Independence Day on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon

As full time RV'ers, retired and doing volunteer work year 'round we have found that the coming and going of weekends and holidays don't feel the same as they used to.  Since starting our adventures in volunteering the middle of last year we have been on duty every single holiday.  And given that we are living in the places that you would go to on vacation, the "rhythm" of anticipating paid days off, the long weekend road trip and the dragging yourself back to work after the holiday, are gone.  I'm not complaining, it is just an observation we have made as we adjust to retirement.  I suspect we are no different than anyone else in this regard that has retired, regardless of whether they are fulltimers or volunteers.  Except maybe the part about living in all the vacation destinations.

So, with our new rhythm not fully developed we woke up one day with talk of a parade, decorating the Polaris and a bar-b-q lunch provided by the concessionaire for park employees.  Wow, it must be the 4th of July or something!  Who knew?  Evidently everybody but us.

National Parks forbid fireworks as a matter of course.  But with us being in a stage 2 fire ban (smokers are required to get inside their vehicles to smoke) there were not even going to be fires for roasting marshmallows and making s'mores.  But the folks with the concessionaire and park service do try to mark the occasion with their own brand of a parade.  They drag out every vehicle that will run and put bunting, streamers, balloons and flags on them.  Then they make a slow loop through the lodge parking lot and past the front entrance of the lodge itself.  The extra twist that they throw in is that they turn the whole thing into a water gun fight.  The lodge gives out squirt guns, super soakers and such to the guests to shoot at the parade as it goes by.  But the parade is armed too.  There are fire trucks and the lodge fills the bar-b-q train with employees that have their own water arsenal.

The Bar-B-Q Train.
Didn't get a photo of it all decorated for the 4th.

The park even had a Smokey The Bear costume that one of the guys from the fire station donned and was the Grand Marshall of the parade, chauffeured at the front of the parade in a Polaris ATV.

We were informed that since we were on duty for the 4th that we had to decorate our Polaris, although we were not encouraged to be part of the parade.  Our Polaris, the all electric one, had just been taken to St. George for some long overdue maintenance.  Among other things, the brakes had been worn all the way down to the caliper pistons and the rotors were ground down to nearly nothing.  In the interim the law enforcement guys had loaned us the use of their gas powered ATV.  It is the one they use to patrol backcountry roads and it had not seen the business end of a water hose and soap bucket in a long, long time.

At 5:30am on the 4th I took the loaner Polaris to the wash bay to see if I could knock off a few layers of mud, trying to get down to paint so we would have something to stick decorations to.  A lot of that mud had become a permanent part of the ATV.  After about an hour I called it good and took it back to the campground where I had some automotive detailing supplies.  There was lots of black plastic trim and its balloon tires that could benefit from some Armor All and tire black.

Using the Armor All and tire black on the patrol ATV is best described as putting lipstick on a pig.  But it did make a difference so I guess it was worth the effort.  We attached flags and stuck on stars and banners.  We were ready to do rounds on the 4th of July.

While the park service used official vehicles like patrol trucks, fire engines and service vehicles, the concessionaire used, in addition to the Bar-B-Q train, panel trucks, recycling trucks and house keeping golf carts.  But there was one entry of a home grown nature.  One of the year 'round maintenance guys (one of only about 4 people that stay all winter and has done it for the last 27 years) has built himself a truck that is made from a mish-mash of all sorts and years of vehicle parts.  This truck has a stake-bed on it and for the occasion of the 4th of July Parade/Squirt Gun Fight he mounted a 300 gallon water tank, complete with pump, hose and spray nozzle that he could operate from the driver's seat.  And to top all that off, he wore an Uncle Sam suit, complete with top hat.

Uncle Sam with the world's largest squirt gun.
The beard is real.

The parade was scheduled for 4pm and the employee bar-b-q was set for 2pm.  Cyndee and I and our camp host counterparts, Ed & Elinore, all piled into their truck for the short drive over to the employee housing area with visions of hot dogs and hamburgers dancing in our heads.  We had not had a drop of rain since Mother's Day weekend, and like so many days before there were a good deal of fair weather clouds building in this early afternoon.  You know, those big, puffy, white clouds that do little more than throw some occasional shade.  But in just the five minutes it took us to drive over to the picnic, the clouds started showing dark bottoms.

Not giving it much thought, the cooks fired up the grills and set out the baked beans, slaw and burger fixins.  They had no more than put patties on the grill and taken the plastic wrap off the trays of side dishes than there was a clap of thunder and the skies opened up.  Everything was water logged in a matter of seconds.  I guess we were getting some help in sticking to our diet.  We made a dash for the truck and went back to the campground to change out of our wet clothes.  The talk on this afternoon was that this rain marked the beginning of the monsoon.  And later that night when we were watching the Phoenix news channel they also declared that the weather pattern had made the distinct shift to monsoon.  I guess it won't be long until the fire ban is lifted and we'll be back to cleaning fire pits.  I may get me a roasted marshmallow yet.

The rain lasted off and on for almost two hours.  There was just enough break so that the parade could get underway at its scheduled time.  Normally it is a hot day and people welcome getting squirted, but today's rain had cooled things down into the low 60's and people were putting on light fleece and rain slickers.  The parade was still a big hit and it even added to its route by including two passes around the outside oval of the campground.