Monday, July 4, 2011

Happy 4th of July!

We started this Independence Day with Dennis and Carol cooking breakfast outside. Phil helped out with pancakes.

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I had everything but pancakes, and it was all yummy! And strictly low-fat!!!

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Almost everyone was wearing something patriotic in red/white/blue.

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Actually, Dennis was wearing a Texas flag shirt on top of his special orange Gypsy Gathering rally shirt from “Steptember 2010” (misspelling not caught by anyone until much later) – not exactly a U.S. patriotic outfit, but we won’t hold it against him.

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Carol wore a special vest her Mom made for her.

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Happy Birthday, United States of America!

Later, we watched the Talkeetna parade. Don and I got there just in time to see the color guard leading the parade. But I didn’t get my camera in action until they had passed us.

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Several entries had a wooden moose, painted and decorated in different themes. Later, an auction was held for the moose to raise money for community improvement.

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Some spent more time on decorating their moose than others.

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This is a restored Nash Rambler, probably 1950-1960 vintage.

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Don thought this entry was the highlight of the parade. A woman sitting atop a minivan playing a piccolo.

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If you could walk, ride a bicycle, push a stroller or walk a dog on a leash, you could be in the parade.

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Does this stretch cab look familiar?

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The Red Hat women had to get in the act, locally called Talkeetna’s Red Hot Ravens.

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This truck was probably used to help build the Alcan.

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And the grand finale, the local firetruck running its siren!

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Just when we thought it was all over, the parade did a U-turn and came back past us, so we got to see it again!

Don bought our entries in the Moose Dropping contest. We were assigned numbers, with a souvenir painted moose dropping attached to pins to wear on our lapels.

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Later, the bag of identically numbered moose droppings were dropped in the parking lot of the local VFW (Veterans of Foreign Wars). The announcer called for the raising of the bag.

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The bag was prepared.

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It was hoisted into position, high above the crowd.

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The contents were released.

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There was one clear winner in the inner circle.

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None of us won, but we had a great time and ate a great BBQ lunch provided by the VFW.

Later, we had a terrific steak dinner. As this blog is getting really long, I’ll spare you the details and maybe report them another time. All in all, it was a wonderful and memorable Independence Day. I hope yours was equally special.

2 comments:

  1. Happy July 4th - looks like you all had a great day.

    Thanks for posting all the pics of the 'moose parade', it sure looks like those folks get into the spirit of things up there.

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  2. I thought the photo of the moose droppings being released was special!

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