They're here, but only some of them

The crowd at Ice House in Rocky Point. (Credit: Carlos Chavez/azcentral.com)

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Despite warnings from their universities, students from the University of Arizona, Arizona State University and Northern Arizona University have descended upon Rocky Point en masse as of Friday morning.

The streets now have students walking along them. The taco stands now have people eating at them. And the main drag in the Mirador neighborhood is crowded with cars and people. But it only feels crowded out on the street, where locals, vacationers, police, vendors and others all come together to fill the narrow lanes.

Elsewhere, spring break looks very different. One couple sits in an upscale dining room at a resort at 7 p.m. They are the only ones there. Only six people cheer on the college basketball game in an adjacent bar. Staffers are sweeping up at a nearby resort cocktail lounge at 9:30 p.m. because no one lingered for drinks. A woman sways with a baby on her hip, the only people on the dance floor at 10 p.m. at a Sandy Beach cantina.

Students stand around and talk about how last year was better, and the year before that even more so. They seem like they're wondering if they shouldn't have come, as though they showed up to a party that everyone else had already written off as obsolete, lame, or over.

But that's the thing about spring break. The act of going on it at all means it's "happening" wherever you are. And so with every tequila shot, every bikini contest, every day at the beach, spring break continues down here.