Rain on the Parade

The forecast was right-on for the day. There were scattered thundershowers all day - scattered all over Campbellsville. We went to the parade in town at around 10 AM for the start, and it was still dry when it started:

We were surprised and happy to see that the Grand Marshal for the parade was Mitch McConnell, the Senior Senator from Kentucky and the House Minority Leader:

He was fortunate to get through the whole parade route before the skies opened up. The entire Main Street was crowded on both sides:

and the parade had its usual number of horses, including the little ones:

After watching for about 15 minutes, the skies opened up and drenched everybody. Many people had umbrellas and many just stood in the rain. We were able to duck under the canopy of the local Country and Western music station in Campbellsville. Of course, the people on the floats didn't have much choice on where to go to take cover from the rain - some had umbrellas, and others just walked in the rain:

We had to get a picture of the Amazon.com float that was part of the float contest (above and below):

The parade was an unusual one for us. This one had a heavy emphasis on Agriculture, and there must have been 50 tractors in the parade. Last year, it was mostly horses in Cody, WY.

The rain finally stopped by the end of the parade, and everybody spilled out into the street to visit the arts and crafts booths, and merchant booths that lined the street:

There was a stage at the end of the street where the entertainment was scheduled all day long. We caught them setting up for the first group to entertain for the day - the East Campbellsville Church of God Choir:

You can see the long list of scheduled events to the left of the stage. It is one of the largest and best 4th of July celebrations in central Kentucky. People were everywhere and it seemed like the whole population of Campbellsville was there, which could have been. We took one last shot of the crowd in the street as we left for home:

There were scheduled events all day long, but we decided to wait to return for the fireworks display at the local park that was scheduled at dark - around 9:30. By the time 9 PM rolled around, we were comfortable in the fifth wheel and not anxious to take a chance on being part of another thundershower and, perhaps, cancellation of the fireworks. It seemed like they went off as scheduled as we both saw them from our rig and heard them from inside. All in all, it was a great day, in spite of the rain.

Today is the start of our next assignment at Amazon.com and we are ready for the paperwork phase and the classes that they have scheduled for us. The real work begins tomorrow, but we are anxious to get things started. We will try to get our shift changed to days, but are prepared to work nights again if they can't accommodate the change. It's off to work we go...