Gasparilla is a festival that’s kind of a big deal in Tampa, and has been for more than a century, celebrating a fictional pirate named Jose Gaspar. It’s a fine excuse to have a little fun, a parade (two!) filled with floats of folk called krewes who toss bead necklaces at the gathered crowds, and celebrate local lore (real and imagined).
When I moved to Tampa back in the fall of 2017, I had no idea this thing existed, but by January 2018 (Gasparilla happens twice every January), I was fully onboard. No, I haven’t yet dressed as a pirate (or anything else), but, y’know, maybe!
I grew up in Lisbon Falls, Maine, which for the part forty-odd years has celebrated Moxie Day (which I’ve talked about a few times in this blog), and when I was living in Colorado Springs there was Pikes Peak or Bust, another commemorative event (this one based on real events). Moxie Day is a community event steeped in the community, which Gasparilla is not, at least not in the same way. Moxie Day has things like bake sales and recipe contests. Gasparilla is food trucks.
Anyway, so the first Gasparilla parade is always the children’s version. The second, a week later, is the adults one, where there is much drinking (it also has the “invasion” reenacted). I used to try and attend both, but that may be firmly in the past tense, or at least has turned in that direction.
My favorite part is actually all the skeleton pirates that pop up to help celebrate. There’s also the Rough Riders (Tampa was a staging ground for the Spanish American War), the Conquistadors, and the cows from Chick-Fil-A (the sponsor of the children’s parade; I took pictures of them previously but not this year).
So that was yesterday.
No comments:
Post a Comment