The town of Moraga celebrated its 50th anniversary with a festive parade near SiSi’s Cafe, past Moraga Country Club on Saturday, September 29. Members of Campo Cheer and Leadership attended the parade. Local groups also walked in the parade including California Academy for Performing Arts (CAPA), Joy in Motion, Boy Scouts, Lamorinda Idol, Saklan Elementary School. Stilt walkers and vintage cars added to the exciting parade atmosphere in Moraga from 10 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. The unusual sight of police on horses were also seen marching through the streets to celebrate Moraga’s history.
Sophomore Leadership student Nora Lawrence helped to organize the lively parade. Different leadership groups were assigned to different parts of the parade to ensure everything ran smoothly. The students wore their Leadership jerseys under yellow construction vests.
Lawrence was stationed with, “the Park Foundation and the librarians [from the Moraga Library].” Lawrence said she “enjoyed hearing about stuff going on in our community…The librarians talked with me a lot…they said they’re doing a book sale at some point.”
Also on Saturday, the annual Pear and Wine Festival took place at Moraga Commons Park. During the sunny afternoon hours the park was busy with a variety of activities including bouncy houses and numerous booths. “The entire park from end to end was completely full of booths and there were a lot of different companies and nonprofits organizing their work,” said senior Vivian Tolajian. She also enjoyed seeing, “the live band and a lot of people selling food and homemade products and all the kids running around the playground. It was nice, it felt like one of the [Moraga summer] concerts.”
Tolajian and fellow senior Ella Dunn ran the Campo Environmental Club booth exhibiting student artwork and selling honey made by 4-H participants. 4-H stands for Head, Heart, Hands and Health. It’s a non-profit youth development program run by the US Department of Agriculture.
The goal of the Environmental Club booth was overall, “to help support a local student-run business…they brought out the rabbits and goats and all the proceeds go to helping improve the Campo garden,” said Tolajian.
Along with manning the booth, Dunn, “walked around and got a few cards from some of the art booths I really liked and I found some cool food.” Dunn’s favorite part of the festival was, “seeing all the young kids…It’s nice to see that new families are coming to Moraga and some new ideas and traditions.”
