It is mid July on the Sea of Cortez.

There is something strange going on off the San Felipe, Baja Ca, shore: fishing for information on a shrimp boat with no nets. What is this strange thing they are doing: fishing for tourists using a rubber raft shaped like a banana.

The shrimp fishermen have hung up their nets and turned to other pursuits, such as towing tourists around behind their pangas on banana-shaped rafts, like Gabriel Salazar-Salazar and Esdras Zamorano below.

Today is Labor Day, a national holiday in Mexico. The beaches and restaurants and hotels are packed with Mexican and American tourists. The air is filled with shouts and laughter, as riders are bucked from the banana boats by the choppy waves. Later there will be fireworks on the beach and dance music pulsating into the night. San Felipe is a little bit like Cabo San Lucas, only a a two hour drive from California.

Your introduction to one will certainly occur while you are tanning on the beach during one of the busy holiday weekends. It's more likely to happen if there is a group of you. A panga will swing up near the shore trailing the appendage in question --the banana. Someone will call to the group, asking who wants a ride?

Negotiations will arrive at a fair price and the intrepid few or many will wade out to the banana and swing their legs over it. A lot like mounting a horse, or seahorse in this case.

The banana will be trailered across the bay several times and on the return run home, just when you thought it was safe to relax your grip a little, the panga will execute a hairpin turn to demonstrate the effect of angular motion on a banana. No one wins this log-rolling contest. You are going to get wet. And if the water is sufficiently deep, you are also going to forfeit your dignity trying to get back on the thing. But for many the fun is enough to give plenty of appeal to the idea of a second banana.

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