PARADE OF UGLY TRUCKS TO BEGIN HARVEST FEST

STE. GENEVIEVE -- The first Ugly Truck Parade will precede the sixth annual Voyage de Sainte Genevieve balloon lift-off Saturday.

Both events are part of Ste. Genevieve's Fall Harvest Fest, two days also offering a farmer's market, craft and food booths, a special choir concert, and tours of historic homes.

The flood cost Ste. Genevieve merchants a full season of tourism, but they are bouncing back, says Marty Kaegel, publicity chairwoman for the French Colonial Ste. Genevieve Merchants & Tourism Association.

"In some ways we have been able to capitalize on the flood because we got so much attention, even internationally," she said.

Last year's Fall Harvest Fest focused on flood relief and was expanded to two days to allow more organizations to participate. That tradition will continue, with only Ste. Genevieve city and county residents allowed to set up booths.

This year, visitors will be invited to take the "Levee Walk" along a two-block section of the temporary levee that protected the town. The section has been preserved as a monument to the volunteers who worked day and night during the flood.

The farmer's market will open at 7:30 a.m. Saturday in Rozier's parking lot. Fifty booths selling crafts and food will be open both Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m.-5 p.m. in the historic downtown district.

The Ugly Truck Parade will leave from the Knights of Columbus Hall at 1:30 p.m. Judges will be Jim White of St. Louis radio station KMOX and Post-Dispatch columnist Bill McClellan.

The parade will end at the balloon launch site. Sixteen hot air balloons will lift off in the Voyage de Sainte Genevieve," which commemorates the first manned hot air balloon flight over Paris in 1783.

Also on Saturday, a special choir concert will be held at the 7 p.m. Mass at the Catholic Church of Ste. Genevieve. The public is invited.

Additionally, Holy Cross Lutheran Church will offer tours of its historic sanctuary and will host a quilt demonstration and sale.

The Ste. Genevieve Museum will be open for tours, along with four historic homes.

Street musicians will entertain both days, and a German band and German folk dancers will perform on Sunday.