The Big Carrot Festival

Yes, I have been reporting about the Carrot Festival before, the latest being last year's 75th Festival, but of course, we have to go there again year after year admiring the floats going by. In case you haven't read about this before, the Holtville Carrot Festival marks the harvest of various vegetables in the Imperial Valley, and right now tons and tons of carrots are being harvested.

The festival stretches of several days, and unlike the Wine Queen in certain areas of Germany, the community elects a Carrot Queen every year. 

February 11 was the day when the big parade was moving down Main Street, towns people had met up by the hundreds along the parade route. It was a sunny day (like most days) but a cold wind was keeping the temperature down.

Only minutes left until the parade and excitement is building

Presenting the valley's products

Mexican Mariachi dancers

Representing modern-day farming some huge tractors were part of the parade

No parade without the old classics

And of course the Vaqueros showed up

Never to be missed the elegant town ladies

After the parade we returned to camp as Dixie had been waiting in the trailer. But the day was far from being over. From 2pm a party would start at the Silverado Ranch with Enrique and Elvira as hosts.

 

I have mentioned the ranch earlier and here we met again with friends dancing and enjoying the afternoon.

On the way back home, we stopped at the Holtville Fair where young folks were dominating the scene. 

This one was for the small children

The closest one could get to flying

Some blood-stopping machines had been set up swirling and catapulting people into mind-boggling heights. I very well understand that we didn't see older folks like us, participating in those games. Nevertheless people around us seemed to have tons of fun.

Readers who have been following this blog know that we are waiting for a replacement of trailer axles, and today we received the glad message that the axles had arrived. Next Monday we are going to Yuma,AZ to get the replacement done.

This whole thing has been weighing on my mind since the middle of December. We are sure looking forward to this as we have been very reluctant to move our trailer around. Already 10 days ago we had gotten 4 new tires.