The Rose Bowl -- Univesity of Oregon vs. University of Wisconsin

The day of the game, Jan 2, 2012. I was meeting my friends from college days early at the Rose Bowl Stadium.

We all wanted to take in the excitement and anticipation of the game, and heck it is a championship football game. People who were for Wisconsin dressed up in bright red shirts, and Oregon bright Yellow and green. We all wanted to get our picture taken in front of the "Rose Bowl" sign. The day was just gorgeous, typical southern California blue sky and by 10am you can tell that the temperature was going to be above 80F for the day.

Rose Bowl Stadium has a seating capacity of 90,000 plus and has a beautiful view of the mountains....

As the morning progressed, more and more people started to fill the stadium.

With huge cheers the team from University of Oregon ran onto the field.

Then the University of Wisconsin team ran onto the field with even louder cheers...

With fireworks,

With a Stealth Bomber flyby,

The 98th Rose Bowl championship between U of Oregon and U of Wisconsin kicked off...

To be continued.......

The day before the Rose Bowl in Pasadena Calif - Part 2

Another area that I was able to observe was where the Cal-Poly University students were making their huge float. This float was totally constructed by the students and as we watched, they were busying themselves with putting the flowers one by one on to the float... The Cal-Poly float was one of very few that was covered in all California grown flowers. No material from other countries was used to decorate it....

This was the area where they kept the flowers before being prepared and used.

Some younger volunteers stripping just the flower petals to be used on the float.

This showed a basic structure and the way the floats were built...

Samples of the natural materials and their variety of colors and textures...

Little closer details of the float and yes they did use the whole potatoes as the cobble stones.

This was a very clever and nice way to ask for donations. You paid $2 and addressed a "To the Rescue" post card. The day of the Parade, the card rode on the Cal Poly University float. After being stamped with "This card rode in the Cal Ploy float January 2, 2012" it was sent back to the addressee. Of course I got mine a few days after the Rose Parade....

In the same area, there were antique cars all decorated with flowers that were going to be used in the Parade. Photographs below are for the Grand Marshall, and for the Tournament of Roses President.

My visit to the float making was a lot more than I had expected. I saw many beautiful floats decorated with breath taking flowers, shopped a little, received University of Oregon colored roses, met many nice people and took vast amount of photographs. Next year? I hope I can make it back and actually see the parade itself...