Spectators gather to watch acrobats practice before the annual celebration of the Fête de la Mare. The atmosphere was excited and playful - after watching the acrobats youth took to the water to try and recreate the spectacle they had seen. The festival is epic in and of itself because it protects sacred marshes from being overfished. It risks extinction with the rapid desertification of West Africa...and notable drying of the Niger river, an integral source of life to the region.