The Finale

Are you on Fantasy Fest overload yet? Us too, but this is the last installment and then it's time to recover. It's going to be weird to see people with their clothes on again. Last night was the float parade, and it was short and sweet. Of course it was dark and the floats were fast moving, which means crappy photos, but I'll give you at taste (album).


We actually got two shots at the floats because we watched them go by near the start and then had to cross over Duval to get home. This float had waited until the larger audience to send Batman high up into the sky. Cool.

It was pandemonium in the street.

Diana Nyad, the woman who swam from Cuba to Key West recently, was there too.

Photo by: Andy Newman

This time, we were actively competing for beads and were standing with two people who were in it to win it too. Michael was actually flashing the bead tossers to try to get ahead.

You'll note a sword coming at Michael in that photo. He kept jumping in front of people to get the beads being tossed to them, so was getting spanked with horse crops and stabbed with swords. I was trying to take photos, so wasn't catching any, but once a float went by, I'd run into the street and grab any beads that had fallen. By the end of the night, I had 50 beads to Michael's 30. Take that!

Here are a few parting shots of random costumes we saw throughout the day.



You'll note that we stopped to take a photo of these Beetlejuice guys and they unexpectedly starting singing barbershop-type harmony (turns out they'd just sang at the Little Room Jazz Club).



You can hear for yourself. They were singing to me and Paula.

Yes, the week was quite a mishmash of insanity. The fact that we only go to a small amount of what's happening during the event is an exhausting thought. And after all this dress up, who's going to want to do it again on Halloween?

Today, we pack.

The Final Hurrah

Whewy, it's a good thing this only lasts a week. We're pooped. Yesterday was more of the same during the day, people in costumes or body paint strutting their stuff. I decided we and probably you have had enough of the saggy boobs, pancake bums, and dangling dingalings, so didn't take any more photos of those, but they were out there!

When we realized people were already setting up for the parade starting 4 hours later, we decided to buy some camping chairs and get set up ourselves. Even though it was a long wait time, it was so fun to people watch that the time flew by.