Sunday promises to be one of the Penticton's most colourful days of the year.
The action kicks off at 10 am at the Loco Landing parking lot with the official start of the 2023 "Wildstone's Colours4Kids Run," and continues in the early afternoon with the 2023 "Walkin' and Rollin' Pride Parade."
More on the latter is a moment. First up, the Colours4Kids Run, a wild and wacky event where participants get repeatedly blasted with coloured powder as they run and/or walk 2.5-kilometer or 5-kilometer loops.
It's truly a amazing scene -- laughing people running this way and that and huge clouds of colour wafting into the morning sky. It hasn’t been seen since 2019, the last year of the event before COVID temporarily shut it down.
Back then it attracted 800 fun-loving people and pulled in a stupendous $21,580 for its beneficiary -- the OSNS Child & Youth Development Centre.
You can still register for the 2023 Colours4Kids Run online by going here or in-person Sunday morning at the LocoLanding start line at 75 Riverside Drive. The latter option will cost you more ($25 versus $20).
But wait. There's more. And it unfolds just down the street from the Run.
It's the 2023 Walkin' and Rollin' Pride Parade, and it begins at 1 pm at the SS Sicamous.
The event is just one of several planned for the city during Pride Month, and is a follow-up to 2022's "Rolling Pride Parade," the first-ever Penticton Pride parade and a product of local educator Rachel Beeson and the Penticton Roller Skate organization.
This time around, it's the South Okanagan Similkameen Pride Society (SOS Pride) at the helm, and SOS Pride spokesperson Heather Adamson seems rather thrilled about the whole thing.
"We'll meet on the front lawn of the Sicamous," she said. "We'll play some music, we'll wait for people to gather, we'll hand out stickers and flags and signs, we'll do a welcome and a land acknowledgement. And then the SS Sicamous will blow its big horn to start us off."
The procession will head east along the Lakeshore Drive boardwalk to the Activate Penticton outdoor rink (de-iced for summer, of course) at 107 Martin St., where there'll be a dance/roller skating party, food trucks, community organization tents, and more.
"We do think it's cool that the Colours4Kids Run is happening right before our event," said Adamson, "because the parking lot at Loco Landing and streets near the Sicamous, right where we start, will be a flood of colour. That's appropriate for us."
Adamson made it clear that everyone is welcome at the parade, regardless of ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, economic status, religion, or roller skating ability.
"We have awesome allies," she said. "And this year, we're really promoting the 'walk' part of it. You don't need to know how to skate to join in. We're really encouraging everyone to come out and show their pride and their support by skating, walking or riding."
According to Adamson, events like the parade and others like it exist not just as celebrations, but as statements.
"The human rights of the 2SLGBTQIA+ are still discriminated against," she said. "There's still homophobia, there's still transphobia. Even though we have new legislative protection for ourselves and our lives, the lingering discrimination from decades and decades of laws and societal views are still there.
"So we need to make ourselves seen and heard and we need to be visible, and make sure the general society sees us and that we span all demographics."
Being part of the 2023 Walkin' and Rollin' Pride Parade -- and the subsequent dance party -- is absolutely free. To join in, just show up at the SS Sicamous Sunday afternoon at 1 pm or perhaps even a few minutes early. And continue what promises to be Penticton's most colourful day of the year.
