The San Felipe Christmas Parade of Lights took place
last night (Dec 8/06) at about 6pm. Shortly before it
began there were indicators that something was about
to happen. The traffic thickened and families wearing
Santa Claus hats with blinking red LED lights began
to stream to the shores of the main intersection, Av
mar de Cortez and Chetumal. An elote stand
below Baja Java began doing brisk business and people
people walked away from it with their hot buttered cobs
of corn and sat on the low planters beside the streets.
As the temperature dropped, kids shoved their hands
in their coats pockets and jumped on the pavement to
keep warm. As the crowd swelled, the trundling voices
of a hundred conversations blurred to the familiar pre-parade
drone. Pickup trucks sagging with people policed the
curbs for parking places. Police cars made a few passes
along the streets with their sirens wailing; the announcement
that the time was near. And then finally the Jurassic
howl of the first tractor truck's air horn as it slowly
edged up Mar de Cortez, its heavy mane of lights presaging
the glittering tribute to Christmas festooning its flatbed.
Below is an automatic Java slide show of the Christmas
2006 Parade. If it does not come
up, go to the
Java Site and install the latest Java Runtime Environment.
