Battle of Flowers

It's late and I've got too many photos of this evening's moonlit parade! Hard to choose but I've picked out my favourites. 

The Battle of Flowers is celebrating 120 years. It began as a celebration of Edward VII's coronation. Flowers from the floats were thrown into the crowd, who threw them back, hence 'battle'. But I only ever remember it as a parade. It was huge every summer, with celebrity guests. Wikipedia tells me that in 1969 there were 60,000 people in attendance and the 'battle' then was between the parishes competing to make the biggest, best floats. 

It's not as epic nowadays and a nice addition is an evening parade the day after the main one. I was pleased to see a big turnout - we certainly seem to have a lot of tourists at the moment and that's fantastic. The parade is especially magical for kids (as it was for me all those years ago) and lots of local children get involved.

The floats are amazing, covered in thousands of flowers. So much work goes into them. I've put a few in extras.