David's Diary: Sunday, February 10, 2002

Carnival In Sitges

One reason that we wanted to visit Sitges this week is that a cruiser in Barcelona said that carnival in Sitges was an event worth seeing. Today is the day of not one, but two huge parades to celebrate carnival. The first parade was the children's parade. We arrived a little late and after working our way through the old town we only got to see the last two floats. But given the size of Sitges and the length of the parade it was just a few moments for us to skirt the side streets and show up on another part of the parade route. The crowds were five people deep, but we managed to find a vantage point and see most of the parade.

The costumes and floats were wonderful and showed a lot of personal time and energy. Each float looked like the group preparing it had worked for a year. Floats were pulled by a tractor and drivers had to be sharp to avoid any rear-end collisions as the parade stopped and started as it wound its way through the streets of Sitges. Children on the floats were from less than one year old to ten or twelve. Each one was dressed in identical costumes that looked like they had taken many hours of sewing to complete.

Adult Carnival

It was after 7:00 when we got back to Dragonsinger and had dinner. The children's parade was just the beginning of this day. The adult parade was next, but this being Spain it did not start until 10:30. After all, the Spanish do not eat dinner until 9:00 or 10:00, so watching a parade until past midnight on a Sunday night is perfectly normal. Karalee and the boys called it a day, but Jocelyn and I walked back to the center of town.

The crowds were already thick. People were walking up and down the parade route looking for the best places to stand. We stopped at a German bar and had a drink. The time was only 9:00, so we felt that there was still time to find a good spot. By 9:30 we stepped outside and decided that a little spot next to the door of the bar would be ideal for us to watch. Jocelyn and I are tall enough and the sidewalk was sloped towards the road giving us enough height to see over the people in front.

We had an hour to wait, so we just watched the crowds moving by. Many people were dressed up for the night in outrageous costumes, but most spectators were just dressed warmly against the cool evening air. The first floats showed up at 10:40 and dazzled us from start to finish.

The Last Float

Like the Children's Parade, each float went over the top in lights and action. Individual costumes must have taken many hours to sew and there were enough high-heeled shoes to keep a shoe salesperson happy for a year. It was nice to see that little commercialism had crept in to the parade. These were people who were participating because they wanted to and not because they had raised the most money.

A few participants were middle-aged, but most participants were in their late teens or early twenties. Young love was in the air as dancers performed together with the heavy beat of music constant from float to float even if the individual songs changed. The floats were powered by Honda generators and gasoline. The participants were powered by enthusiasm and liberal quantities of Ballentines Scotch and Spanish beer. Each float had a special cupboard at the back that was filled with bottles and glasses and it was rare for the door to the cupboard to be closed.

The crowd were well behaved and unlike the participants there was little alcohol to be seen. We kept warm by the energy from the parade and at 1:30 the final float passed by us. Jocelyn and I headed back to Dragonsinger ready for bed, but we're sure that most of the parade participants were up for hours more celebrating another successful carnival in Sitges.