Caribana started in 1967 as a Trinidadian gift to Canada's centennial. Six decades later, it's the largest Caribbean street festival in North America — bigger than Notting Hill, bigger than Brooklyn's West Indian Day Parade.
The headline event is the Grand Parade: thousands of dancers in mas bands (elaborate feathered costumes that take a year to build) move 4 kilometres along Lakeshore Boulevard, soca on every truck-mounted speaker.
Around the parade is a full week of soca fetes, calypso competitions, and the King & Queen Showcase — costume designers compete for awards their grandparents won.
Caribana Lime (kickoff fete, July 30 evening). King & Queen Showcase (July 31, Hard Rock Stadium). GRAND PARADE — Saturday August 2, starts 11am sharp at Exhibition Place. Soca Brainwash & cool-down parties (August 3).
- ●Hot — high 20s to 30°C. Bring water and sunscreen
- ●Soca and dancehall everywhere; speakers on flatbed trucks loud enough to feel
- ●Costumes you have to see in person to believe — feathers, beads, bikinis layered with sequins
- ●Crowds from 10am Saturday all the way along Lakeshore
- 01Get to Exhibition Place by 10am for the parade — it does NOT wait for stragglers
- 02White or bright outfits = read like a local. Tourist-clean sneakers = read like a tourist
- 03After the parade: Soca Brainwash and the LIME after-parties Saturday night are where it really goes off
- 04Rideshares surge 4x on Saturday afternoon — book a chauffeur the night before
- 05The food trucks behind the main stage at Lamport Stadium do the best jerk chicken in the city, only this weekend
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