I'm on the float now. Parade is going to start in minutes. As I stand on, in and around all of the bags, boxes and sacks of beads and throws that I need to get organized I start to feel a bit overwhelmed. Ok..first things first. Make sure I can see out of my mask-check; hook up to safety belt-check; take a drink of my special parade beverage-check. I begin opening up some of the bags and taking out the individually packaged KMC speciality beads and putting them in the wooden troughs that line the wall of the float in front of me (each rider position gets 3 of these to put beads and throws in so you can stand, reach down,grab and throw a bit easier). I quickly fill these up and start feeling like I might have a better handle on this. At this point, one of the float lieutenants at the front of our float- seeing that I may have relaxed after this initial bit of organizing- calls out to me- "Hey Mike, you know that what you have ready there is only gonna last about 5 minutes, right?". Ok. So there was much more to this than I thought. I go back to getting more organized; I open each bag or box to get a look inside so I can more easily know where to look/reach/grab for more items to throw as I run out of what I already have out. I move some stuff around my feet- put some stuff next to me, behind me and in front of me- I also start hanging up some beads on the hooks built into the float behind me as well. As I'm doing this the float begins to move- the parade has not started but we are moving into position. Since the start of the parade is in a residential neighborhood, our float is now literally in front of someone's house. People are milling about on the street and now they are already starting to approach the floats to ask for beads and throws. A group of little kids has spotted our float captain who sits up on the second level and has lots and lots of plush toys to throw. He begins tossing a few to the kids down below. Additionally, adults begin to approach asking for doubloons (each krewe has their own doubloons which are highly collectible for some folks; our krewe had 4 different colored doubloons- red, green, silver and gold; there are also special doubloons given out by the king, the queen and parade captains on horseback;collectors like to get the whole set and many times head to the beginning of the parades to try and get 'em). Anyway, so now in addition to trying to get myself organized, we have folks already asking for stuff. I give out a couple things because altho we were instructed to "stop throwing" when floats came to a stop it looks like other krewe members were giving out stuff - good PR I guess, especially since we were sitting in the street in front of their houses. Finally, the call comes- we are officially starting to roll! The first thing I noticed was the crowds and a close second was the noise of said crowds. Holy cow- there are a lot of people out there..I began to throw some of the items I had taken out. As instructed, I try to make eye contact and/or point to a person in particular to make sure they knew I was throwing their way. Kids and parents w/ kids on their shoulders are also coming up to the float with hands up asking for "somethin'"- it was great handing the toys and trinkets directly to folks- especially little kids who were absolutely thrilled to get a plush toy. The float continues to move at a pretty good clip- our brass band is playing, the sun is shining, the crowd is screaming-this was really something special! The crowds were endless. At points it must have been 10-15 people deep along the route; there were folks close up, far away, sitting on the ground, sitting in chairs, standing on their porches, up on their cars, up on ladders- I even saw one guy up in a tree yelling for beads or a throw. I was going thru my stuff pretty quickly- handing out a lot of plush toys initally to little kids and families; I pulled out some soft footballs and tossed a few; next I tried some frisbees- unfortunately the wind had picked up and this combined w/ being on the move made these throws less than accurate- and maybe even downright dangerous. I opened up a box of our signature individual serving size potato chips and tossed a few bags- nice! I made some deep throws of the packaged beads to folks way in the back of the crowd and was surprisingly accurate- this was fun! It was also pretty cool that you could- even in the sea of people- actually make eye contact with one specific person, throw or hand them something, and have them shout a thank you or give you a thumbs up when you got it to them as you rolled by...wow...On the other hand, I also made some really lousy throws with items falling short, sailing too long or going too far to the right or to the left of my intended target-embarassing. Most of the time, I could see someone else catching or picking up the item thrown but there were a handful of times where I'm pretty sure I hit some poor unsuspecting person (or child!)..oh well...The float continued to roll and it was time for me to start throwing some of my regular beads. These were in big sacks and were "banded" in bundles. I quickly found out 2 things: first, the sacks, which were made of a nylon burlap type material were really hard to rip open (I think they are the same type sacks that are used to package live crawfish!); second, even tho the beads were banded together in bunches by the dozen, they could still get easily tangled as I reached in and pulled them out. This was gonna be a challenge. Initially I was getting lots of tangled beads (Bead throwing 101 tip: if something tangles, just toss it overboard; do not spend time trying to untangle beads or thats all you will be doing). As it turned out ,even the tangled beads were a hit w/ folks along the route-very cool (another hot item with the crowd?- empty bead bags..these are like shopping bags-w handles and a zipper- and it makes sense-if you are watching parades all day and collecting a bunch of beads, you better have a way to carry them home)...As we moved down St. Charles Ave I was focused mostly on the task at hand: getting stuff ready to throw and then throwing vs being able to look at where we were exactly. When I did look up it was mainly to search the crowd directly in front of me for someone to throw to- which at times caused me to freeze up- should I throw close? far? to that person, to that other person? to the little girl? the teenage boy? the mom? the dad? grandpa?..decisions, decisions! I did recognize at one point on the route that we were coming to the end of St.Charles and were about to go under the I-10 overpass ..Lee Circle and the CBD were next..stay tuned for next post...
Ok, I know I have to get to describing the ride..however, thinking it might be helpful for folks who are not familiar with the whole carnival, mardi gras parade scene to be given a little background and context first. So, as I mentioned in earlier posts, carnival season goes for about 2 weeks in New Orleans and ends on Mardi Gras day. During carnival season there are multiple parades going on almost every day or nite in New Orleans proper as well as the surrounding suburbs (Metarie, Algiers on the West Bank for instance). Most of the New Orleans parades roll on what is known as the "uptown" route -one after another. For evening parades, this might mean the first parade is at 5:45pm, second one at 7 and maybe a third at 7:30 pm meaning that for all 3 parades to roll start to finish might mean 6 or 7 hours of parade (like I said, this is serious business down there). This is is the route my parade followed. There are some small variations but for most part the parades on this route start in the Uptown and/or Garden district neigborhoods of New Orleans , make their way to St. Charles Avenue and follow this avenue into the Central Business District (CBD), thru the CBD and over to Canal St which borders the French Quarter, ending roughly in the Warehouse District near the Mississippi River. There are roughly 3 main portions of the route. The first part -uptown and on St Charles Avenue- is roughly 1/2 to 2/3 of the route. The beginning of the parades starts in an all residential neighborhood, and then as it turns on to St. Charles it is a mix of residences and businesses. St. Charles is a wide 2 lane avenue with a grass median (aka "neutral ground') running down the middle. Normally, the streetcars run down the tracks on the neutral ground, but during parade season these are shut down during much of the time allowing folks to "camp out' and watch the parades. (Most parade watchers have either a "sidewalk side" or "neutral ground" prefence and watch all their parades from that location). The St. Charles Av lane that takes traffic uptown (away from the CBD) is open during the parade, but the lane going into the CBD is closed- this is where the parades roll with folks watching either from the sidewalk or the neutral ground. (It turns out my wife and I are "sidewalk side" people- we hooked up with my krewe buddy and his family who have for several years been watching the parades on St. Charles from a specific sidewalk side spot).This section of the parade is the favorite place for locals, families and other folks who want to see the parade in a more open, relaxed environment- altho, for the bigger parades even this part of the route can get pretty crowded and a bit crazy (altho still much less so than the CBD and Canal St portion of the route). Uptown and St. Charles is also the portion of the route where folks tend to "stake out a spot" (sometimes literally with actual stakes,tents, chairs, ladders, bbq grills,etc) year after year to watch the parades. Some of these spots are semi-permanent encampments and are left up for days at a time- empty -or maybe "guarded' by one or two members of the group when there is no parade (people seem to respect the empty chairs, blankets, etc left out along the route, knowing that foks are planning to come back). Another advantage of watching the parade on this portion of the route is that there are for the most part no barricades separating the parade watchers from the parade. This is especially important for folks who like to go from the sidewalk or neutral ground out into the street and right up to the floats to ask for beads and throws. It's also cool to watch in this area bc sometimes you feel like you are inside the parade with the marching bands, floats and other marching groups passing so close you can reach out and touch them -or in the case of the bands, feel the music in your bones. The next section of the parade route begins when the parade travels under the I-10 overpass, moves around Lee Circle (Google it) and into the CBD. Here it is primarily open sidewalks and businesses along the route-altho there are also some apartment buildings and hotels as well. Many of the establishments along this portion of the route erect bleachers or viewing stands along here ( and individuals put up lots and lots of ladders) so at this point, the parade watchers are almost literally eye to eye with the riders on the float. Folks also watch from apartment balconies even higher up so it is a lot different than the St Charles portion where floats are up high and the crowds are down low. It is during this CBD section that the parade also passes by Gallier Hall which is where the official viewing stands for city officials (including the Mayor) , other VIPs (each parade krewe usually has krewe officers and family and friends who sit in these mostly ticketed seats) and ticketed bleachers are located. During each parade, the King's float stops in front of Gallier Hall to do a formal champagne toast with the Mayor (or his representative) as well as toasting with the VIPs for their krewe. After leaving the CBD portion of the route, the parades continue across until they hit Canal St. On Canal, most of the parades turn up Canal for several blocks before doing a u-turn and coming back down Canal St as they head to the finish. The CBD and Canal St portions of the routes tend to get all the folks from the French Quarter and surrounding hotels. These portions are also barricaded for crowd control purposes and tend to be pretty rowdy and much less family friendly. Ok..so now you have a feel for the route...next post will be about the ride itself..Stay tuned!...
