It's Notting Hill Carnival Time!

The last Bank holiday weekend in August equals Notting Hill Carnival. It's been about 10 years since I last went due to me developing a greater and greater dislike for crowds as I've got older. However, I thought if I arrived early, like 2pm'ish, I'd beat the worst crowds and maybe get the chance to see some of the costumes, get to sample some jerk chicken (the queues were already forming at 3pm) and not be trampled to death when trying to find a tube station that's open to take me back home.

There were already hundreds of people making their way to the carnival.

Lots of police too.

There were many happy, colourful, dancing people... and there was NOISE!

Now these girls know how to shake their booties.

Although this elderly lady was walking with a walking stick it wasn't going to stop her from being part of the carnival.

Fixing the costume. You wouldn't want the skirt to fall off in front of all those people.

Some people's costumes were not as fabulous as others....

These drumming guys were absolutely amazing. I wish I could have recorded the sound.

There were plenty of food stalls.

And after some queueing I got my jerk chicken. I even found an empty spot to sit on the street in between two cars. Classy!

People were having house parties. Or maybe they were hijacking someone's windowsill... yeah, that's more likely.

Last but not least... these crazy people were dancing like mad to Michael Jackson outside their windows with no safety nets whatsoever.

God forbid that they eventually got too drunk or dizzy from dancing and fell down on the pavement. Jeeez, I hope not!