July 4TH fireworks
- Thread starter mrfella71
- Start date
packerlandrider
Active member
I've had one person go out of their way to tell me about Copper Harbor's fireworks, so that is where I will be this evening.
Just be prepared for a long drive back to South Range afterwards with all the traffic heading down the peninsula.
Just be prepared for a long drive back to South Range afterwards with all the traffic heading down the peninsula.
garyl62
Active member
Not to highjack this, but since the shows are over, I'd suggest anyone in N. IL or S. Wi who is looking for a good show next year come to Rockford. There is a whole day of activities with a 90 minute parade that ends about 8:00PM then the fireworks is at 9:30. They shoot them off over the river in downtown Rockford and the show lasts 30 minutes. Here is the kicker... they shoot off 4,450 shells! That's an average of 2.5 per second, but in reality they hold 1/2 of them back until the grand finale which lasts about 4 minutes so during that time about 8 go off every second. There are about 100,000 people that come downtown and watch then when it's over most of the bars/restaurants downtown have live music and keep the party going. Just bring a chair and follow the people. They also shoot off "test" shells every 1/2 hour for about 3 hours before they start so you can tell if the spot you have picked to sit will be a good one. That's a nice feature if your a first timer, or don't have a regular spot year after year.
packerlandrider
Active member
Well, I realized sitting there that it has been probably a good 6-7 years since I have sat through an entire fireworks display, and how low of an attention span I had after 5-10 minutes... hahaha. They weren't able to start until around 11:00 due to the clear skies, and lasted a little over 30 minutes. They had one or two pauses to reset things, but otherwise, I thought they were good all things considering (small town of Copper Harbor).
They shot them off from the island across from town. We were in town already earlier in the evening, and set up right on the dock-walk near the Isle Royale ferry. If I was to watch them again I would be interested in trying to watch them from the Copper Harbor outlook on Brockway Mountain Drive - there were people setting out chairs up there earlier in the evening when we were up there, but we decided to just enjoy the crowd and watch from the harbor since it was our first time at Copper Harbor's fireworks.
A bit of a side note, but it is laughable how many people apparently think there is only one highway leaving Copper Harbor. I parked on M26 right across from the gas station (slight mistake of parking towards town), but after the show, I took a little time, pushed my way through the traffic to get turned around to head towards Eagle Harbor. As we drove out of town, the traffic had to be backed up a good half of mile of people trying to head back into Cooper Harbor to get on 41 with everybody else. There was a bit of traffic on 26 to Eagle Harbor, but it wasn't going any slower than I would had it not been there. The second side note on the topic would be how even fewer people know of Eagle Harbor Cut Off Road. The group of traffic I was with got to Eagle Harbor, and only about 3 of 11 vehicles in sight turned onto the Cut Off. Smooth sailing on there to 41, got to 41, didn't have to wait for anyone in front of me, and hopped into a space in the traffic. As we passed M26 in Phoenix, there had to be a line of at least 10 vehicles waiting to turn onto 41. But I guess in the end I shouldn't laugh to hard at everyone crowding onto 41, it made the first 20 miles of the trip back to Houghton basically "normal" for us.
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