Good 4th of July Celebration-- Part 6-- July 4, 1970, No Parade For Us

Sunday, July 4th, started out with Bob Stroud doing a three hour show on his Rock and Roll Roots taking us back to what we were listening to on the radio and on our stereos back in 1970. Can you believe, 40 YEARS AGO?!!

Some songs he played:

Are You Ready-- Pacific Gas and Electric
Hitchin' a Ride-- Vanity Fare
Uncle John's Band-- Grateful Dead
Tighter and Tighter-- Alive and Kickin'
Mississippi Queen-- Mountain
Ball of Confusion-- Temptations

I will have the entire list with his and my comments later this month at http://downdaroadigo.blogspot.com.

Now, this was a great way to get into the proper 4th frame of mind.


YOU CAN"T GET THERE FROM HERE

We decided to do the village spirit thing and see the parade and go to the festival at Horse Fair Park here in hometown Spring Grove. However, I had forgotten the lengths to which the town goes through to essentially lock everything down so no one drives anywhere.

The parade starts at noon. At 11:40, the roads going north into town were blocked by police. That's ok, as the parade is close by. We then drove to Solon Mills, several miles away and tried another route only to be stopped by a cop up there.

I was a bit mad by now and wanted to forget about the whole thing, but Liz wanted to go so we tried one last approach which required quite a few miles out of our way, practically up to the Wisconsin line.

We were beginning to think we were going to make it this time and got all the way down to Horse Fair Park and then came upon a fire truck blocking the road. We were told the parade was to end there and the park closed, even though the parade was no where near there yet.

Greatly disappointed, we decided to go elsewhere. The village gets $5 a car to park with the proceeds going to help pay for the fireworks. They didn't get our donation, not money we would have spent at the festival.

I would call this going overboard on precaution to the extreme and it is not too likely that we'll go back next year. Four attempts and no success just doesn't work for me.

Come On Spring Grove Get a Clue. --RoadDog