Edison Festival of Light Parade

After our adventure with the manatees in the morning, we went back to downtown Ft. Myers Saturday night for the Edison Festival of Light Parade.

Tim & Denise decided to ride along with us, and we found a convenient parking spot on First St., just outside the barricades.

We walked several blocks to the main area of downtown, where there were LOTS of people waiting around for the parade to start.

 We were at the end of the parade route, but we could hear the fireworks that indicated the beginning of it.  We moved a block closer to the waterfront where we could see the fireworks.  It was a pretty good spot, but somebody from the Sherriff’s Dept. told us that it would be a good couple of hours before the parade got to us.  Yikes!

We decided to walk a little further on First St., to get closer to the front of the parade, but the roads were a lot more crowded.  As the parade approached,     

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

it was pretty tough to get a good view of the action.  We decided to go back to our original spot, where there was less of a crowd, and we got there just as the beginning of the parade was arriving.  Good Timing!

There were motorcyles,

and marching bands,

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

-- both young and old!

There were vehicles too numerous to count!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There was a royal court – the normal version,

and the smaller version!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There were well-known characters,

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

clowns,

and cyclists.

Everybody was well-lit . . . even the jellyfish!

One of our favorites was the group of motorcycle police from Indianapolis – they put on quite a show in the road right in front of us!

 

This guy was really amazing – he rode his motorcycle the entire length of the street, standing on the seat!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Shriners were pretty interesting, too!

 

The parade felt like it was going on, and on, and on . . . sure enough, everytime we thought it might be ending, we would see more lights coming towards us!

Just about every High School in the area had a Junior ROTC group,

and there were fire trucks from every surrounding community, including this bright pink one!

There were even German dancers!

Finally, though, we spotted this guy . . .

and it was time to walk back to the car!  We had been standing on the corner, watching the parade for 2 hours!  It was a long one!

It was fun, and we thoroughly enjoyed it . . . it was a beautiful evening, too!