HOLAMBRA!

 Don't think we've left our mission.... we're in HOLAMBRA, Brasil! 

That's HOL (for HOLland), AM (for AMerica) and BRA (for BRAsil) a smallish town located about 2 1/2 hours away from São Paulo.  We made the excursion with several senior couples as well as about 300,000 Brasilians for this yearly event.  People from Holland settled here in 1948 after WW II and brought their flower-loving culture with them.  It seems that amarylis, roses and other hot house flowers are their specialty.  I think the climate doesn't get cold enough here to grow the best tulips.

It was a fun experience to go back to our Dutch "roots".... 

you remember that Grandma Golder was born in Holland.

 For the special week long festivities the locals dressed in their finest traditional dutch clothing and entertained  us with dancing, food, parades and beautiful flowers.

These are some of the participants in the parade.  On the right are the extremely tall dutch people with their little tiny feet (okay, they're on stilts - so scary for them!) and on the left are some girls in the drum line.  I love their ornately embroidered long aprons and traditional hats. 

Most participants wore the traditional wooden shoes.  They look pretty uncomfortable to me.  Imagine a shoe that has no cushion and doesn't have any "give" to conform to your feet!  The upside, I guess, is that there are no shoelaces to keep tied.

One of several floats in the parade displaying the beautiful roses that are grown here.

 This heart-shaped arbor is made of petunias.

 The main display building had several rooms filled with flowers.  This particular room happened to be the "white" room with all of the flowers in white and only the green of the leaves as contrast.  

It was gorgeous!

 The red room had a few other colors intermixed.

 This room had a variety of colors and flowers with mostly yellow and oranges.  Stunning!

This pink display was one of my favorites.........  

On the other hand, I don't think I could say that some were prettier than others. 

 They were all fabulous!

These roses were the most unusual of all.  They are multicolored, and although they're not my favorite, you've got to admit that they're very unique.  After research at home I found that they split the stems and put each one in different colored water.  The water is then drawn up into the petals making the rose multi-colored.    

The final celebration of the day included a short program of dancing and then the event everyone had been waiting for..... the "Rain of Petals" that were blown out over the crowd and also dropped from a helicopter.  The idea is that if you are able to catch one of the petals before it hits the ground, you will get your wish, whatever it may be.

Apparently a lot of people believed in it because the place was a mad house!
PS. Thankfully, the event was wheel chair friendly.