I was just as pumped up about this fair as the rest of the state. I'd never been before (obviously since this is the first time I've spent summer in Iowa) and it was ... AWESOME.
The fair itself is MASSIVE. Or maybe it just felt that way because I kept getting lost. But, SERIOUSLY - I was there for twelve hours and still missed out on some stuff. This thing is pretty much a two or three day afFAIR ;) I had to squeeze a pun in.
There are some Iowa fair traditions that keep people coming back year after year. For example, the pork chop on a stick. I didn't eat one, but I found people who were and it made me laugh. The running joke is that you can find anything on a stick at the Iowa State Fair. Drake pharmacy students were even there doing heartburn screenings and were giving out samples of Prilosec on a stick. No joke. There was also salad on a stick - that was new this year and kind of a big buzz item. I never did see one of those, but I saw the booth that made them in the Agriculture Building.
Another big thing that keeps people coming back is the butter cow. I never did see the butter cow (apparently I was right near it and just totally missed it). It's not just a butter cow - there are all sorts of butter things. This year there was a cow, a butter Shawn Johnson (Iowa's Golden Girl), and a couple of other butter statues. Last year there was a butter Harry Potter. One year there was a butter Garth Brooks. The butter people like to make their cow as always and then do something out of the news. Click the links for pictures.
Personally, i spent a lot of time in the barns. I LOVE animals - especially farm animals like sheep and pigs and cows and chickens and bunnies and pandas. Just joking about the pandas. I saw something about pandas while I was watching the Olympics the other night... I'm getting off topic. Back to the barns. I don't even know if I saw all the barns. There was a swine barn, a sheep barn, a cattle barn, and a horse barn. I think I liked the pigs the best. There was one pig (you'll see a picture of him at the bottom of my post) that was totally my favorite. I stopped and talked to his owner for a while about showing pigs and everything. She initially mistook me for a farmer (although, I'm not sure how considering how touristy I looked) and then explained what all is involved in raising pigs. Not a cake walk, that's for sure.
One of my favorite parts of the fair was the "discovery garden" outside the agriculture building. It's just a small, well, garden, but they had all sorts of cool flowers and butterflies I'd never seen before. And I'm kinda a sucker for flowers and butterflies... I'm a sucker for a lot of things. Don't judge me ;)
Inside the agriculture building they had all the 4-H prize-winning crops and stuff. Like eggplants. You wouldn't think that'd be cool, but it totally was. And flowers. I didn't know they entered flowers for competition. And then there were all these booths... like the Iowa Ostrich Association booth. You may be wondering why an ostrich association is even necessary in Iowa. Apparently at one point ostrich farms were fairly popular. The question still remains, though. What's the point of an ostrich farm? i should have asked.
For a few hours, I also volunteered at the Drake booth! Yes, Drake represents at the fair. Actually, I guess we were kind of all over. Admissions had a booth in the Varied Industries building (go there for freebies), pharmacy students were milling around somewhere else with Prilosec, and I was at a tent with our mascot Spike, free tattoos, the men's basketball team (signing autographs for their adoring fans... and there WERE A LOT of adoring fans), and those face cut-out dealies where you stick your head in some sort of scene and get your picture taken. It was a lot of fun and A LOT of people came out.
Gosh, there was just so much there I definitely feel like I'm leaving all sorts of stuff out. Hopefully the pictures'll speak for themselves. I might need another post just for more pictures.
She's ADORABLE. I don't care if you think she's just a cow - she's A REALLY CUTE cow.
Here it is - the pork chop on a stick. Not the best picture, but you get the idea. People were eating these IN the swine barn which I found a little tactless. And gross - who could eat ANYTHING in the barns? Kinda smells bad.
This was always my favorite ride when I was younger. Heck, don't think I wouldn't have gone on it if I had the tickets.
This is my favorite pig of them all. I went back to see him. Frankly I think it speaks volumes about my personality that I could find this exact pig again in a massive barn full of pigs that looked essentially the same but had a really hard time finding my car in the parking lot.
Baby pygmy goat nursing and wagging its tail as fast as humanly possible (well.. maybe as fast as goat-ly possible). How you can tell it's a baby is beyond me - pygmy goats are tiny anyway.
This is "Freight Train," the biggest, baddest boar at the fair ... at a mere 1,259 pounds. How does it get up?
Who wasn't looking in the view finder to take this picture. Oh, yeah... I wasn't. Chalk this shot up to luck.
There was a wooden statue of a girl taking pictures... so OF COURSE I had to take a picture of it.
In the discovery garden - these massive bees were everywhere. I don't think they're the stinging kind, though.
I stalked this guy for a LONG time. I took about 50 pictures just of this one butterfly. God bless digital photography.
MASSIVE sunflowers. They're actually kinda intimidating.
Corn has never looked so glamorous like it did at the state fair.
Here's our giant inflatable Spike. I had more pictures of the Drake booth, but they're all on a disposable camera that I have to get developed.
State's best beets. Schrute farms, perhaps? Question - which bear is best? Bears eat beets. Bears. Beets. Battlestar Galactica. (Office reference)
One of my favorite shots of the day. Outside the ag. building there were these fountains that the kids were playing in and i stood at just the right angle to see a rainbow in the water from the sunlight. It was flippin' sweet.
Night lights at a carnival are the BEST.
Ferris wheel!
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