Border Fest

This morning we went over to Hidalgo Border Fest which is held at the State Farm Arena in Hidalgo.  We invited our new neighbors, Archie and Isabel Van Beek, to go with us, but they had to drive!  Four people won't fit in our truck! 

First thing in the door, Archie found a car he needed to check out.

We were trying to decide what to do with all of the acts going on today.  We finally decided to sit down in the State Farm Pavilion.  We had been wanting to the hear The Agency - a band that plays a lot of 50's and 60's music in the valley.  This was our opportunity.  They were really good.  We had a hard time getting a picture of their lead singer because he was also the drummer but we finally managed it. 

When we figured  out that Charo was next in the pavilion, we stayed put.  Charo was really quite amazing.  She does the Coochie Coochie stuff very well and she looks wonderful.  She is, however, a trained classical guitarist.  She says the classical guitar got her into the country, but the Coochie Coochie made her a star.  She had another great joke.  She said she came to this country so she could eat and now that she is a star, she can't eat!

Charo playing the classical guitar.

The next act up in the pavilion was Estudiantina Guadalupana.  We had seen them before at the Hidalgo Festival of Lights and knew they were good too so we stayed put again.  We did manage to get some food and take rest room stops between the acts.  They boys didn't disappoint us.  They were really good!

The little boy below was just a pistol and though he doesn't look our grandchild, Jordon, he had a lot of his attitude and gestures.  We loved watching him!

Since our seats were getting sore from sitting, we decided we had better leave the tent and so we did some wandering around the festival.  We stopped in England Square and had our pictures taken with the British Guards.  These guards weren't quite like the real ones - they smiled and talked!

We stopped at the England Stage for awhile and saw the group called Hard Nights Day from San Antonio.  We weren't too impressed.  They had the harmonies down well and the actions, however, they were all really nasal and that wrecked it.  Of course, even if they had done a good job, they had to compete with some African drummers who were mighty loud in the next tent!  It was pretty hysterical.  The Beatles kept singing louder and louder and they changed which songs they were going to sing and sang all the loud ones! 

 

We sneaked out during their show and went into the food court.  Most years they have food from the countries that are being featured but this year they didn't.  I guess they did have fish and chips but there was only one booth of English food. 

Before we went into the food court, we all put up our chairs on the parade route so we would have really good seats.  Then we took turns going to get our meals and we ate in our lawn chairs.  Here Isabel is trying out a cucumber with some sort of chili sauce on it.  It didn't look like anything we wanted to try. 

Here a bunch of people are starting to line up in front of the State Farm Arena for the parade.

And, the parade starts!

As you can see, they know how to put on a parade!  It was great!

After the parade, we went over to check out the cheese carver.  He was working on a sculpture for this Border Fest.  It looks like he is making great progress!

As we left the stadium I had my picture taken with Harry Potter.  He was on one of the floats.  He is the younger Harry Potter for sure!  He just stood around getting his picture taken in England Square.

England Square