“Horses make a landscape look beautiful.”
Alice Walker
A
good friend of ours said, “You have to come to Aiken to see the
Hoofbeats and Christmas Carols Parade. It is a fun parade that I
know you will enjoy.” That was all we needed to give it a try
since we always love an excuse to head to Aiken, South Carolina and
check it out before going to her open house.
Aiken
is a lovely town with unique gift shops, candy shops, restaurants,
parks, and taverns. Today when we arrived, the town was hopping.
Many people were hustling in and out of shops finishing off their
Christmas shopping toting large bags full of goodies. There were
people sitting at tables outside eating a meal or having a drink
before the parade. Yes, it was chilly, but all were dressed warmly
and some with blankets over their laps, but all were enjoying a nice
day in December. Aiken is known as horse country which makes this
such a special parade.
People
were lined up on both sides of Laurens Street in their festive
Christmas outfits along with their dogs being equally decorated
anxiously waiting for the parade to start. Aiken is a dog friendly
city and today it really showed. We saw more dogs there than we had
ever seen before. Many dogs were fashionably wearing Santa outfits
or reindeer antlers. At one point, Joe gave a little whistle to see
where I was, and all the dogs in the area watched him go by. He
thanked them for their attention.
At 2
pm exactly, the parade started. There were some horse and carriages
in the front of the parade all decorated up. Then came the horses.
There were some of the most beautiful horses I had ever seen and more
than I had ever seen in one spot. They just kept coming. There were
Quarter horses, Draft Horses, Saddle bred Horses, miniature horses,
and even statues of horses. The owners and horses were dressed to
the T’s, and proudly rode past us in style. Some participant were
saying “Merry Christmas” or singing Christmas Carols.
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| The elves - Pooper Scoopers |
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| Pooper Scoopers |
At
the end of the parade were the dogs. There were quite a few dogs but
not as many as the horses. If you added up all the dogs watching the
parade though, I’m sure the dogs had the horses beat. Almost 300
horses and 100 dogs had registered for the parade. The last people
in the parade were the Elves, aka the pooper scoopers of the parade
and got a good ovation as they walked by. Each participant gave a
$20 donation for the SPCA, Albrecht Center for Animal Welfare, and
the Equine Rescue of Aiken to be in the parade. How wonderful is
that.
The
parade went 2 ½ miles and looped back so both sides of Laurens
Street got a great view of the parade. This was the 13th year of this parade. It was a hit with all the crowd especially the
children. We thoroughly enjoyed this parade and plan on making it
part of our Christmas tradition.
Check
out Aiken for Christmas events through out the month of December.
They offer so much and this parade was just one of them. It was a
very different and fun parade. We had never been to one like it and
so enjoyed it. Aiken has some of the most beautiful horses in the
world and the nicest horse people.
Till
next time. Bye for now.
