Fantasy Friday

 

October 30, 2021

Fantasy Friday

Friday night of Fantasy Fest week in Key West is traditionally one of my most favorite days of the entire event. Anticipation and crowds have been building all week and generally the most popular local event is held Friday evening as the Masquerade March is also known as the local’s parade due to the large number of local residents who participate. 

The parade features thousands of participants who begin at the Key West Cemetery and walk downtown all while dressed in their most creative costumes while thousands more locals and visitors line the route. The march culminates with the marchers finishing by blending into the packed crowds along Duval Street at the annual street fair.

None of that happened this year, well at least certainly not officially and not to the extent it usually does as both the march and the street fair were among the events canceled due to the Covid-19 pandemic. You would think that would put a major damper on things, but curiously the level of enthusiasm was pretty much on par with a normal year, and the crowds still packed Duval Street.

In fact, as could have been predicted, a small but hearty group of locals gathered at the cemetery at the scheduled time the Masquerade March would have been starting to do a small, but enthusiastic renegade mini-march. In fact, I saw a number of the regular group of locals who dressed up and gathered to march, in spite of the fact that the event was canceled. Of course, the Key West Police Department anticipated that this would happen and as they did during the renegade Zombie Bike Ride earlier in the week, provided a group of motorcycle police to escort the march along the way.

I went to a couple of Fantasy Fest parties and events on Friday as well, starting with the afternoon Playboy Party at the Southernmost House. The place was packed with party people celebrating the Playboy aesthetic at a pool party at the beautiful location. It was tough taking photos that I could post here or that Fantasy Fest could actually use in their promotions as there was a plethora of nudity at the event and revelers were often wearing the skimpiest of bathing attire if anything at all.

It was quite the afternoon, and I was just getting started. The next event I attended was the annual Poster-Signing event at Wine-O at the LaConcha Hotel. The annual poster was designed this year by artist Carrie Disrud, who was not able to be on hand for the poster signing (though she did pre-sign a large number of posters). Last year’s poster artist Pashur was on hand to sign his posters and and the event was pretty good.

The other party that both Kathy and I attended Friday evening was a private party at the home of our friends David and Breanne. They hosted a party at the time when the Masquerade March was usually held and while I could not stay the entire evening Kathy did and had a great time. So many of our friends were on hand and most were dressed up, which is always fun. It seemed so normal that it was sort of strange. It has been some time since we were at a friend’s house for such a social gathering.

Downtown, you would hardly know that this was not a typical Fantasy Fest as Duval Street was jam packed and blocked off just like any normal year, thousands of people in costume and enjoying the Friday night of Fantasy Fest.