Far From Z Madness

Just two more days. Will be there for New Years also. Can't believe it is finally almost here. Thanks for the wonderful pictures, it has kept me in the dreaming mode.

Thank you for your kind words. Favor que me haces.

I hope you have a magical vacation.

Not being an expert I can only tell you that For more than two weeks they used heavy equipment, jackhammers and big trucks to break up and haul off places needing repair. Then they re-did them. Hauled in more big boulders along the pier entrance way. It was not just a nice paint job.

I actually think they did a bang up job and it looks really good. I don't know what kind of paint they used on the actual pier walkway but it hopefully will last and look this good for a long time to come.

A little over 3 million pesos was spent to carry out the 3-week project carried out by over 600 workers that reinforced the structure where it had collapsed or otherwise been weakened, repaired all the seating and shading, repaired and resurfaced the entire pier and the 4 docking platforms. Part of the work was actually the first step towards the permanent repairs. All the work was carried out by local engineers and workers.

Never have I seen our public money spent so well. Apparently there was no graft, kickbacks or other shenanigans that normally typify so many of our public projects. This suggests a sea change in the way our state government operates (since this was a hastily arranged state project).

The pier now meets international safety standards required to land cruise ship tenders and to receive cruise ship passengers.

In comparison, one and a half million pesos were alleged to have been spent (at least on paper) for the two temporary bridges built over the collapsed part of the pier by our previous mayor who in his annual "State of the Municipality" speech declared the new pier a done deal, so convincingly that thousands of locals actually were surprised to walk down to the pier and see nothing had been done except to let it deteriorate.