Parades Ireland

Protestants torched cars, blocked roads and attacked police Monday after authorities blocked an annual march through a Roman Catholic enclave, setting off violent protests across Northern Ireland. For a second day, riot police prevented the Orange Order, Northern Ireland's main Protestant organization, from marching along the Garvaghy Road, through Portadown's Catholic quarter.

Protestants torched cars, blocked roads and attacked police Monday after authorities blocked an annual march through a Roman Catholic enclave, setting off violent protests across Northern Ireland. For a second day, riot police prevented the Orange Order, Northern Ireland's main Protestant organization, from marching along the Garvaghy Road, through Portadown's Catholic quarter.

St. Patrick's Day parade spectators, lined up 10 deep along Fifth Avenue and participating in marches around the country, put war worries aside Monday to revel in upbeat festivities. The New York parade, the nation's largest and a tradition since 1766, drew an estimated 2 million spectators. Large parades honoring Ireland's patron saint also were held in Savannah, Ga., whose event is billed as the nation's second-largest march, as well as in Kansas City, Mo., and Cleveland.

Longhaired parade veteran Gypsy Boots, 79, showed up wearing sandals and green socks, ringing a cowbell and shaking a tambourine. High school marching bands played lively Irish tunes. And the co-chairman of the event tripped and fell as he tried to take a picture of two women clad in skimpy bikinis aboard a float. So it went Saturday at the second annual County Ventura St. Patrick's Day Parade, set under a clear blue sky in Old Town Ventura. About 10,000 people attended the one-hour event.