When life gives you lemons..........find some oranges and throw a big festival!

We broke out our fanciest clothes for the Fete du Citron!

In 1935 the city of Menton was looking for a way to attract visitors during the winter months.  Several years prior, the hotel operators came up with the idea of an annual carnival.  It was successful and they started to explore ways to make it bigger and better.  The region was already known for producing some of Europe's finest lemon crops and someone came up with the idea of celebrating the lemon.  I'm sure whoever had this idea departed this earth many years ago, but I think they'd be amazed at what their idea has grown into over the past eighty four years.
Over several weeks in February and early March the city of Menton, which has a population of around 28,000 will attract over 250,000 visitors.  According to Google Translate, "Fete Du Citron" means "Lemon Party", and some party it is!  There are parades, gigantic artistic displays made of lemons and oranges, fireworks, food, drink and so much more.
We had purchased tickets in advance for both the display garden and the final parade.  As has been the case for everyday of this two week adventure, the weather cooperated completely.  Under sunny skies and a temperature of around 60 degrees we took off from the condo around 8:30 for the short walk to the train station.  Even though it was pretty early on a Sunday morning the train was fairly crowded as folks headed for Menton.  I guess you could say we were all getting an early "tart".
The display garden had only been open for a few minutes when we arrived but a line was already forming around the entry.  As we entered the first word out of my mouth was WOW! The displays were absolutely amazing!  This years theme was "Fantasy World" and the thirteen displays, some measuring over forty feet high, were built around the theme.
The WOW I so intelligently offered up could apply to so many things;
WOW, there are a lot of people in here!
WOW, these displays are really creative!
WOW, this is bigger than I anticipated!
But mainly it was, WOW, that's a lot of lemons and oranges!
Beth and I did a little research after we got back to the condo.  To create this impressive garden takes more than 400 workers and 20,000 hours.  The frames for the displays are constructed with over 15 tons of steel.  Close to 300,000 pounds of lemons and oranges are used and are held in place by more than 750,000 rubber bands!  During the festival there are 12 people whose specific job is to monitor the fruit and replace any fruit that has deteriorated  These 12 folks are to be commended.  That's a lot of fruit to monitor, and while we didn't inspect every piece, we only saw one orange that wasn't looking real good.

After spending an hour or so in the garden we headed out to explore Menton and grab some lunch before the 2:30 parade.  As with the other French Riviera cities we have visited, there was a nice waterfront promenade.  Menton is practically on the France/Italy border.  So as we were sitting in the French Riviera soaking up the atmosphere, we were gazing across the harbor at the Italian Riviera.
As we had done for the Carnival Parade in Nice, we had purchased grandstand seats instead of opting for "standing room".  Again, the few extra dollars for the seats seemed to be a good investment, especially since the crowds in the standing room area were about 4-5 people deep.
In keeping with the theme of "Fantasy World" there were all types of mythical creatures. There were unicorns, dragons, giant butterflies and fairies mixed in among the floats decorated with oranges and lemons.  As I mentioned in the blog about the Nice Carnival Parade, I'm not much of a parade guy but in the span of less than a week I've seen the two best parades I've ever seen!

Menton waterfront

Looking across the Menton Harbor...…..that's Italy in the background

Some pictures from the parade

Thousands of bags full of confetti were thrown or shot into the crowd during the parade.

This float shot out "snow" (soap bubbles)

The crowds were huge and had arrived over a span of several hours.  We knew that once the parade was over everyone would want to leave at the same time so we headed out just a few minutes before the end.  As our full train pulled out of the station we saw long lines for the next train which wasn't due to depart for 30 minutes.  We celebrated our decision with one final ice cream at the store conveniently located between the train station and the condo.
There was one final burning question about the festival we had to answer.  What do they do with all those lemons and oranges once the festival is over?  Beth quickly found the answer.  The lemons and oranges that have deteriorated, which is around half of them, are hauled away for composting.  Those that are deemed to be in good shape are sold at a deep discount!  According to what she learned, in recent years the going price was around .50 euros per kilogram, which works out to roughly sixty cents for 2.2 pounds.  Hundreds of people line up and the fruit is quickly sold.
Tomorrow is moving day.  We'll pack it up in the morning, enjoy a few final minutes on the terrace overlooking the harbor, before heading for the airport.  We'll spend tomorrow night at an airport hotel in Paris before heading back to the US.  There are so many wonderful places to visit.  This adventure has let us revisit a few of our favorites from the past as well as discover some new ones.  The journey continues...……...