Yesterday I headed into Fremantle to watch the end of the Fremantle Festival Parade. It was the culmination of the week long festival in Fremantle celebrating everything Freo through art, music, theatre, sporting and cultural events, and has its origins in 1905, making it Australia’s oldest community festival. I missed all of it. To my regret I even missed the blessing of the fleet last week, but alas work got in the way.
The parade’s theme this year was “future Freo”. I didn’t get off to a very good start. The parade was due to run from 4pm to 6pm, with road closures in effect from 2pm. Of course I only arrive shortly before 4pm and found the procession in full swing.
The route was to start at the Esplanade, down Essex Street, left onto South Terrace and the Caupuccino Strip, round the corner onto Market Street, and then at the junction with the National Hotel, right onto the pedestrian shopping mall towards Kings Square.
We managed to plot up just round the corner on Market Street opposite Bannister Street. What a terrible spot this was. For photo taking at least. Lots of unintentional photobombs, compounded by the parade narrowing…and of course the beam of light that shone between the buildings, saturating most of my photos. I did however manage to find a spot to give me room to change lenses safely. Silver lining and all.
The parade started off well. We had groups representatives from Sambanistas, Lance Holt School, Perth Indonesian Community, Stop Live Export, Amnesty International, Zagreb, Hands off Point Peron, Pride WA, Latina Studio, Wasamba, Circus WA, Perth International Dance, Hare Krishna, Canning Vale College, Bassonovas, The Red Cross, Fremantle Swan Dragon Boat Club, City of Cockburn Pipe Band, Raices Latinas, Freo Trolley, Cats Eyes Costume Hire, Penny Lane Music Workshop, Refugee Rights Action Network (Freo), Segaloya, Fremantle Carnivale and the Beleza Tribe. There were a few groups in between that were difficult to put a name to, but all in all bloody brilliant!
Once all the creative folks walked past, the last what felt like a third of the procession was devoted to groups protesting the proposed Roe Highway extension. Personal feelings aside, I would have happily missed out on all those orange banners. It cast a bit of a downer on something that for me was a creative celebration and not a political agenda. Up until now there had been a few groups voicing their causes, but none compared to the attendance that Roe group brought. Nevertheless, photos…
