California Here We Come - part 7 - Parade Day!

Please see parts 1-6 first

Happy New Year!

Finally parade day is here! This is what we've been waiting for for over a year. This is the whole reason we are here. This is the BIG DEAL!

We decided to skip the free breakfast at 4am in exchange for a little extra sleep. Mom ate some poptarts in our room and I skipped breakfast. We got downstairs in plenty of time to check-in and get on our bus. Grandstand tickets at the parade as well as transportation there including a boxed lunch were the only things that were included in our trip. Our group filled up 3 buses departing from our hotel. There were some other buses at the hotel loading other groups. It was very exciting!

We got on our nice, warm charter bus and it was so nice to just be a passenger and not have to worry about being on the right bus or knowing when to get off. Ahhh!

We left the hotel around 5:45 and arrived in Pasadena around 6:30. The traffic was maddening but our driver was a pro and got us in and parked pretty quickly. We were given our tickets and were left on our own to make our way to Colorado Blvd. We had to walk a couple of blocks and I noticed this extremely long line of people. I thought maybe there was a line to get onto Colorado but it was actually the line for the porto-potties. Yikes!

We had fantastic seats! We were about a mile into the parade so the bands and floats and horses would all be fresh. We were in a grandstand in the next to the top row. Everyone sitting around us was in our group and we all talked and told them about Hailey and the band so they could all cheer for them.

I had some time to take some pre-parade photos. As the sun rose over Pasadena it was looking like a beautiful day for a parade!

 

 

 

As we waited for the parade to reach us we were treated to some skywriting!

 

 

The Goodyear blimp was flying high above to get those fantastic aerial shots you see on television.

 

 

 

 

Finally the parade reached our area! Yeah!

 

 

 

Asimo was the first float and he was astounding in stature! I heard that he actually knocked down some power lines further down the parade route.

 

Other highlights:

Chloris Leachman was a very gracious Grand Marshall.

 

Corky Conzonire, the President of the Tournament of Roses Parade rode proudly with his family. Hats off to him because he's the reason we are here!

 

 

 

I didn't photograph many of the bands because I was really trying to conserve my batteries. Our band was 56th in line so it would be a while before they came by.

One band amazed me though. It was a unified high school band from Hawaii. They were huge and amazing!

 

 

All of the bands in the parade were fantastic and while I was thoroughly enjoying myself and taking it all in I was also waiting with anticipation to see my beloved Homewood Patriot Band!

More to come!

Continued in part 8...