Bonfire!

We went to the annual Salem bonfire last night. It was held at Dead Horse Beach in the Salem Willows Park. The event has grown over the last several years. I'd bet that there were a few thousand people there, which is exponentially more than I've seen in past years. The town clears and levels a part of the beach and piles the collected Christmas trees in the center. This years' pile had to have had a 50 foot diameter and was about 30 feet tall. Different estimates put the number of trees at anywhere from 500 to 2000! Biggest pile of Christmas trees I've ever seen! The trees were lit off at 6:00 last night. The photo shows the fire about 1 minute after lighting. We hung around for about an hour, at which time it was still burning furiously, and I had had enough of staring mindlessly at fire. Fascination with fire has got to be a primitive ingrained thing with humans. Why else would one stand for an hour staring at it? It was a nice little community 'event'. Something to bring people together for a short while. You bring the kids and the dog and it's free. No politics either!