It is 8:30 on Saturday night. Driving down Water Street past the bright lights of the Third Ward and into Walker's Point, the street lamps seem to fade. The large, nearly empty parking lot adjacent to the practically silent sidewalk contrasts with the humming energy just inside the Hot Water and Wherehouse nightclubs at 818 S. Water St.

Like every Saturday evening, it is salsa night.

This early, the bar boasts several couples with the appropriate footwear and obvious natural talent with rhythm. A bachelorette party adorned in matching pink boas giggles in the corner at a table marked "reserved." Patrons mingle within their own groups and the music plays softly in the background. The dance floor remains barren.

At 9 p.m. a tiny woman with a booming voice stands in the center of the room and announces that a salsa lesson will now commence. With hesitancy, the crowd slowly makes its way to the outskirts of the wooden floor. In Spanish, she calls to have the volume of the music elevated and orders the boys to separate from the girls.

Now standing in two lines with 20 feet between the sexes, the crowd of adults morphs into a prepubescent group of shy middle school kids. Unsure where to put their hands, their arms lay unmoving next to their sides as they try to coordinate their now seemingly numb feet to the beat of the music in the directions the instructor calls aloud.

After several attempts at the same basic four-step routine, it is now time to pair with a partner and the lines of men and women awkwardly approach each other. Even the couples that arrived together now uneasily hold onto each other as if they were strangers. Bursts of laughter erupt from the pairs as they step on each other and try their hardest to remain suave.

The instructor imparts the basic steps of the salsa and the cha-cha. She reminds the women to exaggerate their hip motion and calls to the men to take charge as the leader of the dance.

Before long, the half-hour free lesson is complete and the overhead lights dim on the dance floor. The music lifts and the club fills with the regulars and latecomers, all wanting to practice what they have learned in previous lessons, or simply enjoy the vibrant beats of Latin music.

From that point onward, the night unfolds naturally. The newcomers (and their unease) are swept into the crowd with the swirling of skirts and extravagant motions of a few dominant peacocks, showing off with dips and twirls of their partners.

As a spectator or participant, the party is spectacular. Whether it is Saturday's salsa night with the girls, on a date or as a lone lover of dance, it must to be marked on the calendar as soon as possible.