Thousands of spectators braved the cold to catch the kickoff for the 119th National Western Stock Show Parade.

The National Western Stock Show starts each year with a cattle drive right through the streets of downtown Denver, Colo.

This sure ain’t Colorado’s first rodeo, so nothing was about to stop the annual National Western Stock Show parade Thursday.

The parade included horse-drawn wagons and western riding groups. But the iconic Longhorn cattle drive was missing this year — likely to avoid any injuries to the steers on cold, slippery streets.

The National Western Stock Show Parade will hit the streets of Denver one hour later than previously scheduled on Thursday ...

Established in 1999, the Herd is responsible for the city's twice-daily longhorn cattle drive on East Exchange Avenue in the Stockyards. The drive takes place each day at 11:30 a.m. and 4 p.m. and ...

"Most of these cattle are very gentle," Lake said ... "That's when we started the downtown trail drives." Since then, Lake's longhorns have led the annual parade for the National Western Stock ...