Photos

Happy 4th of July!

It is the 233rd birthday of my nation today. Last night they had the pre-celebration at the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial (where the Arch is) in the form of "Fair St. Louis". They have music and food vendors and other stuff for folks to do while they wait for the fireworks to start. Last night was the band "Counting Crows" and counter to my normal modus operandi, I did not go to hear the music.

There is a new park in the area, a sort of sister to the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial, on the other side of the river - the Malcolm W. Martin Memorial Park. I've always wanted to watch the fireworks from that side of the river, but never really knew of a safe place to go to do so. If you check out the link for this park, you will see that they really go the extra mile to keep the place safe and family-oriented.

Usually I am not one for so many rules. However, if you have ever spent much time (or maybe any time at all) in East St. Louis, you will be glad you are sequestered from the general population inside this park.

There were probably less than 200 people in the park, most of which were cops, security people and park volunteers. There were quite a few photographers, too. It made it easy to find a parking place and we pretty much had our choice of pov, which was not the very best, but still not uninteresting. It was worth checking out. They have the Mississippi River Overlook at that place, but it was closed for the fireworks. Only media was able to go up there for some shots.

Anyway, here's a pretty nice one that shows downtown St. Louis, the Arch and a couple of the earlier fireworks in pretty good detail.

Have a great day today and Happy Birthday America!

Thanks for looking - Reed