Hydro Festival of Lights Christmas Parade

I was super excited for the Hydro Festival of Lights Parade. It was my first televised appearance and I was so excited to be apart of this big and wonderful event!

I was scheduled to ride of the Winnipeg Harvest Winter Wonderland Float, a non-profit organization run by Brooke Jones. The ironic thing is, I met Brooke once before when I was Miss Teen Manitoba and attending the Mantioba Opera as a special guest. Brooke was one of the chorus players in MacBeth and I met him after the show. It was kinda funny meeting up with him again. You never know who you'll make contact with!

Anyways, the parade was on Saturday November 17 and started at 6:00 p.m. with the city lighting the lights down portage. I wasn't able to actually see this as I was in the parade headquarters at the Forks. While I was waiting for the parade to start, I went around and on various floats had my picture taken. I met up with a couple of very inquisitive kids who were with the Shopper's Drug Mart Community Relations float and took pictures with them. Look for all of these pictures to be posted as soon as I get them developed. As well, I met up with a couple of the Downtown Biz Patrol I had met at the Changes for the Better appearance, and talked with them for a while as well.

The parade route was down Main street to Portage, down Portage to Memorial, down Memorial to Broadway, and back to the Forks. It was a long route and there were thousands of people!! I had never seen soo many people at one event in my life (well maybe that's a lie, but it was still a lot of people!) When we rounded Portage and Main, I swear there was 3,000 people easily just at that corner. It was an amazing experience.

The float was really nicely decorated and I was standing up at front by Mr. & Mrs. Claus (otherwise known as Santa and Mrs. Claus) There were so many people taking pictures that I couldn't believe I could see at any one point.

The parade was a lot of fun and I would like to thank Brooke for inviting me to be on his float. I am looking forward to more parades and interacting more with the public of Manitoba! There was mention of this parade on Global Television, and I will try to get the video clip up on my site! Until next time!