Friday, March 25, 2011

Arenal Festival Costa Rica 2011

 

sign horse practice

The Arenal Festival in Nuevo Arenal is a big celebration that is held yearly. This year the event was held March 17 – 21. As the event approached, I began to notice more action around town.  Posters began going up, the road was paved down to the arena, and community areas were cleaned.

Arena

vendors  IMG_2658 

Vendors were set up outside the Arena serving food, drinks, and merchandise to purchase.

horses in truck

horse by carhorse cart

On Sunday, March 20 the city hosted a horse parade. For the parade, horses arrived many different ways. To bring the hundreds of horses into town it took multiple trucks, individual horse trailers, and those who chose to arrive by horseback.

horse 3 horse one

horse 2 

My favorite was the horse that looked like a spotted Dalmatian!

horses in field

The parade started organizing around 1 p.m. and for the next three hours riders enjoyed the day showing off their horsemanship.

selling hats This man took advantage of the opportunity by selling cowboy hats.

IMG_2741

Just as I thought the festivities were starting to lessen, a large group of dancing horses began to congregate in front of our house!  It was exciting to view the conclusion of the parade right from our porch. We were able to watch them for an hour as they sat on their horses and socialized.

band in car

They even had their own private band on wheels!

Elizabeth’s Traveling Tips:

In Costa Rica, currency is called colones.

money
$10,000 = $20.00

$5,000= $10.00


$2,000= $4.00


$1,000=$2.00

Hint: Colones x 2 = American dollars.

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