Of course, we were up with the rising sun on America’s annual day of celebrating our independence. We didn’t travel to northern Texas to sleep in as an expression of freedom; we are here for all of the merriment we can partake in.

Note: while we were up early, this blog post is extremely late with its arrival, most of it anyway. It was the end of January 2023 when I finally got around to adding the 19 images that didn’t accompany the single photo of the man on a small tractor pulling a bunch of kids as part of the parade in Canadian, Texas. As I’ve explained in other posts, bandwidth was at a premium back on the days these posts were first penned, and so they were as big as I dared make them, unfortunately. From the original post, there were about 250 words to describe the entire day; they needed to be reworked and integrated into this new text, which will hopefully maintain the original message and sentiment.

This is the Hemphill County Courthouse and the hub of where today’s events are getting underway. Wafting in from around the area are sausages on a stick and kettle corn, trying to drag us in for snacking, but I have my senses tuned for something special in a few hours.

Along the way, we learned that there’d be a turtle race after the parade and that we still had time to size up the participants; our money was on number 30.

Vendors selling t-shirts, jewelry, and various arts and crafts set up in the shade, letting parents mill about, talk, and browse while their kids lined up to be dunked in a barrel of water by other kids throwing softballs at a target. There are hundreds of people lining Main Street with their lawn chairs and blankets spread out for a comfortable view of the upcoming parade.

And then the street comes to life, and the most unlikely of sights Caroline or I could have imagined come sauntering by, who ever heard of longhorn cattle being ridden during a parade? Apparently, it’s a thing in Texas.

We’d be amiss to deny that there’s something endearing about being in a small American city for such a wholesome way of celebrating such a day. There’s zero commercialism here, no police cordon keeping the kids from crossing into the street, just families, friends, and members of the community coming together for a day of partying.

Red, white, and blue were everywhere.

Right after the parade, we sprinted over to the courthouse parking lot only to witness our turtle lose but an exciting race it was. Around the corner, a local grocer was selling 25-cent hot dogs, and later in the day, there was water polo, a watermelon feast, and the rodeo got going.

The faces of a random couple in the stands smiling at the Great American Experience. This was Caroline’s first-ever rodeo.

The opening ceremony began with the national anthem and a ride around the arena with the colors of the United States and Texas in tow.

Men attempted to ride the bulls and broncos, but mostly, they were busy picking themselves up out of the dirt after colliding with it.

While the tots tried their hand at riding sheep, the slightly older kids tried staying atop bucking miniature donkeys.

This is why I had to stay away from the snacks on offer at the courthouse; I knew I had another date at the Cattle Exchange for the last perfect ribeye I’d be having on this trip.

With uncertainty about the fireworks show this evening due to the threat of rain, all we could do was hang out till evening or head back to the ranch; so instead, we took a short tour of the town and then headed up the road.

The horizon is looking rather foreboding.

Drove up to Higgins, Texas, where we crossed into Oklahoma.

We didn’t get far before a flooding road turned us around.

No matter, now we get to visit Texas twice on this 4th of July.

Things started drying up, and with the glimmer of sunshine out there, we started thinking we just might see some fireworks tonight.

Sure enough, following some late-day duck races, fireworks lit up the early evening sky, and after 12 hours of fun and observance of Independence Day, we were on our way back to the ranch for our last night in Canadian, Texas.