PANAMA CITY — Thousands of spectators and countless pets donned thick stacks of beads around their necks Friday after the Kids and Pets Mardi Gras parade strolled through St. Andrews.
The kids and pets portion of the St. Andrews Mardi Gras festivities was the first of the two-day celebration. For the Krewe of St. Andrews, Saturday’s parade will be the 17th of its kind they have hosted. And with the addition of a new “den” in March, float designers have been able to work day or night, and for longer periods of time before the festival, fine-tuning their colorful spectacles.
Some people still were tinkering or adding more beads and purple feathers as late as Friday night, according to former Krewe president Pam George.
“We’ve got them all in the den and they are ready to roll,” George said. “We can work on our floats day or night now so we’ve been able to really focus on how we build our floats, which is an advantage to having the new den.”
The variety of float themes of the more than 180 Krewe members also benefited from the new den. Spectators can expect castles to river boats to jazz clubs with fine attention to detail, George said.
The St. Andrews Mardi Gras began in 1997, when
Though similar events have arisen in
“We parade with the Krewe of Dominique Youx in the beach parade and they parade in
Over the two days of festivities about 40,000 people are expected to show up in
Dutch Sanger, DIB director, said he stopped taking requests from food vendors to participate in Mardi Gras more than two months ago.
“I had to stop taking food vendors because we have local restaurants here and I didn’t want to hurt them,” Sanger said.
About 70 vendors came from as far as
“We pride ourselves on hiring local bands and local talent to get the word out about
WANT TO GO?
-Who: Krewe of
-What: Mardi Gras main parade
-When: Festival, 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.; Parade at 2 p.m. Saturday
-Where: Historic