Gibraltar celebrates Three Kings’ Cavalcade with high turnout

Some 20 floats, bands and walking floats took to Main Street on Friday night for this year’s Three King Cavalcade, with high participation in the event.

Main Street was buzzing with young children and families, excited to watch the fun themed floats drive-by.

Many too were eager to collect their sweets from Gibraltar Cultural Services staff and volunteers.

This year’s event was the second time the Cavalcade has been held since the Covid-19 pandemic, with Gibraltar rallying behind the event.

Some 11 trailer floats, five walking floats and four bands took part in the 2024 Cavalcade, and four more entities expressed interest but were unable to participate due to a lack of trailers.

This Cavalcade was the year of Super Mario themed floats, with both scooping top prizes.

The Senior winners were ‘We are family’ with their Super Mario themed float, GJBS came in second also with their Super Mario float, and in third place was the Bus Company with their Wednesday Addams float.

The Junior winners were the 1st/4th Scouts celebrating 20 years of the Beavers with their ‘Smurfs’ float. In second place was the Youth Service with their ‘Nightmare before Christmas’ float and in third place was Special Ops with their ‘Fortnite’ float.

The ‘We are family’ group marked their seventh year taking part in the Cavalcade, having previously entered as the Balloqui family.

The 30-strong extended family, decided to change their name to reflect the different branches of their family who every year come together to create a fun float for the community.

The family began taking part in the Cavalcade 2015, now each year looking forward and planning ahead.

This year's float was inspired by Super Mario, the Nintendo game series much loved by children.

“We wanted something colourful and with music and hilarious for the kids,” Zyna Smith said.

For the family group, getting a float together and finding a trailer has been hard work.

“We’ve done it in eight days because we didn’t get the trailer till the 22nd [December],” she said.

“It’s been hard work, but the kids enjoy it.”

The family started looking for trailers in August but didn’t secure a confirmation they would receive a trailer until October.

They were able to begin work and access the trailer on December 22, working on the float for around eight days, from early morning to late at night.

The family have also been sponsored by Ms Smith’s workplace Acquarius, with around 12 family members working on the float during the break.

“We’re there from 10.30am till about 8 or 9 at night,” she said.

“We go every day. We take tea, we take the sandwiches and it’s fun. It’s like having a picnic.”

Senior Manager at GJBS, Stephen Valarino, told the Chronicle team at GJBS agreed on the Super Mario themed float as they thought it was inclusive for children.

“We normally start the first week in December,” Mr Valarino.

“Getting together the idea starts straight after summer.”

“We have a couple of meetings and that takes longer than actually building the thing, getting people to agree. So the actual physical work is in December.”

The team received the trailer two weeks ago but work had begun before.

“We had been doing some work away from the trailer and then we bring it all together on the trailer,” he said.

GJBS also build the nativity themed float for the Cavalcade, which is not a competitive float.

The family and friends of the Bus Company put together their Wednesday Addams float, after hearing about the Cavalcade committees call for more participants.

Alfred Porro said around 80% of the materials used had been recycled and the float took four weeks to complete.

He thanked their sponsors and Government Minister John Cortes for allowed the Bus Company to use their premises to build the float.

Before setting off on Friday evening Mr Porro said he hoped Gibraltar enjoys their efforts.

“We’ve all tried produce our best of the series on Wednesday,” he said.

“I hope everybody enjoys it. When we do go along, I hope that the children along the route will be able to join in and dance with us.”

In a special celebration, the 1st/4th Scouts decided to build a float to mark 20 years of the Beaver Scouts, the youngest section of the Scout Group for six to eight year olds in Gibraltar.

Jonathan Saccone said work began on their ‘Smurfs’ float on December 12 on building the basic structure.

By December 22 teams came together to work on the float, taking it in shifts and working from 8am to around 10pm to 11pm.

The night before the Cavalcade the team perfected their float until 1.30am, with around 16 to 20 people pitching in.

Mr Saccone told the Chronicle taking part in the Cavalcade had been an amazing time for all those involved.

Youngsters across the Youth Service voted for the theme of their Cavalcade float selecting the ‘Nightmare before Christmas’.

Around 50 youngsters have taken part in creating the float, with a core of five doing the bulk of the work.

“It’s something so lovely to be a part of because the young people get to be involved in a community event,” Youth and Community Worker Aroa Nuñez said.

She added: “It’s something that every year we take part and young people are able to be part of the community.”

Special Ops Gibraltar have entered the Cavalcade throughout the past few years, with this year’s float focused on the online game Fortnite.

“The theme is kids are very much on their electronic devices and you’ve got a lone gamer in his bedroom watching laser tag on the tv rather than playing Fortnite on his playstation or xbox,” Blythe Reeves said.

“While he could be [playing laser tag] for real with his friends rather than online.”

Mr Reeves said the float served to highlight how youngsters are addicted to their game consoles, and highlight their laser tag activities which are in person and where children can have fun with friends.