N.C. PrideFest Parade will be colorful fun
If you’re open minded (and I hope you are if you’re reading my blog) then you absolutely should make plans to attend the N.C. PrideFest Parade on Saturday near Duke University’s East Campus.
It’s one of the largest gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender events in surrounding states and it draws a colorful, welcoming crowd. The most recent year I could find stats for was 2006, when an estimated 6,000 people attended.
The parade starts at 1 p.m. Here’s the route it will take:
The march will begin on Campus Drive and turn right on West Main Street then travel west to Broad Street. It will turn right on Broad Street and proceed to Green Street and turn left. It will turn left on Ninth Street and turn left on West Main traveling back to Campus Drive.
The parade is part of a day long festival on Duke’s East campus. You’re guaranteed to see hilarious costumes, amazing drag, a lot of rainbow flags and more. Vendors and nonprofits have booths, so there’s plenty to see if you want to arrive early. (Photos courtesy of flickr user Weege).
I’ve only been to the parade once, and that was four years ago. So if you’ve been in recent years, let me know if you have any tips on best viewing areas or other events that day that shouldn’t be missed.
Ginny, thanks for the ad. The best gift to our area would be media coverage of this event that doesn’t only show the “outrageous” part of our community, but actually shares stories about some of the amazing people who make up the local LGBT community, the struggles some have overcome and the courage they’ve shown in simply living their lives authentically. But to be sure, almost without fail, every story on the event will lead with a picture of drag queens.
And for the record, many of the drag queens in our community contribute hours of their lives and raise tons of money for our community, so this is not a slam on them at all. I gained a huge amount of additional respect from them when I saw the movie Pageant. My point is that our community is more diverse than that.