At the Parades

It would be easier to just shut my big yap, and post some pictures about Mardi Gras, but there is still much to be said. As the days get closer to Mardi Gras Day, you can sense the increasing intensity of the celebration. On the Friday before, the City shuts down all vehicular traffic in most of the French Quarter. It becomes one big pedestrian mall. In addition, there is the annual Mardi Gras tradition of the "greasing of the poles".

Hehe. I know I have your attention now! In the French Quarter, many of the buildings have balconies. The buildings and the balconies have been around for nearly 150 years, so, they were not meant to hold the weight of 21st Century Mardi Gras spectators. Those balconies that are supported by cast iron poles still have safe weight limits. Therefore, the poles are greased, to prevent the rowdy revellers from climbing up to the balconies, and causing them to collapse.

On Mardi Gras Day, people will go to the route of their favorite parade, beginning around 5:00 am, or earlier, to stake out a little turf from which to view the parade (and party). They come with folding chairs, ice chests filled with drinks, bar-b-que grills, and bags of food and fixin's, enough to last well into the night. They will consume hot dogs and drinks, and hamburgers and drinks, peanuts and drinks, popcorn and drinks, cotton candy and drinks, drinks and drinks ... well, you get the idea. One gage of the Mardi Gras Fun, is the trash that the Sanitation Department collects each Mardi Gras Day -- in 1997, they collected over 900 tons of trash!.

There were, according to my count 56 parade krewes rolling between February 19, 2000, and March 7, 2000 (18 days). Not all of the krewes have web sites, but the ones I know about are, Bacchus, Barkus, Corps de Napoleon, Endymion, Krewe du Vieux, Orpheus, Pegasus, Pontchartrain,  Tucks, and Zulu.

Below are some photographs (15 - a New Orleans dozen) taken at the Gladiators Parade, the evening of February 14, 1998, in Chalmette (suburb of New Orleans. If you click the thumbnail, you can see a larger version of the image.

Lagniappe

D.J. and the Zulu Parade
Denise Walter McConduit, Emile F. Henriquez

Mardi Gras and Bacchus: Something Old, Something New
Myron Tassin, Gaspar Stall (Contributor), Dom DeLuise