Guerneville's festival of lights, aka the Gayest Parade Ever*

(*or at least in a small California town formerly known mainly for its logging operations.)

Guerneville, we learned, has a significant gay & lesbian population, dating back to the time of the AIDS epidemic when many people "retired" there from the Bay Area. (I use "retired" in quotes because the person who told us this did so himself; hes said that many moved there to die. We had a short but moving conversation about how different things are now; he grew up in SF during the worst of the epidemic. Today both his husband and his ex are long-time HIV positive and still healthy.)

Our first clue, before we learned about the history, was this poster in the bathroom at the pizza place:


This was another clue, albeit not quite as unambiguous  clue as the poster:


Dax at the Sonoma Nest Company (where we dropped in for owl photography purposes) was another clue, and a lovely one at that. He kissed my hand, stroked Orhan's upper arm, and LOVED the bird.


The owl photography was pretty rich there, too. There were some interesting nesting possibilities...



...friends...


...and even transportation options.

Getting back to the parade, though, Saturday night was the annual Festival of Lights (not a Christmas parade; a person on one Santa Claus float  wore a Hanukkah hat!).

Between dinner and the parade we had some time to wander, so we wandered along the street where the parade was being assembled. This -- THIS! -- was the vehicle that carried the grand marshal.


The woman driving it kindly let Baykuş Keechbird (now also known as the Owl of Radical Acceptance) sit on the bucket.

When the parade actually began, it got even better. Here is the grand marshal:


But I'm getting ahead of myself. While we were waiting for the parade to start, after our tour of the assembling parade groups, this lovely mermaid-and-Triton pair came along to keep us entertained:



Some parts of the parade were standard, like the tots from the nursery school (wearing cards to reflect the parade's Las Vegas theme) (not shown because they are recognizable), and the Ballet Folklorico (though we were impressed by how many people were in it -- dozens of girls and a few boys):


The parade also included the usual "old car" brigade, which is to say, one semi-vintage vehicle and one truly venerable truck:



The dog park showed up:


And of course, many fire trucks:






There was also a hot air basket that gave out periodic bursts of flame.

But the highlights, much as I love fire trucks and fire-belching baskets, had rainbows:




It was magnificent.

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