February 5, 2005
Austin, Texas
Amazing…
What an amazing event! Members of the club turned out in full-force to accept the challenge of hauling multiple groups of scouts for this years annual Report to State parade up Congress Ave. Arriving at the the TxDOT parking lot, the group unloaded and prepared for what was to be an excellent event. About 8:00am, we departed to the Austin American-Statesman parking lot to wait for the scouts from Venture Crew 634 and Pack 395 from Oak Hill. Slowly but sure as the sun rises each morning, the scouts began to arrive. Then, the hot chocolate and Krispy-Kremes which made the morning! Thanks to Pack 395 on that one!
About 8:30 with scouts and parents loaded up, the group moved to stage on the Congress Ave bridge. As always, this is the ‘fun’ part in that it’s usually unorganized. This year took a bit of time to move the front of the line 3. However, our club surely made a statement to all the other participants that ‘we were the best’. The pictures that were taken and the pointing and comments about our magnificent vehicles just made the slow trip to the front that much better.
When we got to our appointed staging point, we had accumulated Danny K and his M151A2/M416 trailer, Scott and his M38A1, Toby and his MB, John K and his MB, Herb T and his GPW, Rich H and his M38A1, Rory and his Unimog and John S and his M35A2. It was a most impressive display on the bridge.
Most of the time was spent waiting for the parade to start. Tim spent an hour or so playing chess and Scott was busy selling the club fund-raiser .50 cal rounds to eager scouts. By the time the parade was ready to start, Scott had finished selling all the remaining rounds. In addition a HUGE thank-you has to be given to Pack 395’s Shayne Reeves for the unexpected donation to the club for our participation.
The parade was a good one in that the weather was super. By the time we started, there were already scouts returning from completing the parade that had left ahead of us. We made the trek up Congress Ave. and were identified by Bob Cole, a local radio personality and finished our trip at the Capitol. Those that were carrying signs pulled them off their vehicles for the trip back down to the Statesman lot where we unloaded the kids and departed.
If each successive year goes like this one, we’ll have many good parades in our as well as the scouts future.
