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For over 31 years, Gonzales has hosted the "Come and Take It" parade
through the streets of this historic city. This was about my 3rd time
for this event, and I consider it one of the best we attend. To the
people of Gonzales- You put it on, I'll keep coming back!
The club was expecting 3 or so
vehicles from Austin to turn out for this event (this event actually
restricts the number and size of vehicles). Everyone made their own way
to Gonzales football field parking lot. I arrived at 08:00. Danny and
Fred were in the process of downloading there vehicles. Before I was
off the trailer, Carlos Manning pulled in beside me and started his
downloading, and before Carlos hit the ground, JD’s Jr and Sr
from Corpus Christi pulled in and downloaded their Jeep.
So, we had Danny with his 1963 M-37, me and my 1953 M-37, Fred and his
CJ Navy gray jeep, JD and his dad with their MB jeep. Carlos Manning
with his Jeep. We ended up with 5 vehicles in the parade. Danny took
point, two armed jeeps and one Navy Gray jeep in the middle, and I was
in the rear.
We fired up and headed to the
staging area, located our staging spot and parked. Then waited. About
9:30, the judges started making their rounds. We missed Scott this year
and let the judges off the hook, no song and dance! We did smile and
salute them a lot.
At 10:30, the parade started.
This is what's called a 'reverse-order' parade, and a mighty fine
concept at that. The first vehicle in the parade is actually the last
one in line. The second vehicle in the parade is next to last etc. This
way, the participants get to see the other entries parade past, and
once you start, you get to drive by those still waiting to roll-out.
Everyone gets to see everyone else. We saw some terrific entries.
At the beginning of town where
the parade starts, the awards are given out. One of the judges ran over
to the lead vehicle (Danny) and presented our group with 2nd Place for
Group Participation. Last year we won a 3rd place.
As the parade meandered through town,
the crowds were great. Lots of smiling faces, clapping and the
occasional standing ovation. In fact, there's a better showing of
spectators here than the Veterans Day parade up Congress Ave in Austin.
We were entry #23 and it took us right at one hour to finish. There
were 170 entries total, which is 39 more entries than last year, which
shows a growing awareness of the Gonzales Parade.
When we arrived back at the loading
area, we all secured our vehicles in short order. Most of us going to
Austin had decided that lunch was the next order of business and we
decided on Kreitz's Market BBQ in Lockhart. Those of us who went there
were treated to some pretty good Bar-B-Q. Everyone swapped stories and
stuffed themselves to maximum capacity.
Overall, an excellent parade and its growing. My hat is off to the organizers of this event and look for us next year!
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