Festival de San Isidro de El General

It was time for the annual agricultural festival at San Isidro de El General. Pecos and I packed up my grandkids, ages eight and seven, and headed out in The Kid’s vehicle (the one with brakes) to attend this event. We wanted to see the premier flowers, crops and livestock of our province of Puntarenas.

The festival grounds along the Inter-American Highway are comparable to the fairgrounds of Wheeler County, Oregon, whose annual county fair is the smallest in Oregon. A round stadium with seating for about 500 people (thus likely to squeeze in a few times that number) was central to the festival grounds. The exterior of this aged wood structure was rimmed with vendor stalls displaying hats, jewelry, clothing, house wares and toys. Vendors proclaimed the virtues of their goods in loud, staccato voices and sometimes blocked the narrow wooden sidewalk that curled with the stadium, trying to encourage zealous shoppers (such as Pecos, shopping aficianado) to step into their stalls. I admired oil paintings in thick, bright Costa Rican colors.

Vendors also sold shrubs and potted plants at extremely reasonable prices. I bought two bougainvillea plants with crimson blooms. Just like at our county fair, a large indoor building held floral displays, although disappointingly only a few. Orchid flowers were nearly as large as my hand.

A few hundred gray Brahaman cattle and mixed-Brahaman breeds with brands on their rumps were tied to headstalls in open-air barns, all with red rope fashioned as halters. Up close, these bulls and cows are huge! Brahaman cattle are the mainstay of cattle raised in the valley of the General, as well as throughout Costa Rica due to this hump-backed breed’s ability to stay cool in the tropics. The only other cow that we’ve seen on our many drives is the occasional Jersey, kept as a homestead provider of milk and the homemade cheese sold at nearly every local pulperia.

Other large buildings on the festival grounds held furniture, mountains of shoes, and new vehicles. A carnival at the rear of the grounds beckoned with deafening salsa music. Despite a light rain, we took my grandchildren on nearly all of the rides – or rather, they took us – including the Casa de Terror, ship ‘de Pirata’ and countless runs in the bumper cars where these usually sweet grandchildren turned into wild, road-raged drivers. Surely all Tico drivers first learned to drive on the bumper cars. Small makeshift buildings offered a house of venomous snakes (we passed on this) and the Casa de Espejos Locos (crazy mirrors).

Food? Delicioso. We ate Caribbean stew and Salvadoran turnovers.

The gentle rain was persistent. Toward the end of this long day, The Kid called on our cell phone. Bad connection? No, torrential downpour at his finca. It sounded as if he was standing next to a waterfall. It would be impossible to bring our grandchildren home as his jungle-path was likely washed out and too treacherous to attempt to get out in the storm. He’d put a bucket outside and in the past hour it had rained more than five inches – an amazing amount, considering that Fossil, Oregon receives 11 inches annually.

Since we were already wet from the continued light rain, we decided to wait out the storm and to take in the huge horse parade. Hundreds of horses and their riders had gathered in a huge empty field about a mile and a half south of the festival grounds. The milling of horses and riders had electrified the field, so plentiful with teeming animals and people that the ground seemed to shimmy and shake. Horses were pulled up into a tight canter to trot rapidly in place without going forward one step. Some of the horses were decorated with ribbons and braids; others looked as if they’d just been brought in from the fields. No matter, all did the same brisk, knee-lifting trot. Many riders resembled centuries-old Spanish conquistadors, decked out with traditional sombreros, colorful braiding and large silver studs on clothing and saddle.

We positioned ourselves at the very beginning of the parade, where horses and riders poured in a slow-stepping, trotting stream, ten or twelve abreast, from field to highway. Traffic was forced aside and finally stopped completely as drivers realized there was no end to this stream and that it would be fruitless to circle around it. Dozens upon dozens of horses and their riders kept pouring onto the highway, streaming down it as far as we could see, well over a mile – and yet the field still looked full. It seemed as if all of the horses of Costa Rica had been brought here for the festival.

Without warning the rain switched to a heavy downpour and we ran to our vehicle that was parked beyond the parade route. As we left, the horses were still entering the highway, the beginning of the parade was out of sight far down the highway, and the crowds that had gathered highway-side were still cheering.

We inched our way up the slippery mountain and spent a pleasant evening with my grandchildren. Even after the storm subsided, it rained steadily all night and finally stopped at dawn. The early sun turned all of the water cupped on shrubs, trees, flowers and grass to glittery crystal before rising high in the sky. By mid-day the deep puddles were gone and the road was dry again. 