In Vail, everybody loves a Fourth of July parade

Dr. Jack Eck was up front leading the veterans, while a group of local men in Hawaiian shirts who’ve achieved fame for flipping and swinging lawn chairs with military precision marched at the back. In the middle was a sea of floats, costumed stilt walkers, marching bands, cheerleaders, dancers, vintage trucks and cars, animatronic gadgets, Smokey the Bear and Santa and his reindeer.

The years change, but the appeal of Vail America Days remains the same — just some good, old-fashioned fun on the Fourth of July. The quirkier, the better. This year’s parade theme, “Let the Games Begin,” was a nod to the upcoming Summer Olympics in Paris.

And, just like the Olympics, Vail’s “Games” drew a massive crowd: More than 24,000 spectators were in town, according to device numbers from the town’s Wi-Fi network, up about 9 percent from last year. Both town-operated parking garages were full by 9:42 in the morning, with a total of 548 cars spilling out onto the two frontage roads.

Lining the streets from Golden Peak to Lionshead were crowds of spectators, nearly all in some combination of red, white and blue, waving American flags and cheering. The only reason to look away from the fun on the street was for three coordinated flyovers.

A C-130 Hercules out of Buckley Space Force Base in Aurora roared past around 10:30 a.m., followed by a Black Hawk helicopter from the HAATS facility in Gypsum around 10:40 a.m. For the finale, F-16 military fighter jets from the Colorado Air National Guard screamed by around 11:18 a.m.

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“I love the jets coming over,” said Alida Zwaan, a longtime local who lives in Singletree and who watched the parade from outside of the Berkshire Hathaway office in Lionshead.

“It was great to see Jack Eck, Saint Jack, as the grand marshal,” said George Gregory, another longtime local.

Eck, one of Vail’s first full-time physicians who arrived in 1971 after having served as a flight surgeon in the Vietnam War, was named the town’s Trailblazer Award recipient earlier this year.

Floats of all shapes and sizes

This year’s parade featured 52 float entries and a whole assortment of drumlines and brass bands, from the Broncos Stampede, the Denver Nuggets Skyline Drumline, the Colorado State University Presidential Pep Band and two New Orleans-style bands, Brothers of Brass and Bourbon Brass, as well as the Guerilla Fanfare Brass Band.

Alpine Arts Center, in Edwards, upheld its annual tradition of preparing a float made by local kids in a week-long art camp held in advance of the parade.

Sunshine Massage Studio broke up the red, white and blue with a splash of bright yellow and the resonant sound of a gong echoing through the streets.

The Vail Valley Chapter of Canine Companions’ giant inflatable dog watched over kids grabbing candy below, one of several inflatable floats.

In Gypsum, Ted Tanis with Mechanical Express has been preparing floats for the parade for 25 years and gave crowds an interesting showpiece this year with a giant inflatable cat that resembled a hot-air balloon.

But Tanis’ true prize was his first remote-controlled float, an Oscar Mayer wiener that zoomed around behind the other Mechanical Express floats — the cat balloon, a large Ferris wheel and Tanis’ Colorado River Queen steamship.

The steamship is usually the most recognizable piece for Tanis, but he said this year the wiener was a favorite among the crowds, with many people approaching the device and attempting to talk to it.

“Most people think there’s someone in there,” he said. “It went really well.”

The remote-controlled wiener took Tanis three months to build, but some of his other pieces have taken up to a year, he said.

Tanis spends most of his time in Gypsum, where his plumbing and heating business, Mechanical Engineering, is located. But he said he got the idea for his moving Ferris wheel float while traveling.

“I got the idea when I looked at some of these big cities, you always see the Ferris wheel there,” he said. “So, I decided to make one.”

In the spirit of Olympic competition, this year’s contest for entries was fierce. Vail Resorts yet again took home the prize for best float with an entry featuring a massive paper mâché mountain with various events taking place on it.

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Vail Valley Young Life won best youth entry, Canine Companions won for best-motorized entry, Sunshine Massage Studio won for best merchant entry and Timberline Tours won for most original entry.

Three valley nonprofits also claimed cash awards: The Buddy Werner League ($1,000), Alpine Arts Center ($750) and the Battle Mountain High School dance team ($500).

The Broncos band claimed top honors for best marching band.

Everybody loves the lawn chair guys

Of course, no Fourth of July parade in Vail would be complete without the Vail Precision Lawn Chair Demonstration Team, which celebrated its 40th year of performing for crowds in Vail.

In what has become an annual tradition, the outfit brings up the rear so everyone in town — including late arrivers — can catch the act. This year, the group made up of nine “older guys” and seven “younger dudes” handed out stickers celebrating its four-decade run as it marched along the parade route.

And what a run it’s been. Among other things, the team has performed at two presidential inaugurations, halftime shows for NBA, NFL and college teams, and at parades in Denver, St. Louis, Missouri, Manhattan, Kansas, and San Diego, California.

Scoie Von Handorf, an Edwards resident who moved to the valley from Nebraska in 1999, said she’s been coming to the parade ever since she became a mother, and that she always looks forward to the performance from the lawn chair outfit.

“I just love the traditions,” she said.