Alaska State Fair!

On Saturday Andy decided to put his hatred of crowds aside and take me to the State Fair in Palmer.  What a nice husband!

We got to the fair early and hit no traffic on our way to Palmer, which is about 45 miles north of Anchorage.  Palmer is really farmy and actually reminds me a lot of the little towns around Salem, just surrounded by giant mountains.

As I have mentioned before on the blog (and as you probably know from general awareness of the world), there's a lot of daylight in the summer in Alaska.  This means that even though the summer is somewhat short, the growing season is awesome.  I have photographic evidence (note, these pictures are from the junior gardeners division, I think they roll out the "pro" vegetables as the fair goes on):

Exhibit A:

This cabbage weighs in at a whopping 89.4 lbs! That's a lot of sauerkraut. 

Exhibit B:

That is a rutabaga.
I had never seen a rutabaga before, let alone a 53.35 lb rutabaga

 Exhibit C:

10+ lbs (x2!) of disgusting zucchini - the only vegetable I hate.

Exhibit D:

Dahlias the size of my head! 

 After checking out the giant veggies and flowers, we moved onto livestock.  First up - chickens.  I really liked the animals because they all had names - even the cattle that they were putting up for the beef auction, which is super creepy.  Almost all of the animals were raised by kids, too, which I loved.  I always wanted to be in 4-H, but that's not something that you can really do in the suburbs.

This was my favorite chicken.  Her name is Becky and she won a fancy ribbon.  Mom and dad - get one of these chickens! (I have no idea what kind she was)

We also saw some GIANT chickens.

 After the chickens, we went to check out the ducks.  Apparently the latest trend in ducks is ducks with afros. I thought that this was just something that someone attached to the duck's head, but it seems to be natural from looking at other ducks.  This means that some horrible person actually took the time to dye this duck's hair purple.  This is sign #1 that PETA has not yet taken notice of Alaska.  Sign #2 comes later.

This duck does not have purple hair, but it still looks ridiculous. 

 After the ducks and chickens, we headed into the main livestock area and were greeted by this monster.  He was not friendly and really scary.  Turkeys are for eating and not for pets.

Pigs! The first pig was called Princess.  The sign on her pen said she is going to have babies at the fair! Much to my dismay she did not have her babies as we were walking by.

These pigs reminded us of our cats.  They are just as lazy and skinny as the pigs.

The fair was full of baby animals.

baby goat!

Baby cows!
(These were petting zoo calves and not the ones that were in the beef auction)

We even saw a goat being a jerk to another goat.  He would not stop kicking his friend in the head.  Then again, it might not be fair to call that goat a jerk, maybe it was payback for something the other goat did.  We'll never know. 

This goat was really fascinated by me.  Isn't it weird how his pupils are square? Is that normal for goats? Why do I have so many questions about goats?

After checking out all the animals, we went out to the outdoor portions to see the various food and junk vendors.  I think the NRA booth was my favorite.  They were raffling off guns.  GUNS!! GUNS!! GUNS!!  America!!!

Then we stumbled upon sign #2 of PETA's absence in Alaska.  This booth is sponsored by the Elks and is called the Rat Race.  It involves gambling so I was instantly attracted.  Andy said this booth had been at the fair at least since he was a little kid.

Me placing my bet.

 So here's the lowdown.  In the middle of the booth is a giant wheel that rotates (not fast, but it definitely spins).  The wheel kind of looks like the one from wheel of fortune and has about 10 different colors all around with a hole in each pie piece.  In the middle is a dome tied to a string.

Everyone gets about a minute to place their bets.  Some colors appear more frequently on the wheel, so the odds are less.  For instance, black pays 1 for 1 because it has the most pie pieces.  I think pink was the rarest and paid out 13 to 1.  Minimum bet is 25 cents, maximum bet is 50 cents.  Everyone is in charge of keeping track of their own quarters.

After the dome lifts, the excitement begins!!  The "rat" (actually a gerbil) is let loose - and everyone cheers for their color.  COME ON BLUE! 

I will remind you that this is spinning, so the poor little gerbil is just spinning around
 and running terrified towards the holes...

 Eventually the rat (gerbil) pics a color and they pay out the bets.

I think this one went white - we didn't win.

 We tried it about 5 rounds and never won anything, but didn't feel too bad about donating a couple bucks to the Elks.  Also, it was really entertaining.  One guy I stood by was winning a LOT - betting 50 cents each time on some high odds colors and winning just about every time.  He said he planned on spending the whole day there, and it's the only place he goes at the fair every year.  The lady at the booth said they only let the gerbils go for 20 minutes at a time and they have a whole bunch in the back of the booth.  The one we bet on was called "Juanita." I am really surprised we never saw anything like this at the Harney County Fair and Rodeo in Burns - this seems like something that might've even been invented in Burns. (Megan, tell your dad about this brilliant moneymaker!).

We walked around and checked out the rides, but didn't ride any...

The weather was beautiful despite the horrible rain forecast and at one point the clouds even parted and the mountains came out!

The last stop at the fair will be no surprise to many of you...

Yes I do think that's a (former) church. Drinking and church do go hand in hand.
As Fr. Art at UP once told me, do you think they were drinking grape juice at the last supper? He's so smart. 

 We grabbed a beer and sat outside to watch the show at the pavilion.  We caught the end of some Alaskan Native dancers' performance, which was really interesting and entertaining.

Enjoying the day.

About as close to church as Andy will ever get. 

Our view from the patio.  Such a beautiful day!

 We also had the opportunity to do some excellent people watching while we sat down.  This person I loved so much, I had to take a picture.  Sadly, I could not get a picture of him from the front, but I will say he had an epic beard (from the front he was more mountain man than hippie) and was also wearing an Obama 2012 bumper sticker on his shirt.  This guy was awesome because you just couldn't peg him by looking at his appearance or his clothes or the drink in his hand (a really nice $12 glass of Oregon Pinot).

He reminds me of my staunch libertarian coworker who makes his living as a bureaucrat.  I think being a living oxymoron is uniquely Alaskan.

Well that was the fair! On the way home, it got really busy and the traffic to the fair stretched for miles. We were glad we got there early and we had a great time.  Can't wait to make this a yearly tradition!