Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Preview: St. Patrick's Day - This Year on the 17th! Let's Dye the Chicago River Green!

Chicago's St. Patrick's celebration this year will be something we haven't seen for quite some time.

Firstly, it will actually take place on St. Patrick's Day. This year, the 17th falls on a Saturday.  The ceremony of the speedboats, turning orange dye to a green river, has an official start time of 10:00 a.m., March 17th, 2012, but arrive early.  Best viewing along the river from Columbus Drive to Michigan Avenue.  The annual parade kicks off at Columbus and Balbo at noon.

Secondly, for the first time I can remember, it won't be cold and damp. It'll be warm and windy, with a good chance that the all-time record high of 74 will be eclipsed.

We hope to get pictures of this year's edition of all the annual rituals - dyeing the Chicago river green, drinking green beer, wearing green hats, and placing flowers at the statue of Greene Vardiman Black, the father of modern dentistry.

For now, a photo essay from last year. We really liked some of these pictures, although we were the only ones.




Created with flickr slideshow from softsea. move your mouse over the image area to hide and display menus. click on individual images for more options

And give you this short video . . .

1 comment:

Terry Murray said...

Sorry I missed these pix last year. I like them too! And I'm looking forward to your documentation of this year's festivities. (Man, that river is really green!)