Vancouver Pride Review

The 2014 Vancouver Pride Weekend came and went like the blur I expected to be, but what a great time!

(Un)fortunately, Mr. P had an opportunity to go camping in Washington and Oregon with some good friends so he decided to go. Even though I was going to miss him over the weekend, we both agreed that it would be best for him to get out of the city and recharge and heal given he hasn't been out of the city since before the cancer diagnosis and amputation. He's coming home tonight and I think he'll be in a much better and healthier headspace than before he left. At any rate, we're going back to Shadow Falls for this upcoming weekend as well as the August 23rd and August 30 weekends (Labour Day weekend).

As it turns out, Vancouver Pride is on the Canadian August long weekend, which in British Columbia is celebrated as the BC Day Civic Holiday. The other provinces have other name for statutory holiday on the first Monday in August, some eloquently called 'Civic holiday'. True.

So, I spent the weekend with old friends and new friends. Friday evening on my way home I stopped in East Van for a couple beers with some friends from Calgary. After a good visit I headed downtown to meet James and Stu as we planned to rubber up and head out into the crowds at the Telus Street Festival on Davie Street celebrating the opening of the Pride Weekend.

Once the guys came over, dressed and had a few beers, we headed into the crowds. We did a few circles up and down the closed street from Burrard to Jervis and back, handing out promotional cards for the Rubbout Pride Party on Saturday night, and of course running into lots of friends, including Rob, Andy, and Doug and Hugh, handsomely dressed in their head-to-toe leather.

That Tigger is such a big bottom....

The lineups into the beer garden and the bars were so huge by 10pm we didn't really know what to do next. Stu had bailed on us earlier and managed to get into Pumpjack, and James sweet talked the bouncer that he knew well to get in but he would only allow one, so I was sort of abandoned. I went home for awhile, and then finally decided to check out the Vancouver Men in Leather Den 4 Men at 8x6. I got there around 12:45 and the place was basically empty. I was told by the owners that there had been around 40 guys there at the peak. I was planning on packing up my locker and leaving, but caught a glimpse of a cute couple coming out of the playroom. I chatted them up a bit in the locker area to find out where they were heading next and they informed me that they were heading into Stanley Park form some late night playing.

They asked me to join them so I decided to. I had never fooled around in the Park before, so this was a Pride adventure for me!

We milled around the cruisey area in the Park for awhile, and eventually ran into a pair of other cute guys in one of the clearings. We all fooled around for a bit, but I learned (not surprisingly) that these guys were big on the drugs and bareback sex so it sort of turned me off and I decided to pull out of the action a bit. There were a lot of other guys voyeuring around the action but not getting involved and a few other flareups of activity happening. It wasn't quite what I thought the session would be but it wasn't a surprise by any means.

We decided to head out of the park. One of the guys I went with buzzed out on too much GHB so I chatted with the other guy for awhile and then the other guys we were playing with showed up. They were heading into another area of the park. I left and suspected the other two were going to join them again.

Rubbermen with a cute balloon man.

Anyways, I climbed back up the Slope to Davie Village. Around 3:05 I walked past Pumpjack and ran into friends outside for a smoke. They told me the bars had extended serving licenses this weekend, so Pumpjack was serving until 4am. I went in for a beer, didn't really see anyone I knew other than a couple friends on the street, so I finished my beer and went home.

Saturday morning I slept in, and basically got up and headed over to 8x6 to help decorate and take banners and equipment over there. We decorated from 1 until 4:30 and I must say the place looked great. As I was heading home I got a message from Higherlycra, a great play buddy that I haven't seen in a long time that was in Vancouver en route back to school and who had just gotten himself free from the group he was hanging out with on the weekend. I swung by and picked him up. We went back to the condo, rubbered up and played in the sling until 9pm, when we got ready to head to the Rubbout Pride Party.

We got there at 10pm. The place wasn't very busy but it was full of many of my friends and playmates so I was happy. We had a lot of fun socializing, making friends and playing in the playroom. At the end of the night it was tallied that we had 80 paid tickets through the door. I was disappointed with the numbers, however we put on a great party...and considering all the competition I guess we didn't do too bad. Also, it's important to consider all the great feedback I got about the venue, our party and the fun that the guys that attended had. That made my day! :)

It's too bad that so many think the location on Denman is so far from Davie Village because 8x6 is a great club with a great mission statement and I think they should be wholly supported by the community. However this does not appear to be the case.

There was a bit of animosity in the fact that Pumpjack announced they were doing a leather/rubber/fetish party the same night just three weeks before Pride when we had been promoting the Rubbout pride party since June. I don't know if it was coincidental or intentional, but it certainly would have hurt our numbers. I think some of the big parties were just too important for too many gay men not too miss. At any rate I had a blast at the Rubbout party and I truly do appreciate and thank those that made the effort to attend.

As it turned out, Highlycra ended up playing with J and S for awhile, and I ran into Wardog, Tuchus' boy who was at the party on his own. We chatted for awhile then decided to do some fisting in the playroom. Time must've flown by because by the time we were done, the club was effectively empty again. Wardog, Higherlycra, Kinx, Lucien and I left together and walked back to the Village. Lucien went back to his hotel but the four of us went back to the condo to play. Kinx left for awhile but the three of us fooled around; we even donned my M. Stevens ballet gear and rolled around in bed before heading back to the sling for awhile longer!

Kinx came back and joined us for awhile however both him and Higherlycra left late night and Wardog and I continued to play until 6:30 before we crashed.

James and SG came over to do James' pride party makeup at 8:30 on Sunday because I had the 'coolest place of all three of us'. Wardog and I continued to sleep though we started to stir around 10:30 and had a quick sex romp in bed while James waited for us to get up. A bit rude, perhaps, but we were still horny from the night before!

We got up, Wardog had to meet friends for the Parade which started at noon; I got ready and James and I headed over to Mr. P and my friend's place on Harwood for a mimosa before heading to Ldk, Mark and ICs place for their Pride 'Luncheon' which technically went all afternoon.

We got glimpses of the Parade from their place on Barclay and Denman (my old neighborhood), and learned there were estimates of 500,000 at the parade, down some from previous years, but the parade still went on for 3.5 hours. It was a hot day, I was happy I wasn't broiling at street level, especially in latex.

Wardog's turn...what a cute pup he is!

We had a great time there, but considering all the work James did on his makeup we decided we needed to make it to Davie Village again to show him off. We got into Pumpjack around 6. I stayed until 9 or so, then went home as Wardog was supposed to come over again. He got back over around 10:30 and we proceeded to play again until 4:30am on Monday morning. We slept in until 11:30am, got up relaxed a bit then back into the sling around 3 for a few more sessions until 8pm went he went back to his Sirs' place for food and sleep.

I was still buzzing after he left and spent the rest of the evening cleaning up the sex disaster in the condo in preparation for Mr. P's return tonight from his trip. I still have floors to wash but pretty much everything else is done.

I made to work a little worse for wear but with a great big grin on my face from the terrific weekend I had!