The Beltline Illuminated

We had planned and prepared for this lantern parade.  The first time we went, two years ago, we had no idea what we were doing, but we had a great time.  Last year we had a better idea what was going on.  We made better lanterns, and were astonished by the increase in the size of the crowd; it had been only a few thousand people a year before, but last year it was estimated that ten thousand people showed up.  We'd heard that there were Concerns about inadequate arrangements for a crowd that turned out to be that size, with only a couple of port-a-potties and two police officers there.  This year -- like us -- they were going to Be Prepared.

In August, Iain and I went to one of Chantelle Rytter's lantern-making classes.  We started with a large paper folding lantern, attached it to a bamboo pole, and decorated it with shapes cut from tissue paper and glued on with Elmer's glue thinned with water.  Add a battery-powered light and we had lanterns.  But we saw the materials there to make the large illuminated hats that we had seen at the parade last year, and Iain got what was needed to make one.

I'd been out of town for the week but got back mid-afternoon on Saturday.  Iain had spent the day working on his illuminated hat, which was almost done by the time I got home.  We'd invited our neighbors Carolina and Pawel to go with us to the parade, and we all went to Caramba for dinner.   Then Tom dropped us off near the start, where the crowd was huge.

This really large fish was in the parade last year, I think.  (Check my photos from last year.)  It hadn't been an angler fish last year.

This year, Iain was one of the people wearing a large illuminated hat.  I requested a group photo, and the illuminated-hat people dutifully posed. 

The Crewe of the Grateful Gluttons was there in force, with the giant illuminated puppets.

Once again my pictures on the trail didn't come out very well, but you can get a feel for how many people were there and the wonderful lanterns from these pictures while we were waiting for dark and for the parade to start.

Once the crowd started to move it still took a long time for us to get on to the trail; it takes a long time for that many people to move onto a 10-foot-wide path.  The route was congested with spectators and sometimes the parade just stopped moving altogether.  Iain and I were all trying to stay together with Pawel and Carolina and we mostly did.  So many people on a warm and humid night -- people everywhere.  Thousands of spectators, thousands of people walking.  By the time we got to Virginia Avenue, there still were lanterns coming heading toward us on the trail as far as we could see.

I've seen estimates of 15,000 and 20,000 people at the event -- I would believe twenty thousand.  There were people in the parade and along the route, watching from lawns and balconies and windows and rooftops, from trailside and from bridges.  And there were definitely more people walking than in years past.

Last year, at the start of parade, we did see an Atlanta Police Department officer on a bicycle, and a port-a-potty on Irwin Road.  This year, there may have been more of both, but we didn't see any at all.  Fortunately we didn't need either one.  I'm not sure how big a crowd they planned on this year.  

Next year?  I'm sure it will be even bigger, and we'll be there.