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NEWS - February 21, 2023

Only three boats from gay & lesbian bars in this years Canal Parade

Boat of Spijker Bar during the 2018 Canal Parade

Photo via Wikimedia Commons

The highlight of Pride Amsterdam is the famous Canal Parade. This year, however, only three boats from gay & lesbian bars will participate, which is probably the lowest number ever.

The participants for the boat parade were announced last Saturday during a festive gathering in the building of Booking.com at Amsterdam's main gay street, Reguliersdwarsstraat.

It turned out that during the upcoming edition on Saturday, August 5, only café 't Mandje from Amsterdam, café Kalff from Utrecht and food bar FERRY from Rotterdam will be sailing.

This small number of boats of gay & lesbian bars is understandable given that the hospitality sector has had a very tough two years due to the corona crisis and is still under considerable financial pressure because of the current energy crisis.

With an amount of 650 euros, the Pride organizer may have kept the registration fee for this category of participants low, however, the total costs for renting and decorating a boat of some size easily amounts 10,000 euros or more.

Participants in previous years

Despite these costs, five gay & lesbian bars participated in the Canal Parade last year, namely bar De Regenboog from Rotterdam, café 't Achterom from The Hague, café Kalff from Utrecht, and café Montmartre and Bar Buka from Amsterdam.

The number of LGBT boats in the 2022 parade was 30, or 37% of the total number of participants. This number was slightly higher than during the 2018 and 2019 editions and has roughly returned to the level of the previous years:

Participants in the Canal Parade 2016-2022

The high number of "mixed boats" in the years 2019 and 2022 is due to the fact that this also includes the major sponsors, after the Pride organizer indicated that their participation was initiated by their LGBT personnel networks.

However, the question is how justified it is to classify these boats as mixed, since these companies are actually sailing along as part of their sponsor package and their LGBT networks are more often than not visible during the parade itself.

Since the list of participants is only available in alphabetical order, it is not yet clear how the classification of the boats will turn out this year.

Origins of the Canal Parade

With only three of the 80 boats, there is little left of the connection with the local gay & lesbian places at the Canal Parade, while that is where the origin of Amsterdam Pride lies.

Contrary to what many people think, this event does not go back to the Stonewall riots which took place in New York in 1969, but it was an initiative from the gay nightlife businesses to celebrate the freedom and diversity of Amsterdam and to keep the city an attractive destination for gay tourists.

The Amsterdam Pride initially lasted three days, with the boat parade as the highlight. During the first edition in 1996, more than 45 boats took part, of which 10 from gay & lesbian nightlife venues, 16 from (gay) individuals and only 2 from external sponsors.