Fifth Avenue in Manhattan saw a celebration of Italian heritage on full display Monday for the 80th Columbus Day Parade. 

For Stefano Giussani, the parade feels like home. He grew up in Milan, Italy, and now lives on the Upper West Side.

“Proudly happy to be Italian in New York with two kids raising them here, so happy,” Giussani said. His daughter Nora is also a fan of the parade.

“It’s fun looking at different things, like people holding Italian flags,” she said.

Organizers say the importance of confiding in family as part of Italian culture is a theme of the parade.

“It’s warmth. It’s love. It’s always having someone to go to when you have a question,” Jodi Pulice, who is on the Board of Governors of the Columbus Citizens Foundation, said. 

The historians from Centro Coordinatmento Maschere Italiane say they celebrate Christopher Columbus' voyage to the new world and discovery of the Americas in 1492.

“Columbus discovered another world with his courage,” historian Marco Raffa said. He traveled from Genoa, Italy to march.

That sense of longevity and tradition of having people come back is paramount — so important that organizers say the planning for the annual parade starts a year in advance.

The parade started at 44th Street and made its way to 72nd Street.