It's been a busy weekend. Friday was the Clover's Day Parade and then the Fireworks Party that evening. Now, today, it is over to Gleneden Beach for a Fourth of July Independence Day Parade and then down to the beach for some Fourth of July Fireworks from Siletz Bay.
Bah-is-zee!!
Whew!! Honestly, I was feeling the fatigue from walking all over the huge metropolis of Cloverdale and then spectating the fireworks at Devils Lake that evening. I really felt it in my legs but overall, I was pooped. And, so, I was dragging a bit as we headed out to Gleneden Beach for their celebration.
And they were putting on the dog.
In the Marines, we called these trucks Six-Bys. In the Army they were called Deuce-and-a-Halves. Hahahaha, if the Marines say it is brown then the Army will say it is beige. They won't agree on anything.
Woo-Woo!!
Rock 'N Roll, 'Murica!!
America loves it some party time.
And this one was definitely bigger than the one we saw at Cloverdale. Still, you could feel the excitement in the air, the anticipation as the parade began to come together. At least for this one, they'd get both lanes of the street.
And we definitely got our fill of vintage cars and trucks. I'm enjoying seeing the plain, simple, utilitarian dashes of those long ago days. They might have been plain, but they still had a sense of honest beauty in the simple lines. No frills, no ornaments...just there.
And here, they had more vendors selling their wares. I've noticed that this area has a huge number of individual craftsmen and artists. Lots of home-grown industries here and some very good stuff for sale.
Like this...
And these. Handcrafted America.
I enjoy seeing these reminders of the ability of people to get by without mass-produced consumerism.
And they wuz busy.
We've seen this display at the Farmer's Market in LCO. Creativity with a 20s twist.
Carol has her eye on a couple candidates for Jessica.
It was a busy scene.
This guy was making up some balloon animals for the kids. Handy-Crafty and makin' money, Honey.
Amazing, some of the things they've created for sale.
There were plenty of well-behaved pooches around, too.
I looked for some fry bread but, doggone it, they didn't have any. They did have a lot of brats, hot dogs and burgers.
Ratz!!
Then we stumbled onto the staging area for the parade vehicles.
I don't know about you but, for me, whenever I think of parades, I think floats and flowers and what-not. I guess I've been spoiled by the Rose Parade. The main features with these small-town parades are vintage cars and trucks and lots of people.
Like this old fire truck. Some classic lines here. I enjoy the style and lines of these older models.
And, evidently, I have a thing for dashboards.
Who knew!?!
Still, kinda clean and classy. That steering wheel is a deathtrap but, hahaha, it has clean lines, eh?
This one was Carol's favorite. I think this is around a 1948-50 model.
You knew you were driving a car in this big baby. Bench seats and a rear seat you could really stretch out in.
And, speaking of Big Cars, here's a Caddy for you. With yards and yards of hood and a lot of room for comfort inside.
My Uncle Ray had to always have a Caddy and riding in it was like riding in a boat going over the waves. It would sort of roll with each bump in the road and gently bounce up and down a couple times after each pothole. Like being in a boat.
And from one baby blue to another.
I like the car but I'm not too hot about the color.
Hoo, Boy!! Try to put a rumble seat in today's car!!
Boy, if I had some money, I'd get me a couple of these old beauties.
I don't see too many Nash Ramblers at these things. In fact, I don't see any of them.
This one is a Rambler Marlin.
Fun Facts: A two-door fastback produced from '65 to '67. It was marketed as a personal luxury car. In '65, the car was marketed as a Rambler Marlin. The '66 model was just called a Marlin and the '67 model was named the AMC Marlin. They were reaching for something to catch the public's attention.
The fastback roof design was previewed on the '64 Rambler Tarpon (they had a thing for fish, I guess. I never realized that before), based on the compact Rambler American. The '65 and '66 model year production Marlins were fastback versions of the mid-sized two-door hardtop Rambler Classic, and '67 brought a major redesign in which the car was given the new longer AMC Ambassador full-size chassis. This version had a longer hood and numerous 'improvements' including more interior room and a new V8 engine.
Hahaha, what car of the 60s wouldn't benefit from a bigger hood, more room inside and a larger engine!!
I think this one is the 1967 model. The AMC Marlin.
It's kinda like they say in the opening of the Six Million Dollar Man....
We can rebuild him. We have the technology. We can make him better than he was. Better, stronger, faster.
The dash of a '58 Chevy Bel Air.
I like the painted dashes. And that steering wheel. With the small, inner ring for the horn. Those went the way of the floorboard dimmer switch and ashtrays in the car.
I figured it out. I like the dashes because, well, because they're so photogenic. I mean they make for a good picture. And for good memories, too.
I had a '50 Chevy Bel Air like this one during my senior year of high school. I'd inherited it from my brother, Curtis, after he got his Mustang. It had a Flat Head 6 engine and home-made, reversed gears. And it was roomy.
And it was green, too. Course, not as shiny as this one.
But we were both sorta wrung out from the day before and so I figured we'd pretty much seen the whole parade there in the staging area so we walked on back to where I'd parked the Mini. Which was, coincidentally, right next to the beach.
We didn't go down to the beach, I'm such a killjoy when it comes to walking down a hill. Plus, I've been to the beach before. But I did get close enough to take a look and get some shots.
One thing about beaches in Oregon is that they aren't crowded like the ones on the East Coast. Or even down south in Cali-Forn-I-A.
You can stretch out on these beaches.
Or, if the wind isn't blowing, you can set up your own shade and chill.
But we wuz pooped and so we took one last look at the playa and then headed back on home.
For some really superb naps. I mean, I knocked out several hours in the ol' fartsack.
And it wuz good!!
The plan was that we'd come home, rest up, and then, after a couple of very, very good naps, we'd go out on the beach at our place and watch the fireworks display down at Siletz Bay, about 6 or so miles south of us.
And it would have worked except for a couple small snags.
Snag #1 was the weather. There was a fog along the coast all day. Mostly it set off-shore but in the evening, it moved inland a bit and that made seeing the smaller fireworks six miles away hard to see.
Then there was Snag #2. That was the folks on the beach celebrating their own kind of the Fourth. There were fires and fireworks all up and down the beach which made for a lot of smoke in the air, too.
So, bottom line, we didn't get to really see the fireworks being shot off down by the Bay. Oh, we saw a couple, but the smoke and fog along the beach made it tough to see anything, only the largest displays were visible.
It wasn't a loss though. There was plenty happening along the beach and a lot of it was within a hundred yards of us.
In fact, it was tough getting any pictures because the fireworks were popping off in front of us and behind us and right over us and there was no order to them. You had to be looking in the right direction and very quick to catch them.
So here's another night of fireworks. These are along the beach right by our house.
There were a lot of these. They were like sparklers on steroids. They would blaze up for at least a minute and were, the first 20 or so times, pretty cool.
It's amazing to us, how sophisticated and LARGE these fireworks are that you can buy for your private use now.
I mean, these were small bombs, and they were being set off on a beach by a bunch of young people who had been drinking beer for the better part of the day.
Really, what could go wrong, right!?!
All these pictures were taken on the beach within a couple hundred yards, or less, of our house.
It was an interesting evening, this first celebration for us at the beach in LCO. As I mentioned, there were plenty of campfires along the beach and plenty of folks there enjoying them.
Hahaha, you can get an idea of how smoky it got on the beach. And, for better or worse, there wasn't much of a breeze coming off the beach. Not much at all.
It's been a good week-end. A busy one, too. We definitely got our fill of fireworks and vintage cars.
Happy Birthday, America.
Thanks!!
I'm proud to be an American.
Life is good.
Hooah!!
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