While much of Europe enters the solemn weeks before Easter, the party is just getting started in France’s Ribera.
MENTON, France — While most of Europe enters the solemn weeks before Easter, the party is just getting started on the French Rivera.
The Mediterranean town of Menton celebrated the upcoming Paris Olympics by showing off its lush citrus fruits at Sunday’s Carnival parade. Sculptures of athletes made of lemons and oranges decorated the streets and rode on giant floats.
Rivera’s capital, Nice, kicked off its annual carnival season Saturday night with a parade of pop-culture-themed lights and extravagant floats, with “Star Wars” character Luke Skywalker as king and super Marilyn Monroe, dressed as a woman, appeared as the king. Queen.
Both festivals, held on France’s Mediterranean coast, derive from the medieval Mardi Gras tradition of staging public spectacles for visiting European aristocrats. Modern versions of Carnival over the past century have mocked politicians and public figures.
But the weekend parades in Nice and Menton avoided divisive politics and tragic events and instead focused on celebrating the achievements of film, music, art and sport.
“Paris hosts the Olympics, so we wanted to pay homage to them,” said Christophe Guilena, technical director of the Lemon Festival in Menton (‘Fête du Citron’).
The theme of the 90th Lemon Festival is “From Olympia to Menton”. Ten floats carried tennis, rugby and badminton players, boxers, swimmers, equestrians and a giant figure of a surfer called John Lemmon along the seaside promenade, allowing visitors to explore the town’s population of 33,000. doubled the number of people.
For each float and historical scene that lined Menton’s Les Jardins Bioves Park, up to three tonnes of fruit was secured with rubber bands to attached wire frames and shaped into shapes that reflected the Olympic theme. The Greek goddess of victory and the ancient Olympic discus and javelin throwers were joined as representatives of modern athletes.
Located between France’s Southern Alps and the Mediterranean Sea, Menton was once one of Europe’s leading lemon-growing regions, but today there are only 15 producers. More than 140 tons of citrus fruits used to assemble the floats and park exhibits were imported from Spain.
“Locally produced lemons alone are not enough to host a lemon festival,” said Marine Klenck, event manager for the Menton Tourism Board. “Honestly, we’d rather people actually taste lemons than see them in stores.”
According to local legend, King Louis XIV of France drank the juice of Menton lemons, bathed in essential oils and enjoyed the juice. In Nice, mechanical puppets of Luke Skywalker and Marilyn Monroe were crowned with bright lights, cheers and confetti as they took their thrones in the central square to the tune of the Star Wars theme.
In keeping with this year’s parade theme, the king and queen will oversee their subjects and other pop culture icons in a series of parades until the end of the month when they will be burned and buried. Barbie, Wednesday from “The Addams Family” and Indiana Jones are other characters on the float.
A politician appeared to join the crowd at the Nice parade on Saturday. It looked like Donald Trump, until Philippe Huzan, a visitor from Paris, unmasked the former US president.
“He’s a man of character,” Uzan said as confetti rained down on his Stars and Stripes suit.