County/state fairs

[RedAngie]

I'm a State/County Fair junkie!!

I never made it to the California State Fair in Sacramento when I lived in CA, but did go to the Los Angeles and Orange County fairs. The LA fair can be a little scary; there have been incidents over the years like the one posted above about the Meadowlands fair.

The Delaware State Fair opens two weeks from today. For such a tiny state, they do a pretty good job. They have all the usual stuff, animals, agricultural exhibits, arts & crafts, midway, plus a casino and racetrack. No particular concert scheduled this year appeals to me, but I'll probably go anyway.

I think our Iowa State Fair is one of the biggest, with over 1,000,000 visitors every year.

We went to the Iowa State Fair in 1996. Flew to Des Moines specifically for the fair. (And Adventureland theme park). It was one of the best ones.

Don't forget to get your super shamies, ginsu knives, and the like. HAHAHA.

I enjoy going thru the buildings looking at all that crap.


Going to the Minnesota State Fair in St.Paul at the end of August. It's said they have the craziest food concoctions there.
http://www.mnstatefair.org/find/new-food/


Other fairs I've attended:

Kentucky
Ohio
Indiana
Texas
Virginia
Maryland
North Carolina
New Jersey
Iowa
The Big E (combined fair for the 6 New England states in Springfield, Massachusetts)
I don't think Pennsylvania has an official state fair, but they have several large regional ones. I've been to Allentown and Bloomsburg.

Canadian National Exhibition in Toronto
Pacific National Exhibition in Vancouver

I also like going to church carnivals, even though I'm not a member of any congregation.

 

[Colleen27]

Our county fair is dinky, mostly 4-H exhibits and livestock, with some grandstand events like demo derby or a rodeo, and some inflatables run by the preschool as a fundraiser.

Ours is the same, though we do have a small carnival that sets up for the week. Two years ago was the last time we bothered with rides - I got each of the kids $10 worth of ride tickets on "every ride is $1" day and they had a hard time using them all up. But the 4H exhibits are always fabulous, the rodeo and tractor pull are fun if you're into that stuff, local bands play in the evenings, and the splash pad at the park/fairgrounds is always nice for cooling off. Not many vendors that anyone would recognize - nothing you'd see on a late-night infomercial - but there are always some crafters and local shops running booths, plus church ladies and the friends of the park with their fundraiser BBQs and the library-sponsored face painting and storytime for the little ones. Because my girls are 4Hers we're out there all week, taking care of our bunnies, so we rent a cabin in a nearby campground and make a mini-vacation of it.

 

[tcufrog]

I usually go to the Texas State Fair which is the largest state fair in the country. It runs for about a month in the fall at permanent fair grounds. Last year more than 2.4 million people attended. The fair dates back to 1885 and is famous for its talking Big Tex statue. Every year he gets a new outfit. The fair is also famous for the huge selection of artery clogging fried foods

 

[RedAngie]

I usually go to the Texas State Fair which is the largest state fair in the country. It runs for about a month in the fall at permanent fair grounds. Last year more than 2.4 million people attended. The fair dates back to 1885 and is famous for its talking Big Tex statue. Every year he gets a new outfit. The fair is also famous for the huge selection of artery clogging fried foods

I was there in 2012 the day after Big Tex burned down. People were putting flowers and other memorials around the base.

Did they rebuild Big Tex?

 

[Jdbsfw]

I was there in 2012 the day after Big Tex burned down. People were putting flowers and other memorials around the base.

Did they rebuild Big Tex?

Oh the humanity.....

 

[tcufrog]

They did rebuild him. He doesn't look exactly the same but there couldn't be a State Fair of Texas without Big Tex.

 

[Forevermarypoppins]

I LOVE the WISCONSIN STATE FAIR.
I haven't any interest in my county fair!