Carnival en Rio Mardi Gras Parade

The first parade of Mardi Gras officially rolled tonight here in Lafayette, Louisiana and it really got me into the spirit of the season! My parents are in town this weekend to help Roxi and I get the house ready for Mardi Gras visitors next weekend. They will be back along with my brother Travis and his fiance Danielle as well as her family and some of their friends. It will be a big group but it is a fun group.

Roxi was busy working on her PhD and my mom was just not in the mood yet, but my dad and I made the quick drive down to the tail end of the parade route near Cajun Field and started the long process of the parade to make it's journey through downtown Lafayette. It's been a while since I've been to a parade in Lafayette and I had kind of forgotten how slowly they move. The parade rolled at 6:30 pm so I was certain that when we arrived at the end of the route at 7:30, it would be right around the corner. But it wasn't and it continued to not roll around the corner for another hour and a half. Finally, at around 9:00 pm, the advanced police escort motorcycles made their way down the street and the parade got going.

The Krewe of Carnival en Rio is apparently the newest parade in town starting in 2005 but they did not disappoint with their much locally hyped Grand Marshal, Mr. Erik Estrada. This video I took is a little dark, but it was indeed Officer Francis Llewellyn 'Ponch' Poncherello from TVs "CHiPs."





We had a fun time and it really got me excited about the coming festivities of next weekend. All in all, time well spent and it was a good dry run for planning wait times for next weekends bigger parades.