Monday, January 25, 2010

Tampa: Gasparilla Pirate Festival

The 106th annual Gasparilla Pirate Festival and Parade will be this Saturday, January 30th, in Tampa, Florida.

This Mardi-Gras-style festival celebrates the (probably folkloric) pirate José Gaspar, who supposedly hailed from Spain and operated along the west coast of Florida in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.

Official site: www.gasparillapiratefest.com (beware noisy Flash site)

1 comment:

  1. All my research on the Laffite operations in Barataria and Galveston points to Gaspar being a figment of Spain's imagination. But good times, none-the-less!

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