With Holy Week close on the horizon, lakeside communities have advanced preparations for the traditional  processions and pageants that bring the Easter story to life and  heighten personal identification with core values of the Christian faith.

Mexico’s Easter traditions begin in the Lake Chapala area with eye-catching tributes to La Dolorosa—Our Lady of Sorrows —that appear on the last Friday before Holy Week, falling this year on March 22.

The closure of Calle Ocampo at the corner of Colón in central Ajijic was lifted Tuesday, March 12 after reconstruction of the intersection was completed ahead of schedule.

In the framework of the March 8 commemoration of International Women’s Day, the Jocotepec government honored Silvia Flores as a trailblazer in the fields of reproductive health care, family planning and sex education. She has been actively involved in the municipality for more than five decades.

While Lake Chapala’s shrinking level is a matter of increased public concern as the dry season progresses, the excessive presence of microalgae that alter the water’s composition is another current problem that should be closely monitored, warns Alejandro Juárez Aguilar, director of the Instituto Corazòn de la Tierra (ITC), a local environmental NGO.

A full house of 320 guests packed into Chapala’s Villa Encantada events center on Wednesday, March 6 for the 17th Lake Chapala Shrine Club (LCSC) Ribfest.