They don't call it the Grand Parade, or anything cool like that. It's the Adults Parade, to distinguish it from the Children's Parade. But it's pretty grand.
It's a real cultural gathering, with princesses, moko jumbies, steel pan, masqueraders and parade troupes. The troupes are what you think of when you think of a Caribbean carnival. The picture above is a girl from a Dominican Republic dance group.
It's supposed to start at 10 in the morning. It never does, at least not in our experience. We can hear it forming up from about two blocks away from our house, and we can tell shortly after noon when they get moving, Then we just hop in the car and skirt the main road, arriving in Frederiksted a few minutes later, well ahead of the marchers.
And it takes a long, long time. The first entry steps off at about noon. The last one staggers past the reviewing stand as the sun sets around 6:30 p.m. It's a long damn day. Fun, but long. The photo below is an 8-year-old girl who was jumping up and down with excitement because her sister's majorette troupe was about to pass by.
As it happens, I did not cover the parade this. I did go down and shoot video, which we posted here. The coverage by another Source reporter is here.
So festival is almost over. There's power boat races today and closing ceremonies tonight in the festival village. It's fun, but it's time for it to be over, I think. Time to get back to work.
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