Top Travel Leads

Experience one of India’s most fascinating festivals, the annual Pushkar Fair in Rajasthan. Every year, thousands of Rajasthani village converge in this picturesque town to buy and sell camels and other cattle. They come for the entertaining camel-races and local circuses. Crowds of village folk also browse the local markets for camel saddles, textiles, glass bangles, and silver jewelry. They wash away the day’s fatigue at the Pushkar Lake (considered sacred by Hindus). Beyond the bustle of the market is the sweeping expanse of desert, dotted with thousands of camping families. All around, there is a riot of color and throng of warm, joyous faces. Tented Camps are erected during the Pushkar Fair as the town does not have enough hotels to accommodate the large number of tourists who visit the festival.

Today conclude the carnival celebrations in Panama that have been in progress since Friday. The festivities started with the Coronation of the Carnival Queen and from then on it’s been five days and nights of non-stop partying all over Panama. The most lavish and traditional festivities are known to take place in Las Tablas on the Azuero peninsula, that is believed to produce the most ravishing Carnival Queen, show off girls with the most stunningly embroidered or appliqued polleras, and display the most creative floats. Las Tablas is considered to be the best place in the country to celebrate and experience the carnival.

During the day the “mojaderas” water is sprinkled on carnival participants in the streets, in the afternoons the parades take place, and by night the Seco, the white cane spirit, flows and dancing to the latest Reggae, Soca and Merengue continues until dawn in the toldos and bohios, the open-air dance halls, all throughout Panama. Panama’s Carnival is the same as New Orleans’ Mardi Gras and their counterparts in Rio and elsewhere in all Latin countries are a modern version of the old Roman Lupercalia. For more and lots of great pictures go to Carnaval de Panama 2007. For more on Panama’s carnival and other worthy Panama info see CZBrats.