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Washington DC Cherry Blossom Festival: Parade and 10 mile run

by Amy Judd | April 4, 2009 at 07:50 am

1880 views | 15 Recommendations | 2 comments

The Washington DC Cherry Blossom Festival Parade and 10 mile run take place today in downtown DC and hundreds of thousands of people turned up for the event.
The parade started at 9:45 am on Constitution Avenue.

The Tidal Basin in DC is the perfect place to view the parade and crowds were already gathering Friday afternoon.

The Cherry Blossom 10-Mile Run and 5 K Run-Walk also took place this morning.

Three sporting events and the Cherry Blossom parade will make this a busy weekend in Downtown Washington. Metro is adding extra trains for all the Saturday activities. One of the most popular will be the Cherry Blossom Parade, which takes place on Constitution Avenue between 7th and 17th streets. "Jeopardy!" host Alex Trebek is the Grand Marshal.

"Bring your kids, have fun, enjoy the floats, enjoy the balloons and the bands -- I hope they're going to be a lot of bands. I love pipe bands," Trebek said.

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Uwe Paschen

at 09:39 on April 4th, 2009

We have our festivals going from the end of March till May as Japan has 4 climate zones. This is a big deal here and I am still working on a p. about it.

anartist on flickr

at 01:03 on April 6th, 2009

The cherry blossoms around the Tidal Basin are one of Washington DC's special delights. They are ethereal when at their peak, fluffy clouds of light pink above, a cool dappled pink shade below. I make sure I see them every year, and take my camera. People come from everywhere, many from Japan. The original trees were a gift from the Japanese. The Cherry Blossom Festival is also a celebration of Japanese culture and the Japanese Embassy helps with arrangements to bring in some of the Japanese performers.

anartist on flickr has contributed a photo to this story.