Saturday was not your typical, laid-back, summer Saturday on upper Queen Anne. Not with the 20th annual Crown of Queen Anne Fun Run & Walk, a children's parade, a sidewalk sale and community picnic.
The predawn drizzle gave way to a cloudy but dry morning.
More than 350 runners and walkers gathered at Queen Anne Lutheran Church to prepare for the Queen Anne Helpline's Fun Run & Walk. At 8 a.m. walkers left the starting line at Fifth Avenue West and West Halladay. Runners took off on the 3.3-mile course 20 minutes later. The first male runner to cross the finish line, for the second year in a row, was Nick Kirschner. The first female was Erika Daligcon. Michael Proulx placed first for 12 and under, and David Danbom, 70, took the honors for the highest finisher by age. Helpline director Pat Sobeck estimates this year's event netted $9,000 or more for the organization.
Then came the children's parade.
The parade left the McClure Middle School parking lot at 11:35 a.m. and made a circuit around the Queen Anne Community Center complex. The green-clad All City Marching Band lead the way with rousing march tunes. In their wake: kid-powered bikes, trikes and floats, plus parents and assorted others wearing funny hats, blowing bubbles or just walking.
Motorcycle cops smiled and tapped their black-booted toes to the music, and a group of Little League All Stars, at one end of the playfield for Saturday morning practice, broke into an impromptu dance as the parade rolled by.
The 30-minute spectacle spilled down West Howe to the community center playground where free hamburgers and hot dogs were already on the grill and the steel drum band Bakra Bata was setting up for the community picnic.[[In-content Ad]]
