Sunday, November 30, 2008

The rains have gone.......


It was one of those picture perfect days. November and December seem to have the best air quality in the high mountains. January and February are reserved for the beginning of the burning season.
Burning of everything. Garbage, old crops, real old crops, old garbage, real old garbage and anything else that will burn, smolder and otherwise make the normally clear sky of Michoacan look like Los Angeles in the 70's

For some reason locals enjoy having smoldering piles of anything burning. Must be some kind of a ritual dating back to early civilization.

Something like not letting the campfires embers go cold.

I remember one of my first visits to Mexico was to Mazatlan in the 70's. That was a new experience for me.
I had never been exposed to continual fires fueled by coconut palm fronds, old coconut shells and miscellaneous garbage.

Now that most of the coconut trees have been plucked off the land it seems that there is not much to burn, or the air quality police have figured out a profit center.

So, if you are going to look for picture perfect days, December is your best bet.

1 comment:

Michael Dickson said...

I have to take issue. December is problematical because, especially in the latter half, it can get bone-cracking cold here. You won´t get that, with very rare exception, in November.

November. Now there´s an ideal month for you in these parts.

Rain is gone. Cold has not arrived. Everything is still green because the rains are not that far behind us.

So it´s November that´s the sweet one.

Of course, there were a couple of very cold nights hereabouts this November. Highly, highly rare. So I´m sticking with November.