Desert Hot Springs Holiday parade honors Olympic medalist, Sarah Robles

Hundreds lined the streets of Palm Drive for Desert Hot Spring’s annual holiday parade Saturday morning.

“It was beautiful. So many people coming out to support the community,” said one viewer.

The parade was made possible by the Desert Hot Springs Rotary Club.

“We do this because we’re a small community, and we come together to show our community pride. Desert Hot Springs has faced its challenges, which have recently changed in the last few years and because of this, the community spirit has only grown,” said Desert Hot Springs Rotary Club senior. Many came to catch a glimpse of their favorite float. Others were excited to see familiar faces featured in the parade. “We all like to come out and see our neighbors and be like ‘hey I know that person…they did something really cool. Maybe I can do something like that’, Diana Fong said, of Desert Hot Springs. Grand Marshall and Olympic medalist, Sarah Robles, hopes to inspire people from her hometown. “I’m thankful for the position that I’m in, that I am able to inspire people and I hope it helps people to get fit and love themselves and do things that they never really thought they could do” said Robles. Robles says serving as the Grand Marshall of the parade is an honor, as she remembers marching down the same street she did today, a number of years ago. “The very first time I was in a parade was at the Desert Hot Springs Parade when the library was first built, the other kids and I, we dressed up as books, because the library was built, and I was great expectations and we marched down the parade,” said Robles. And the fun didn’t stop there. The parade led people to an after-party party, where kids got to play in real snow and meet their hometown hero.