The streets of downtown Napa would have made anyone from the dark side proud Saturday afternoon, as hundreds of ghouls, vampires and zombies — along with princesses and superheroes  — turned out for the sixth annual Hometown Halloween Parade.

This year’s parade kicked off with a woof as about three dozen costumed dogs joined their masters in a costume competition sponsored by Napa Humane.

The Villegas family, of Napa, turned their Belgium malinois, Mister, into a red-colored ninja dog. Meanwhile, father Johnny Villegas and his 3-year-old son Jacob dressed up as red and black ninjas, complete with katanas. Jacob’s mom, Lisa, dressed as a geisha.

“They have to protect me,” Lisa explained.

Mister’s get-up earned him scariest costume honors and a gift certificate to Pet Express. Other awards were handed out for funniest and most creative costumes. While the pets served as the opening act for the Halloween festivities in downtown Napa, the hundreds of children and adults who dressed up were the stars of the show.

Some people came scary, others came sweet. Brianna Serrano, 8, a third-grader at West Park Elementary School, went the technological route and dressed as a cell phone, complete with text messages that read “LOL, OMG and GTG K,” Internet lingo for “Laugh out loud,” “Oh my God” and “Got to go, OK?”

“She didn’t want to be a princess of anything so I said, ‘How about a cell phone?’” said Melodia Rivera, Brianna’s mom.

In true Napa style, Garth Howard and two friends who were visiting from San Jose — Adam Costa and Darcie Connell — dressed as cabernet sauvignon and chardonnay grapes. Costa and his pals had spent the previous night blowing up dozens of purple and green balloons for their costumes.

“It’s good times,” Costa said.

“When in Napa ... right?” he added.

The crowd gathered at 2 p.m. near the intersection of Main and Pearl streets and marched south on Main Street, then west on First Street — where businesses displaying black-and-orange balloons were handing out candy. Children took photographs with people dressed as the Flintstones and the cast of “The Wizard of Oz.”

Craig Smith, director of Napa Downtown Association, said he estimated that vendors gave out 400 pounds of candy. Smith said he got the idea to hold a Halloween parade in Napa while on vacation in Maui,  where a similar event was being held. He connected with Vintage Bank, now Umpqua Bank, and brought the event to downtown Napa six years ago.

“It’s a community event,” Smith said. “It’s a safe way to trick-or-treat.”

Smith said merchants normally don’t see an increase in business because of the parade, as they do with similar events held throughout the year, but they voted to continue the tradition as it gives them a chance to support the community and check out the great costumes, from cell phones to chardonnay.