La noche de los muertos

Our first graveyard in Uranden

A tour until 4:30 A.M.! Where else but in Mexico for the Night of the Dead Tour with Animeche Tours?

We left the town of Pátzcuaro in central México at 9 p.m., and en route to our first stop our guide Jaime told us of the history of the celebration and regaled us with song.

Jaime leading us in a singalong en route to our first cemetery. 

In Pátzcuaro, as in some other locations in México, the "day" of the dead, is more like a "week" of the dead. It pre-dates the Spanish colonization of the country, and was adopted into the Catholic Religion to coincide with All Saints Day on November 1st. Traditions connected with the holiday include building private altars called ofrendas, honouring the deceased using calveras (skulls), aztec marigolds, and the favourite foods and beverages of the departed, and visiting graves with these as gifts. Visitors also leave possessions of the deceased at the graves (Wikipedia).  It is believed that the souls of the deceased return at this time and the survivors celebrate their return.

We first went to the town of Uranden, and after a traditional meal we were treated to traditional dances. The dancers had lightening fast feet!

Many people, even if they aren't performing, paint their faces, starting several days before the
Day of the Dead, much like people in Canada dress up for Halloween. I especially like these two with their smart-phones; quite a contrast with the traditional dancers.

We then watched some pescadores with their fishing nets and boats perform a show, a representation of the traditional way in which some indigenous people still fish for small sardines using the butterfly nets. In season they get up before the sun and use the artificial light of the torches to attract the fish.

Next we travelled to Arocutín to visit our first (of three!) graveyards. This was a larger cemetery than the others and there was more room to maneuver.

What struck me was that the people weren't sad or sombre; many of them were laughing even.

I was trying to discretely take a photo of this family, but they saw me and smiled for the camera. 

A more somber looking lady. 

By now, it's about 3 a.m., and they don't look very tired!

Some of the offerings for the souls of the loved ones.

These boys, though, couldn't last the night.

While marigolds are the dominant flower, there are others.

Whereas children here ask for candy, there they ask for money. His jack-o-lantern probably represents a calvera (skull).

There was a lot of traffic getting from Arocutín to Iguatzio, and so we didn't have as much time at the last two graveyards, and since I was taking photos, I didn't get very far in either of these cemeteries. And then we had a long bus ride back to Pátzcuaro, and I had a fifteen minute walk home. I stopped first at an Oxxo (corner store), thinking a beer would be good to put me to sleep, but they had the beer fridges barred off (and all the next day) so I had to make do with a liquid yogurt. By the time I got to bed it was 5 a.m. (and two days later I was up at 5 a.m. to catch an early bus to the airport). My body had quite a time adjusting!

Camera settings:

Auto ISO, with a max of 6400. (And often I needed 6400.)
Shutter priority
Aperture - usually as wide open as I could, from 4-5.6, but sometimes, if there wasn't much movement in the scene and I wanted more depth of field, at f/11
SS - usually slower than 1/10 of a sec.
I did bracket all the shots (3 images for each), and usually HDR'd them when editing.  
I used a tripod, usually set low, not only to get low angle shots, but because it was easier to move around with it