Travis #99

Travis Fourth of July Parade 2009, #99

Guys in dresses, a Priest in a trike, mounted police, musicians in sequins and feathers.

 

 

 

 

Old Brushfire truck, more pipers piping, Norwegians and Chinese Dragons.

The King, a moose, a goat, an old "T".

 

 

 

 

Peetah, Rolling thunda, Beatniks, and a Jeep.

 

 

 

 

This year the weather was mostly sunny with a cool breeze, high in the low 80s. The parade was quite long, with a lot of entries, but a little light on marching bands. There were also alot of gaps which was a bit annoying; one of the longest was caused by the Mayor and his entourage. Thanks Mike for ignoring the vote of the people.

Next year will be the 100th Fourth of July parade down in Travis. I think it will be quite a parade. If I hadn't already been in the parade and hated it (everyone is looking and pointing at you), I would have said "Hey let's be in the parade". Maybe, a family band on a flatbed?

I have only missed one parade since I can remember (Japan '03 DSL Beta Tour), but I don't know if I missed any as an infant. We used to start off at my Grandfather's house, on the lawn waiting for everyone in the family to show up. While waiting we would watch the pre-parade arrivals. For the longest time there was only one road into Travis, so we would see everything. In the late 1970s, they built an expressway with an exit into Travis and more of the entries took that route. We would wave at everyone and clap and I imagine from the view of the passers by we might have been a tad annoying. Gramps lived on the same street as the parade, but they didn't march past his house, so when everyone was ready we would walk down. We would occupy a section of the sidewalk in front of the house of the man who made my Grandfather's rocking chair, which is now mine. There were alot of us, but we were well behaved, no silly string or super soakers, the only miscreant was my Uncle Jack. He was very outgoing and would go out and shake people's hands and ask questions and create big gaps in the parade. Probably annoying for those downstream, but very entertaining for us. After the parade, we would go back to the family farm and get rides on a firetruck, then have a BBQ back at Gramp's. Now I no longer have to sit with the hoi polloi, one of the perks of having married into a family, one of whom has a house on the parade route.