“Only in Houston – I can tell you that for a fact,” is how Rose Nolen, 65, summed up Saturday’s Art Car Parade, an annual event she said she has attended for the past two decades.

Nolen was one of thousands of Houstonians who lined Allen Parkway to watch this year’s quirky caravan of artwork on wheels. Occasional rain showers did little to dampen the enthusiasm as a sea of umbrellas only added to the explosion of colors and patterns that was the 39th annual parade.

Among the art spotted on vehicles this year: an oversize Cheshire cat, a volcano with light-up lava, giant scoops of pastel-hued ice cream, a cotton-candy pink shark, and a rhino with gold tusks and pipe-cleaner eyelashes. The works were done in mosaic, spray-paint, even artificial turf, while others were canvases for advocacy slogans, like one that read “Proud Immigrant.”

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Rene Deleon, 61, said his favorite was a car fashioned to look like a chameleon, complete with shifting eyes. But he was hard-pressed to choose just one favorite.

“It’s just fun watching all of the creativity,” he said, watching cars roll by from under a tent canopy.

It was his third or fourth time at the parade, Deleon said. What keeps him coming back?

“Just all the different people, great people-watching,” he said. “It’s a reflection of the city, how it’s open and everybody’s having fun.”

Nolen said she has been coming to the parade so long that she has seen children of art car owners grow up and create their own art cars for the parade. She pointed out a father-son duo driving by, the father in a gold-painted vintage car and the son in a deep-blue lowrider.

“That was quite an inspiration, but at the same time very heartfelt, that they are following the tradition,” Nolen said. She added: “Families, unity – I love it. Just love it.”

Nolen, who has ridden in the parade before on art bicycles of her own creation (one, “the Black Swan,” took her nine months to build, she said), is now working on her first art car to display next year, she said. She wouldn’t reveal the theme.

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Parade participants Richard and Winnie Simcik, of Waco, brought up the rear in their “Crapper Car,” a red and blue port-a-potty on wheels that Richard designed in 2007 and has brought to the Art Car Parade for many years. His perch, the toilet seat, doubled as the driver’s seat.

The tongue-in-cheek vehicle is always a fan favorite, Richard Simcik said. “We’re No. 1 in the No. 2 business,” he said.

For the Still family, who drove in from the Kingwood area, this year’s parade was a team effort.

Their art car, “Hamilton the Octo-bus,” put an aquatic spin on a 1971 Volkswagon bus, which Justin and his wife, Claudia, restored as part of their business, NVT Rod and Custom. After three months of restoration work, the bus now has a modern engine and an AC system, Justin said.

The two-toned white and teal bus was laden with blue tinsel and inflatable clown fish, and topped with an oversize red octopus – sewed together using fabric and a yoga ball.

“We were like, ‘We need a giant octopus,’ so we quickly put it together,” said Claudia Still, 39. She wore a Kraken costume, including a green wig and mermaid’s tail, for the occasion.

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The homespun mollusk was only a slight liability. “There’s a tentacle right in my line of sight,” Justin said, laughing, as he moved the plush arm off the windshield.

Lincoln Still, 10, put together the design as part of his burgeoning art and 3D-printing company, called Lincoln’s Beautiful Oops, Claudia said. The young entrepreneur looked relaxed on Saturday afternoon, as he and his two siblings lounged in the back of the bus.

“That’s one of the reasons we do it, is for the kids to have fun,” Justin said.

This article originally published at Houston’s 39th annual Art Car Parade draws big crowds through rainy streets.