This morning we had a very good breakfast of coffee, oats, potatoes, eggs, and sausages before leaving Chas and Tricia’s cabin. Our ride today is fairly short because we want to get off the road early due to 4th of July holiday traffic and the heat. We climb steadily up hill out of Cornucopia, cross over the hills, and then descend again back to the coast into Washburn. We stop for a break at a coffee shop, where we meet a woman who does inline skate marathons. Then we continue on to Ashland. As we arrive we find out we’ve missed the 4th of July parade. Oh well, it’s 85 degrees and we’re done pedaling. Ashland is a regular town (unlike the villages we’ve seen lately) built along the coast of Lake Superior. We walk around town, most businesses are closed, but the City is filled with interesting historical murals. At a food co-op the checker tells us that we should see the annual Fire Run on Main Street before the fireworks. So, at 9:00 we go downtown to watch the event. Dusk is settling in and people start lining up along Main Street for blocks, we’re about midway through town. A couple of old retired Fire Engines go by driving east, towards the fire house, with 10 or 12 volunteers sitting in the empty hose beds. This is the 2nd parade of the day. It’s getting dark but still 84 degrees, and light traffic continues both directions on Main. No streets are blocked off, we are only 1 block off Highway 2. At a quarter to 10 we can hear the sirens as they approach. People get up for a better view of the approaching sirens. Then a police car, 2 fire engines, a ladder truck, the 2 engines with volunteers, 3 ambulances, a Chiefs car, 6 wreckers, and finally another police car all race by at 40 miles an hour down 20 blocks with lights, sirens, and horns blaring. The crowd waves and cheers as they pass. As the sirens fade away down the street, the crowd picks up lawn chairs and moves towards the highway to get situated for the fireworks display over Lake Superior. This is 4th of July in Asland, Wisconsin.
Greg