PHOTO LINE OF COWBOYS
I’ve never been to a rodeo ([from Spanish, from rodear to go around, from rueda a wheel, from Latin rota] says freedictionary.com), and maybe that’s still true despite the hours I spend at the fairgrounds out next to the airport in La Ceiba, Honduras a few Sundays ago. What I did see was bull-riding, and horse riding, in separate rings. I don’t know what standards exactly the men in white were trying to express as they glided around above their horses but the atmosphere, broad-brimmed hats, kerchiefs etc all had a strong whiff of Seville.
PHOTO STIRRUP AND SPUR
The bull-riders just wanted to stay on for seven seconds, and their circles were much smaller and more frantic.
Here’s a hapless bullrider whose boot got hung up somewhere and was dragged around the ring before being rescued.
There was one man in particular charged with diverting the bull after the rider was dumped. I was a little offended by his clownish, disrespectful-of-the-bull manner, except when the bull really got his attention.
BULL CHASING CLOWN
This mule and cowboy team was the real worker of the day, calm, steady, effective, good at lasso-ing, also the only cowboy I ever saw wearing glasses. 
The fancy-prancy horses occasionally appeared, but their saddles didn’t have horns and their riders were only good at sitting still and exuding ‘cool’.
Otherwise the fairground events closing the Carnival of San Isidro were pretty typical of a Maryland county fair, bovine division, with food tents, souvenirs, cows and horses on display.
COWBOY WATCHING HORSE
Every time this vendor came around I wondered what his t-shirt was about. Dole?Standard Fruit? It says ‘Warren Buffet Our New Top Banana’
UPDATE: From one of my smart friends “Is a play on the fact that Fruit of the Loom went bankrupt back in 1999 and in 2002 Berkshire Hathaway bought the company. You may or may not remember that the human fruits were part of one of the more classic TV ads of all time [Wiki side note: the grapes were once played by Academy Award-winning actor F Murray Abraham!]” Thank you Michael!
Here’s my souvenir of the rodeo; a new hat. It’s got some really stiff clear coat treatment over woven ‘palm’, not a very boat-friendly hat, but it will be very light and comfortable while it degrades in Ann’s hat camp.
More rodeo photos here:
http://galivant.smugmug.com/Honduras/Rodeo/12294128_4X66v/
Sure is nice to have a fast-loading internet connection – Thanks Jim & Jackie!