Vancouver Pride Parade 2010

As usual, the Vancouver Pride Parade kicks off the beginning of August and we were there, although for some reason we struggled a bit to get up and get out of the house. But we made it and as usual it's one of the best parties this town throws.

Louise's favorite part of any of these outings has to be the carnival food and she was lucky enough to taste some. While Holly and I had to basically view each of the food vendors to make up our minds on what to eat, Louise was pretty much in favour of anything, so long as she could share.

In fact, she was getting so rambunctious in her stroller that at one point she shook it hard enough to spill some ginger beer we got (from the kiosk representing the Reef, a great little Caribbean themed restaurant in town). Normally I wouldn't care, but I had absent mindedly placed my camera in the top of the stroller next to the drinks. Oops. I wiped it off quickly but as the soda dried it got sticky and I've been noticing it has been making the lens grind and pop as it zooms in and out. I'm hoping a gentle cleaning later will sort things out - I really like my camera and it's already been through a lot with me, including my wipeout in 2009.

Nonetheless, all three of us had a great time. We even ran into Randy, a friend from work who was volunteering for the Vancouver Friends for Life charity. From their website:

The Vancouver Friends For Life Society serves as a catalyst to enhance the wellness of individuals living with a life threatening illness by providing complementary and alternative health and support services.

If you feel so inclined, I urge you to consider donating to these people. By the way, Randy isn't in this last picture, this is one of the parade performers who happened to also be visiting the Friends for Life booth at the same time.

Eventually we had to go home and somehow we miscalculated. We were faced with either walking all the way around the parade route or cutting across the street mid-parade. With all the people watching the show, this was not an easy task. Eventually we found a section where people were using super soakers to spray the parade float performers as they went by - at least there were fewer people sitting in that section, so we squeezed through and eventually made it - Holly had to stop a couple times for people to take pictures of Louise, but we were all pretty happy to make it across. After that much fun and excitement, Louise needed a nap.