CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — The first annual 'Parti Gras' took place in Aransas Pass today, and it brings a little taste of New Orleans to the Coastal Bend. The festivities kicked off this Saturday at 10:00 a.m. with a parade down Commercial Street.
From the music to the food to a few costumes, the event was an authentic peek into the celebration of Mardi Gras.
"We're in the gumbo contest and we made seafood gumbo with crab and shrimp and sausage and it's pretty much number one right now." said Frank McKnight, showing off his cooking.
Parti Gras is hosted by the Aransas Pass Chamber of Commerce (APCC), and after their parade, they blocked Commercial street off so vendors and performers could set up to keep the fun going.
We spoke with Rosemary Vega, CEO of the APCC about what this celebration was all about: "It was a way to ignite the downtown to really kind of inspire people to be alive and active and to bring people and traffic, you know foot traffic, into our commercial businesses down here."
And the amount of people that showed up today was a great surprise for a community that thrives mostly during summer vacation.
"For us as a city we recognize that there's a huge demand for activities in our community and everybody just kind of embraced this idea and it's just been really surprisingly amazing for us."
Liz Dorris of Destination Aransas Pass agreed. "Pardi Gras," she said, "We came up with the idea a couple years ago and we finally launched it so yes it's been a success today. It's been a great success."
The Gumbo competition also brought out the competitive side of the community. Prizes range from hundreds of dollars, to a complete trip to New Orleans.
Frank, with his seafood gumbo, was downright jazzed. "I hope this continues, Aransas Pass needs this, I mean it's awesome. Aransas Pass is an awesome community." he told us.
With a few weeks left before Mardi Gras day, Parti Gras is giving Aransas Pass an excuse to get the celebration started, and take a break from the cooler weather.
This year, Fat Tuesday falls on March 2. If everything goes according to plan, the APCC plans to make Parti Gras an annual event.
For the latest updates on coronavirus in the Coastal Bend, click here.
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