At the Iowa State Fair

 80 degrees here in Clarinda, IA at 7:30 pm on Wednesday with 2" of rain overnight and more rain with storms expected during tonight.

Sitting behind our trailer, eating supper in the shade at the Iowa State Fair Campgrounds Sunday after we had gotten trailer set up..  Were on sidehill on grass.  It rained during the night Sunday and again Monday during the day.  Great Granddaughter Jessica will spend the week with us.

This was the trailer as set up Sunday afternoon.

Monday morning we walked the 100 yards
or so to catch one of the shuttles down to the
Fairground.  We stopped to have Jessica registered
in case she got lost.

First building we came to was the Agriculture
Building, had to wait 15 minutes for it to open.

Though it had been advertised that a likeness
of Caitlin Clark would be in butter, there was
a sign that No Caitlin Clark - and it was true.

We got a hard-boiled egg on a stick -- looked a little like this:

Clifford, the Red Dog is behind these two girls here.

About noon it started raining hard and we
found a lady putting on exhibit of
preparing beef indoors.  After an hour there we
went back outside, still raining.

After locating some restrooms, we spent some
time under the roof at the Administration
Building watching it rain.

We waited in some lite rain to get into
the Iowa Pork Tent.

Had some delicious pork and waited out
the rain.

Spent some time in the Learning Center and visited ducks, goats, hogs that had just farrowed (one had 15 piglets) chickens, baby chicks, and probably other animals I can't recall right now.

After walking around the Industrial Arts
Building we got seats under a canvas covered
area on seats and waited nearly 2 hours for
the show.  We were up front.

95-year old LeRoy Van Dyke put on a good show and then introduced Chris & Taylor Malpass, the Malpass Brothers.  We have seen them many times and they gave a very good show.  There was some mist in the air and quite a few people were out in the open.  We, and the performers, were covered and we enjoyed the show.  They were doing a second show at 7 pm, but we were beat after walking around the fair for about 11 hours so headed back to the trailer.

It rained more Monday night, I was up twice re-filling gas in the generator.  By Tuesday morning it was a muddy quagmire where they had us park.  I tried to drive up the "path" but spun out and finally backed clear back down, took down a pennant-type fence and backed clear out into a grassed area.

Wasn't any signs to not go there, so used that way out.  We stopped at Aldi's and Sam's Club in Des Moines and then headed for Clarinda.  Arrived about 3 pm after dumping tanks at the city spot near the airport.

It is raining hard now at 9:20 pm as I write this and watch is out for severe storm, maybe with tornado and hail.

Will write another blog tomorrow to bring up-to-date the last of the Kenwood RV Rally at State Center and the weekend at Cam & Patty's.

LCM