I don’t know about you, but one of my favorite family traditions growing up was driving around and looking at all the Christmas lights on houses. Even now, I still look forward to Christmas lights, only now there is a lot more technology involved and simple house lights have become “shows”.
Boats with Christmas lights are even better! With the way the lights reflect off the water, it’s like you get double the lights. So of course, in our first year having the boat harbored in Ventura, we signed up for the little Christmas parade. I say “little” parade, because California, like so many other states that are on the coast, has some huge, boat parades, hundreds of boats, of all shapes, and sizes, and whoever spends the most wins. So, the parade in Ventura that had about 20-25 boats was little in comparison. There was a lot to do to get ready, we had to sign -up, go to Captain’s meeting, to make sure there was a planned route, so boats do not start running into each other. We also got numbers so the “judges” knew which boats to vote for.
The most demanding thing about decorating the boat for the parade wasn’t figuring out how to attach the lights, it wasn’t figuring out how much power we’d need, and where to plug in, it was…what is our theme going to be? Putting up the lights, and running cords was easy in comparison to what “props’ we would have, what music will be playing, and what costumes, (if any) will the “crew” be wearing. These are the tough decisions. So, for our first year, we went with an island theme. As you can see our 8-foot polar bear was decked out in coconut shells and a grass skirt. The crew had planned to show off our best Hawaiian shirts, and we had a little island music to move to. Well, even in California the weather turns cold, and it was a bit too chilly for just the Hawaiian shirts, we put on our sweatshirts and jackets under and put on our Santa hats. We had a wonderful time! We also won first place in our category! The next year, we didn’t join the parade, but we still put up lights to be in the spirit. The next time we “competed” in a boat parade was after our big adventure and living in Texas.