July 4th in Hannibal, MO

We were surprised and pleased to find that the carnival in Hannibal was Jones.  That's the same one that we have used in Raytown for years and they have been coming to Hannibal about 25 years.  It was easy to spot owners, Darcy and Carl's 5th wheel because of their darling white picket fence around their patio.  They were busy but made time to visit with us for a while.  What a nice surprise.

It was a full day starting with parade.  We watched for 1 1/2 hours before going on to visit all the vendors on the town sqauare park.  It was a wonderful park in the city with large bandstand with live music and the sidewalks spread out like spokes on a wheel.  Perfect for booths on both sides of sidewalks.  There was a large variety of items sold.  In the parade, there were a lot of politicians and queens and princesses from several towns and organizations.  Most all of the churches had representation as well as many businesses.  While waiting for the parade, we met some other people from southern Missouri.  They were delightful.  The aunt, 94 years old, still ran the uniform store behind us.  She was born and raised in Hannibal.  Amazing lady.  They even went inside and got us a folding chair to sit on.  Meeting people is one of the best things about travel.

The children really enjoyed all the candy thrown to them.  Everyone seemed to have buckets full but they were careful to throw them toward the crowd on the ground and not in the air.  Another welcomed thing they gave out was the frozen coolaid sticks.  These were really welcomed by young and old since it was so very hot.  Later in the parade there were floats with people using super shooters and spraying the crowd.  One lady was even using a large bowl to throw water on people.  Everyone wanted to get wet.  How funny!

As we were watching people, we noticed some of the girls with a darling hairdo.  We inquired about it and they said a man at one of the booths did it.  We searched him out and it was amazing how quickly he did it.  He was selling wired hair bands and with any purchase, he'd do your hair if you had longer hair than mine.  Go to http://festivalnet.com/fno/members/104997 for more info.

Since the 4th was in the middle of the week, their celebration started on the 4th and continued through the weekend.  There was to be live music and many contests like fence whitewashing, backseat drivers race (person in wheelbarrow giving directions to person pushing it who is blindfolded), and many more fun contests.  Unfortunately, we planned on leaving on the 5th so we didn't get to see any of these.

Fireworks from Lovers Leap over the Mississippi River

Between the town and river is a large levee.  People gathered in chairs and blankets on top of it to watch fireworks.  Near the river is a park which was full of people too.  There were several young ladies singing patriotic songs.  What a fun evening!