Fiesta!

After a long respite, the blog is back!  And what better way to bring it back than the river parade at San Antonio's Fiesta!

 

Almost everyone has heard of San Antonio's famous river walk, the most impressive man-made tourist attraction of any city anywhere.  In fact, the San Antonio river is real, but before some genius dreamed up the river walk it was just a sleepy little muddy stream.  Now it is a year-round tourist destination, with all its trendy shops, hotels, and restaurants.  Well, not exactly a year round destination, as the city fathers drain the river in January to clean out a year's worth of gunk so that the rest of the year it can look pristine.  Don't ever make the mistake of a vacation to San Antonio when the "river"  is just a smelly trench through town!

 

And what is Fiesta?  A week-long party celebrating San Antonio culture--and the best event is surely the annual river parade.  Imagine a parade made up exclusively of people like the Shriners--those men in fezes who ride little motorcycles and have a very good time doing so.  This parade is made up of floats with a lot of participants having a lot of fun.

And, there are a lot of spectators, also having a very good time (this year the crowd estimate was 250,000).

This rather large family of ducklings was hoping for bread crumbs from the merry makers, but instead all that was thrown from the floats was candy!

The most fun for me, of course is watching the reaction of the children to the parade, and one child in particular.

Lest it appear that the parade is all fun and games, it is important to note that each float is sponsored by a firm or an organization and highlights one of the children's agencies in San Antonio.  This year the Cavaliers, the sponsors of Fiesta, will donate over $200,000 to support children's programs in Bexar County.  To date the event has channeled over $2.2 million into such agencies as Boys and Girls Clubs, Eva's Heroes (an organization founded by Eva Longoria for children with special needs), and Child Advocates of San Antonio.