In this entry, I'll be walking you through the events of this year's Leicester pride! The march started at the Curve Theatre and made it's way to Abbey Park for the pride festival itself. (Shot on Samsung S23 Ultra)
So let's take you back to the start of the day, me and Ellie boarded the Park-And-Ride Shuttle Bus to Leicester City. Centre, at around noon. Not much later, I believe around twelve thirty? We got dropped off at Jubilee Square, home to the city's biggest night club, 'Mosh'. I actually thought we'd miss the parade but we ended up joining in the middle at Jubilee Square, so that was lucky!
So as I said, we joined what looked and felt like the middle of the parade, right off the bus! At noon the parade started at the Curve Theatre and gradually would loop around the city, leading to Abbey Park. To be a part of the parade (and a pride festival in general) for the first time, was amazing, this took me alot of years to get to a comfortable point and confidence but I'm glad I finally went to one!
Here's the routes and timing of everything so you can have a better idea of what the day was like! These are official graphics from the Leicesterpride Facebook page.
As we continue to stroll on through the city, we eventually came across a lady running a stand long the path of the march. She had alsorts of lovely pride paraphernalia in her wagon, it felt opportune to purchase something from her as she'd most likely be cheaper than any market stalls inside the event, selling the same things. To which we found out later that she was in-fact, much cheaper. The fan I purchased from her wood of been not five pounds but twenty pounds at an in-house retailer, along with Ellie's Bi flag being around twenty five instead of a tenner. Big savings by supporting the independent sellers!
At the pride march, before even entering the event, I saw so many familiar faces! Some I chose to approach as they were good friends, others I chose to turn my head and hide as they were... old chats from apps, avenues I didn't feel needed to be explored further... Let's just leave them at that. But it was nice to see friends and positive familiar faces! So it worked out.
After getting through baggage check successfully, we proceeded to hover around the entrance in waiting for our friends, Renee and Dyl. These were the people that would make up our main group, us four peeps hanging out. And can we just take a moment to appreciate how stunning everyone looks? Give it up for Miss Dyl especially, everyone!
We collectively sat by the party tent for a bit then proceeded to let Renee take the reigns and show us the way, while the other three had been to prides before, this was my first one so I needed to be shown around a bit. In previous years pride was held at Victoria Park, but I'm so glad the team moved Pride to Abbey Park as this venue makes so much more sense, the area was lovely and spacious. Thousands must of attended so it felt like anyway, but with it being so spacious the event wasn't impossible to navigate. I couldn't imagine how crowded the previous ones must of felt at Victoria Park.
Much to her mother's delight, Ellie found more things to splurge money on, she found these cute Malibu earrings along with some Dino earrings later on in the day. They're quite nice I must say.
One of these massive advertising chairs you can find at events and even a few permanent ones dotted around the city plus outskirts. I couldn't pass on the opportunity to get a photo on this massive chair and made sure Ellie got on it too! Helsinki is one of Leicesters top gay bars for those that might not know or are from elsewhere.
Having ads everywhere in real life sounds dystopian, but I think if done in that right way they can be quite fun and get people talking about a product, person, place, in a positive light. Finding a way to associate advertisement with what will be a fun memory for the people, is the best way to go.
Will I ever financially recover from buying this ring? Well at fifteen pounds I'm not so sure, but I love it so I decided I'll make it work, If I can't afford dinner then oh well! Kidding, festivals are fun but pricey, pride was free entry but you'll definitely find yourself still spending a fair bit, all in all I spent £40ish
Pride was such a fun, happy and colourful festival to go to, I couldn't recommend it enough and we had people of all ages and backgrounds attending. Truly beautiful.
One of my few food purchases on the grounds was this Dick waffle, I don't even know what else to say. I couldn't pass on the opportunity! The guy running the stand was hilarious, there's 5 different coatings you can have it dipped into. And as he does this, after a certain point he says 'Want me to go deeper?' to which I replied 'Surprise me'. It was quite the experience to say the least, he had loads of dips and toppings at no extra cost, so worth the money in my opinion. It was I believe four pounds, not bad for a festive by any means, probably the cheapest food there infact it was cheaper than the four pounds fifty tray of chips!
I'll leave this final photo here along with a link to the YouTube channel for this blog, where you can watch some of the clips I took while at Leicester Pride. I give a big thank you to my friends that came along with me and can't wait to go to the next one!
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