Chinese New Year Parade

February 23

San Francisco's Chinese New Year Parade is the largest celebration of its kind outside of Asia. Over 100 parade units will participate in 2008, many featuring the theme of this year's Chinese zodiac sign, the Rat. Nowhere in the world will you see a lunar new year parade with more gorgeous floats, elaborate costumes, ferocious lions, and exploding firecrackers.

Parade highlights include elaborately decorated floats, school marching bands, martial artists, stilt walkers, lion dancers, Chinese acrobatics, the newly crowned Miss Chinatown USA, and the Golden Dragon. The Golden Dragon is 201 feet long and is always featured at the end of the parade as the grand finale. It takes a team of 100 men and women to carry the Golden Dragon, accompanied by more than 600,000 firecrackers!

Chinese New Year is a two-week spring festival celebrated for more than 5,000 years in China. The San Francisco Chinese New Year celebration originated in the 1860s during the Gold Rush days and is now the largest Asian event in North America.

The celebration includes two major fairs, the Chinese New Year Flower Fair (February 2-3) and the Chinatown Community Street Fair (February 23-24). The highlight of the festivities is the spectacular Chinese New Year Parade (February 23).