December 31 & January 1- New Year in Salinas

The week before New Year’s , the local people started  collecting/making/buying their dummies-viejo anos- to be burned  at 12 o’clock on New Year’s Eve. I blogged about this custom last year as the same was done in Cuenca and all over Ecuador. In Salinas, the dummies looked far less home-made, more like cartoon characters, soccer players or super heroes.

http://www.cuencahighlife.com/post/2012/12/28/Ecuadorian-tradition-the-New-Years-Eve-burning-of-the-dummy-clears-the-slate-for-2009.aspx

 

Here are a few near the Naval Base street corner.

As we walked along the Malecon, several could be seen decorating balconies

As New Year’s approached, the beach became more and more busy, much like it had been during Carnival. As well, almost every condo in our building and surrounding buildings became occupied by their absentee owners. Most of these buildings are second homes to well off Ecuadorians mostly from Guayaquil. They usually only come during the ‘high’ season- New Year’s to Carnival in February. In the two provinces,  ours, Santa Elena, and Guayas, that the large city  of Guayaquil is in, have  summer vacation for their children in February, much like July and August back home.

We had been told that a huge long fireworks show would be held all along the beaches on New Year’s and that last year one million visitors partied in Salinas. We made the wise decision to stay home and watch the festivities from the privacy of our balconies. We also decided on a simple meal of home-made pizza and were soon ready to enjoy the display.

As the evening progressed, more and more cars came. Parking was soon filled up to three blocks past the beach. The sidewalk along Chipipe beach was also covered with lawn chairs rented to all those visitors who wanted to watch right on the beach,

We did take a short walk along our street just to get a feel for what was happening. Everyone was in a great party mood- adults and children all gathered  to watch the show.

Here is our condo dummy waiting his turn to burn

Here is the New Year’s crowd on the Main Malecon

The fireworks started about 8-8:30PM and continued all along both beaches, the main Malecon beach and our beach Chipipe, for hours. Uwe and I alternated between two of our balconies, one overlooking Chipipe beach and the other overlooking the main Malecon beach. The display was amazing! Thousands and thousands of dollars must have been spent. Here the rich people try to outdo each other in their fireworks to the benefit of all us watchers.

We stayed up until at least 3AM watching this spectacle, consuming way too much vodka.

At 5AM we woke up to incredibly loud music coming from one of the houses behind our building. It continued until at least 9AM and moved us out of our beds far too early.

Welcome to the New year 2013!