A Rainy Day Celebration

It was a rainy day in Hilo with high winds, intense downpours, sunny skies and then a remix of everything.

In spite of all these changes, we still cherish the rain and put on a good parade and the rest of us stayed covered in our pop-ups.

Parades in Hawaii are all about color, color and color oh yes did I also mention the aloha attire is mandatory gear?

All the antique cars display amazing tropical flowers from our local nuseries and add exotic color!

This is our local marching band with their aloha gear, putting up a good show in spite of the rain.

Pau riders in all their splendid leis and elaborate ornamentation always steal the show and the smiles are genuinely shared.

Even the horsey dung carts are sweetly decorated and have happy smiles!

Now you know this is a real Hawaiian parade when they include a marching band just with ukule players, giving the shaka (local hand aloha gestures)

Boy the ladies in red hats know what color to wear today and how to make everyone cheer for these volunteers!

Miss Kau coffee is putting out some sweet smiles, Kau coffee is becoming as popular as Kona coffee in the coffee world.

Oh okay, a few more pau riders, yes they are my favorite and really show us aloha, Each rider wears colors and flowers specifically to their islands and their leis are handmade with local foliage and flowers.

Canoe clubs are celebrated here and wood canoes are the traditional way of racing. They are prized and also used for parades...these types of canoes are very rare to produce nowadays.

Even little dogs like to show off their aloha and wear their leis for a big parade.

Aloha and thanks for watching our celebration of the Merrie Monarch Parade highlights, I hope you enjoyed your visit to hilo town.

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