If you’ve never experienced the annual Beach Avenue Parade (http://www.vanrathfest.com/), this is your chance and you can even be a part of it! It’s a beautiful mix of people and smiles flowing along Beach Avenue and ending in Stanley Park at the Ratha-Yatra festival where they offer free vegetarian meels for thousands of people. It’s just magical and beautiful, that’s it.

Last year the big surprise was the ornate floats and costumes along with the super friendly people in the parade that all welcomed the hugs with wonderful smiles. Parades are normally fast-paced and hectic, but walking along with the people of this parade and offering free hugs to the spectators is a peaceful and fulfilling experience.

We’ve been personally invited to attend again this year and the more friendly people that can join us, the better. We’ll be meeting up shortly before the parade (11:00-11:15am) under the Burrard Bridge (near the parking lot) at 1005 Beach Avenue to get organized, then we’ll interact (and hug) the people of the parade before setting out on our journey. Anyone is free to leave the parade at any point, but if you make it to the end, you can enjoy the parade and food, then they offer free shuttles back to the start if needed.

We can loan out matching “FREE HUGS” shirts for the event so that we’re all a unified (and colorful) group so please contact us via Facebook or http://hugsarenice.com/ to tell us your shirt size in advance if you would like to borrow one.

Never given out free hugs before? Check out http://www.improvanywhere.ca/freehugs.html and http://hugsarenice.com/ to learn all about it, then just show up with open arms and a smile and that’s all there is to it! This event is totally free, takes no preparation, and requires no commitment whatsoever – give it a shot and feel free to leave at any time if it’s not for you. But just so you know, you’ll likely find yourself hooked within minutes and you won’t want to leave even after everyone else is gone.