Halloween Parade in Park City

I think there are two events in Park City that bring everyone out and highlight the town's quirkiness. The Fourth of July is the biggest, but Halloween is the most interesting. I would guess that there were about 5,000 people out on Main Street, mixed with 500 dogs. The street is packed, top to bottom.



Half the people were dressed in costume, but almost all of the dogs were. The afternoon starts with kids trick or treating at the stores of Main Street. Then the dog parade kicks into gear. It's really more of a rambling dog mob than a parade, but at one point, most of the dogs were actually headed in one direction. This is an improvement over last year.

Here we have Jasper dressed as Superdog, and Holly (Bill and Loris Benson's dog) dressed as a pumpkin.



Jasper also had a cool jester's costume. It was cute but it didn't fit him. Julie was kind enough to handle Jasper's leash so I could shoot photos.



As you might imagine, the two most popular dog activities were butt-sniffing and eating kid's candy off the street.



Loris (Holly's mom), Cathy King (Executive Director for Friends of Animals) and Julie.



This lovely lady is one of the Park City Mountain Hosts that I work with. Cindy Lea is dressed in a lovely inflatable costume. You can squish the air out, but there is a tiny fan that fills it right back up. Who thinks of all this stuff?



Julie and Jasper are posing with our next door neighbor Hannah. She's one of Jasper's best friends and is as adorable as anyone can be. I felt bad that we ate out after the parade so we missed having her come trick or treating at our house. With so many of the houses and condos in our neighborhood being second homes, it stinks for gathering candy.



Cathy King and one of her five dogs. She was a witch and he was either a wizard or a warlock. Is there a difference?



These were my favorite human costumes. Very timely if you read the news. They were bed bugs.



If you are dressed as a wookie from Star Wars, are you part of the dog parade?



More contacts from Friends of Animals... Cathy is our Operations Director and runs Furburbia. If you stop by the adoption center, you will almost always see Moose and Dino, the big lovable Rottweilers. Cathy's husband Chad is the one who took me looking for elk a month ago. He did end up seeing some big bull elk and shooting a spike (younger male).



I am just a sucker for little kids in costume. This little guy could barely walk but was having a blast exploring all the debris in the gutter.



Never one to miss such festivities, this is Rob Schumacher, the contractor who built our house. He is accompanied by another Superdog, Elvis. I think Robbie was from the Lonely Hearts Club Band.




I saw several of the movies and never once did I see Spiderman with Oompa-Loompa hair.



And we end with my favorite shot of the day. I'm not quite sure why. The costumes. The purple building in the background. The exhaustion on their faces that probably comes from a Halloween-induced blood sugar spike and then crash.



Halloween in Park City is a wonderful excuse to go out with friends, dress up your dogs, and run into everyone you know. Weather permitting, it is not to be missed.