[Source: AP]

Thousands of people turned out Saturday to watch Mexico City’s Day of the Dead parade as costumed dancers, drummers and floats took a festive turn down the Paseo de la Reforma boulevard all the way to the historic colonial main square.

There were marching bands disguised as skeletons and dancers with skull face paint performing in Indigenous costumes. The smell of traditional resinous copal incense hung heavy over the parade.

A skeleton drum group pounded out a samba-style beat, while blocks away dancers swirled long skirts painted to resemble the wings of monarch butterflies, which traditionally return to spend the winter in Mexico around the time of the Day of the Dead.

In a nod to social change, there was a contingent of drag performers costumed as “Catrinas,” skeletal dames dressed in the height of 1870s fashion.

The holiday begins Oct. 31, remembering those who died in accidents. It continues Nov. 1 to recall those who died in childhood and then on Nov. 2 celebrates those who died as adults.