bigmacbear | TO Pride: Sunday

gmjambear and I decided at the last minute to join the RGMC bus to Toronto for Pride this weekend.

We got up Sunday morning, checked out of the hotel, and stored our bags on the bus for the day.

"How butch!" -- Reaction from at least one Chorus member as I told him we'd been at the CFL game the previous night.

Then we went with a bunch of Chorus members to Cora's -- a chain which also has locations in Montréal, where we ate several times during the GALA festival last summer -- for breakfast. We sat on the patio and watched the world go by. Two men came and sat next to us, one significantly older than the other (father and son, or "daddy" and "boy"? hmmm....), speaking Spanish. They did tell the waiter they were in town for the parade, but I also heard one use the word maricón, so I'm not sure what was going on there.

After brunch we hopped on the subway to the village and checked out the art festival. We chatted with

mathan and

scottybear among others, as well as Dan, one of the younger Empire Bears. Off in another part of the festival we ran into

bitterlawngnome and

danthered and had a nice chat about the calendar Bill has been working on and the Bear Brotherhood Flag (featured prominently on the T-shirt I was wearing). We also stopped by the Singing Out! booth and I picked up a CD which I hadn't got the chance to in Montréal, and we got some bottled water from the Gay Hockey association whose tournament we went to see

kj play in a few years ago.

"Your trailer park called. Their trash is missing." -- Spotted on a T-shirt.

The parade was about to start so we made our way down Yonge Street for a bit then ducked back into the village to avoid some of the crowds and stake out a spot on Gerrard St. at the end of the parade. On the way we had a chance to chat with

nfotxn,

dizzibear and

backrubbear, who were on their way to a house party.

When we finally got to a spot on Gerrard we found it takes a while for the parade to make its way there. There were some cute paramedics though, attending to folks along the route who perhaps might have been done in by the heat. We also saw some folks we knew from Rochester who hadn't come up with us on the bus, taking positions across the street.

"You would pimp me out, wouldn't you?" -- Young man to his girlfriend as they made their way behind us in the crowd, holding hands.

The parade went by in all its glory. There were bikers and churches and discos and public servants (the Mayor and police chief of Toronto included). There were teachers and students, parents and children (and a few grannies), New Democrats and Communists, leathermen and drag queens, unions and professionals, you name it, they were there.

I got a few pictures of bears as they went by. One of the Gen-X Bears stopped and gave me a skritch under the chin. ;-)

All of a sudden there was a gap in the parade. Two police officers pointed out that the last car in the parade is always a police car. Despite this information, people were leaving in droves.

"It ain't over till the fat lady sings." -- (singing) "Ahhhhh!" -- A couple of reasonably chubby ladies behind us in the crowd.

As the time for re-boarding the bus drew near we decided to make our way to Yonge Street and catch what we could "on the fly". In this way we got to see the Proud Anglicans contingent compete with our friend Chris as the Queen, a role he does every year with relish.

We caught the subway after wrestling with a bit of a crowd getting into the College station. On the way out at St. Andrew we walked past a sunken garden and pond under the plaza by Roy Thompson Hall and got some pictures of the ducks that live there. Also, we got a picture of the front of Joe Mama's and a waiter at one of the adjoining restaurants waved as I took the picture.

The return trip was quick (almost exactly three hours, usually it takes up to four) and a nice young man checked our ID's at the border.

Pictures to follow.