It's time for Guavaween Oct. 28, 2000, Ybor City Click for Family Fun Fest calendar Guavaween concert calendar Thousands of area residents and visitors flood the streets of Ybor City in October each year for Guavaween. [Times photos] Ybor City knows how to party, especially for Halloween. Each year more than 100,000 people gather for a wacky celebration called Guavaween. Everyone wears wild costumes and adopts even wilder attitudes. But what's up with the weird name? Halloween and Mardi Gras meet. Legend has it that in the late 1800s a Spanish food broker came to Tampa looking for guava forests. His goal was to get everybody eating guava jelly and cooking with guava paste. But the climate and rising land prices prevented his erecting a guava factory near Tampa. Ybor City became a land of cigars instead. That attempt was on the mind of Steve Otto, then a newspaper columnist for the Tampa Times and now with the Tampa Tribune, when he nicknamed Tampa the "Big Guava" in the 1970s. When the Ybor City Chamber of Commerce were looking for an annual October fundraiser, guava was suggested as as a theme and the suggestion stuck. Guavaween is modeled upon Mardi Gras. The celebration includes street festivals, concerts and a Family Fun Fest. Guavaween coverage from the Times: Guavaween: more a whimper than a scream, police report TAMPA -- This year's Guavaween celebration was a kinder, gentler version than those of years past, with more children in attendance and fewer arrests, police said. Anything Guava goes TAMPA -- On any Saturday in Ybor City, women wear platform boots, sequined halter tops and leather miniskirts for a stroll down the street. On Guavaween in Ybor, men with hairy backs squeeze into backless pink dresses for a night guzzling beer. [10/29] Kids start Guavaween fun, then adults take over Ybor TAMPA -- Oh, what clever costumes will the masses dream up this year? How rude will they get? [10/28] Mama Guava for president! She's representing the one-party system, and that party is big enough to embrace everyone -- at least for one night. Happy haunting A musical mixed bag -- featuring Destiny's Child, Godsmack, Foghat and Barrio Boyzz -- will be the soundtrack for Ybor's Halloween bash. Ghosts of Guavaweens past Oct. 26, 1985: For the first time, "Guavaween" appears in the name of Ybor City's Halloween street fest. Flash Guavaween scares up big acts [10/11/00] Old haunt loses its bite The Halloween celebration crowds more than 125,000 people into Ybor City. But some longtime revelers wish for the time when the costumes were more clever. [10/31/99] A "she-devil" watches the parade down Seventh Avenue.