Fin-weather friends have their day in the sun at Coney Island Mermaid Parade

[Trainspotter]

Fin-weather friends have their day in the sun at Coney Island Mermaid Parade

By Nicole Ettlinger and John Lauinger

DAILY NEWS WRITERS

June 23rd 2008

 

[float=right]

Cairo for News

These two mermaids shunned sea hues for

brighter attire at the Mermaid Parade in

Coney Island on Saturday.

[/float]The sands of Coney Island shimmered with glittery shells, sequins and scaly fins Saturday as a tidal wave of sea beauties splashed down for the annual Mermaid Parade.

 

Thousands of costume-clad revelers hit the Boardwalk for the annual summer celebration of art, aquatic impersonation and Coney Island's honky-tonk charm.

 

"The mermaid parade is unlike any other parade in the world - and there's nowhere else in the world like Coney Island," said burlesque dancer-turned-mermaid Angie Ponpani, 29, of Kensington, Brooklyn.

 

Other ocean lovelies praised the parade's high-seas spirit.

 

"This is a celebration of creativity and freedom," said Erica Fuery-Gaudio, a 36-year-old environmental scientist from Connecticut who wore shells in her hair, a shell bra - and a yellow-green tail, of course. "Let your freak flags fly and it's perfectly okay."

 

But the parade was not all about gorgeous sea-women.

 

Decked out as a sailor in a light-blue wig and red-white -and-blue bell-bottoms, East Village resident Mark Barrett, 35, said he hoped the Mermaids keep coming to Coney Island - even if the oceanside amusement mecca is redeveloped.

 

"It's great fun," he said of the 25-year-old tradition. "There are not a lot of sponsors, just local people being creative. I hope with the changes to Coney Island, it doesn't die."

[metsfan]

Yea, i hope also that these plans to mall-ify coney island are shot down and a reasonable plan is put in place. They have all summer to do it.

 

- Andy