That's when the city of Durango hired Bob Kunkel as its downtown coordinator, and five years later, the city streets were packed with people enjoying food, music and patriotism.

"The answer to the question, 'What do you do in Durango on the Fourth?' used to be 'Go to Bayfield or Silverton,'" Kunkel said Friday while he supervised the assembly of a large stage on Main Avenue for the evening's festivities.

"I thought something was missing, and I started with the other end of the day," Kunkel said.

Durango Parks and Recreation began the Freedom 5-kilometer run; Rotary Club of Durango did a pancake breakfast; Fort Lewis College supplied readers of historic documents; the Kiwanis Club stepped up and did the barbecue; and Wells Fargo Bank took the kids'flea market.

"They're all independently run, so they don't lose their entire day, but taken together with the parade, street dance and fireworks, it's a full day," Kunkel said.

Diana and Kevin Tsosie and their young son, Nakai, of Albuquerque have visited Durango many times, but had never seen the town buzzing like it was for the holiday. While Nakai had already filled his quota of the "beautiful stuff" he came to see, including the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory, the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad depot and the scenery, his parents were trying to keep up with the day's schedule.

"I had no idea Durango did anything like this," Diana Tsosie said. "We'll have to come back on another Fourth and try to do more."

Kunkel said this year's parade, at 35 entries, was expected to be about half the size of the winter Snowdown parade, but recently it's grown every year. The same is true for the fireworks display, which this year cost about $15,000 and included more than 3,200 individual explosions.

He said he's proud of the work he and the city crews have done to get the Fourth of July weekend on a par with Memorial Day and Labor Day, which have always filled the town with bicyclists in the spring and motorcyclists in the fall.

"If you still like Bayfield, go there. If you still like Silverton, go there. But you shouldn't have to go there for the reason that there's nothing to do here," Kunkel said.

Durango's Doug Huwer, lounging with his wife, Toni, in the shade of the Main Avenue beer tent at Buckley Park, said he had no plans to move until long after the fireworks ended.

"I'm pretty comfortable right here," Huwer said. "I don't think they want me driving over to Bayfield right now, anyway."

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