I am pleased that I arrived in Italy in time to see the last parade at Carnevale Viareggio. I have been several times now and I love it. The photos below don’t really give an idea of what it is like to be there.
The crowds are huge and swarm all over the road where the floats travel. It is absolute chaos…in a fun way. Anywhere else there would be barricades to keep people back from these huge floats, but not Italy. There are people pushing babies in strollers wandering beneath the floats with giant moving parts, whole families standing in front of a monolith moving slowly towards them.
The music is so loud it thumps in your chest and there is so much going on you really need to go more than once. There are hundreds of people in fantastic costumes dancing in front of the floats and performances happening on the floats…an amazing spectacle.
The floats feature political satire and social comment. Some are easy to understand and others not. Donald Trump is an obvious choice and so easy to ridicule. There were 2 Donald floats this year.
Frida Kahlo representing Freedom and Tolerance.
Locked up…are we all in chains?
Please help!
Some participants are on a much smaller scale, but no less impressive.
Our obsession with selfies and the beautiful people on the red carpet.
Turning into butterflies.
I’m not sure what this one means.
Knights on horseback.
Salvador Dali and friends.
Ulysses and the siren…beware of bewitching sirens.
The last Snow White.
The beast.
My favourite…High Tide, a huge whale covered in plastic.
It took 2 hours for the floats to do the circuit. It is an incredible spectacle…go if you can.
A word of caution. My wallet was stolen from my zipped handbag which didn’t leave my arm. The number of thefts made the news. If you go take nothing with you!