Stampede Parade Day! (& HRH Prince William)

Yeeeee Haw!  What a fantastic day!  I was more than tired by the end of the morning's festivities, but it was all worth it.  We have some great memories and some very fun photos.

The morning started at 5:15 when my alarm went off to beep and buzz me out of bed into the shower.  By ten after six we were on the road into the city and at 7am we had parked, walked, and planted ourselves along the parade route with all the other bleary-eyed crazies.

This year there were a record number of people in attendance.  Since the Royal Couple is in town to help kick-off the Stampede 2011 festivities, an estimated 400,000 people were along the parade route - almost half the population of the city itself!

There was so much to see and take part in.  The parade is such a huge event every year that people arrive on the route the night before and camp!  So, in the hours of the morning before the parade starts, there is a parade prelude program - loving dubbed "commercials" - that local dance academies, performing arts, and martial arts groups take part in.  They travel around the parade route singing, dancing, and kicking up a storm to advertise their business/organization.

Then the grand time arrived.  The Duke and Duchess were to start at the end of the parade route and drive backwards to the beginning and arrive to set off fireworks and commence the parade.  We were somewhat disappointed because, although we knew they were in a covered car, there were six identical cars (obviously for security reasons), which all had small windows that were slightly tinted making it was very difficult to see them.  We had hoped that the windows would be somewhat larger in order that we might see more of Their Majesties.

After they passed, more "commercials" and then finally the parade made it's way down to our end of the route.  The festivities had begun!!  As usual I took way to many pictures so I am going to have a little gallery below for you to enjoy a handful of them too.

Former Stampede Queens ride in style.

Mmmmm, mmm, mmm...  What finery!  It's one of my favourite parts of a Canadian parade.  Seeing the women and men RCMP officers - right up there with the horses!



There were only 2 times cheers went up from the crowd.  The first for the Royal Couple and the second for our troops.



No, you are not seeing things, yes that is a City of Calgary street cleaner dressed up like a horse.  Everyone gets involved for Stampede!

There were about another hundred photos to show you, but the uploading is taking WAY too long for me to stick it out and add more.  There were all sorts of horse and rider groups, all the rodeo queens and pricesses, the fancy cars with dignitaries and historic founding families, floats and blow-up mascots (like the Calgary Flames one), and tons of marching bands, cultural groups, and Scottish pipe bands.

Enjoy the photos!

Heather