Day 1 - Blogabond

152,674 read my odometer as I pulled out of the gas station near my house in Oakland. $4.05/gallon was the price. 11:42am was the time. I was on my way. There is something momentous about taking your first steps toward an unknown adventure. The theme from 2001 hanging in the air. Chauncy Gardner walking out the door. I beamed. I was also scared. I kept finding things I needed to do before leaving as if delaying a 5 week road trip was truly possible by random 5 minute chores. One of the things I am embracing in this new life of mine is Courage. I have felt the fear and been held back by it. Now I want to feel it and have it help propel me forward. Quitting my job was the first experiment in courage. leaving the house and hitting the road was another.

My plan was to drive half way to Boise today and finish the rest of the drive tomorrow. Winnemucca, NV was a place I had heard about as the place if you get arrested at Burning Man, that's where the county seat is and where you have to go to face the music. Winnemucca is that half way point. About 30 minutes into the trip I placed a call to my sister to chat about life and things and that conversation resulted in my first detour of the trip. Turns out in all of my research and planning I overlooked my own backyard for something to do. Cara tipped me off to the California State Fair in Sacramento. Now I had been looking up other state fairs, but they are all gone by September so i scratched them off my list. I am so grateful to her for that suggestion. The State Fair is amazing. The Cal State Expo grounds for one are really cool with all the pavilions and grand stands, and whatnot.

Horny

The livestock displays were awesome for a city boy such as myself. Cute food, some of it still alive

Pig Pen

and in a pen and the rest of it either on a stick, or deep fried. I had to get a deep fried Twinkie.

Deep Fried Twinkie

I just had to. Disgustingly good. Exactly as it should be. They also had a pretty impressive visual arts pavilion with a wide range of mediums that reflected pretty diverse disciplines.

Starving Artists

But the best part of the California State Fair were the County displays. Not all of the counties were represented (including none of the Bay Area counties,) but the ones that were there ranged from cheesy to cheese fest with a side of slaw.

Big Bird

We're talkin the good kind of bad, not bad bad. Someone had an idea and someone else gave them the money to build it, and someone else pinned an award ribbon it. Seemed like everything there at the fair got a ribbon. What's up with that? There were an awful lot of first place llamas.

Winner

Not to mention 100 different award winning jams, jellies, and preserves because boysenberry and boysenberry/blackberry count as two different categories. What must really suck is if you enter something your proud of and in the face of all those ribbons that you got none. FAIL. State wide FAIL.

I could have spent all day at the fair, but I had a county set in the middle of Nevada to get to, so after 2 hours, a hot dog on a stick, an ear of corn, a lemonade drink and the before mentioned battered and fried Twinkie (with Strawberry sauce) I hit the road.

written by

JRadhirsch on September 1, 2008 from Sacramento, United States

from the travel blog: The Great American Road Trip

tagged CaliforniaStateFair, DeepFriedTwinkie, Jams, Jellies, Preserves and BeingThere

Send a Compliment

What a fantastic telling of Day 1. And the first day is already full of revelations, unexpected happenings, and statistics! Whoo-hoo! You made me (almost) there. :)

I might have even tried a deep fried twinkie.

Blue Ribbon for you! And this ain't no State Fair. I only give out one per day. You're it today.

written by

Justine Smith on September 1, 2008

mmmmm....fried food. with you all the way

written by

pop on September 2, 2008

Ribbons on all the entries! Being a "FAIR girl" myself and all, only the winning entries get displayed at fairs. The suckier ones get to go home. Lucky for you, you got to see the best of the worse!

Thanks for sharing your blogabond with us! We are keeping tabs on you for sure!

written by Cat on September 2, 2008

I am so sad I missed out on the jams/preserves/foodstuffs. After 5 hours at the fair we were plain pooped - not even the prospect of a Demolition Derby could keep us going.
Hope you have Basque food for breakfast!!

written by Cara on September 2, 2008

to cara

wow you must have really been pooped. demo derby is the cats meow!

written by

pop on September 2, 2008

Wow, so that's what they do with all the starving artists, I had no idea. And here you were probably ready to "feed" them some coins only to see the sign that the machine was out of order. Cara must've been really pooped if she didn't go to Demolition Derby. You guys loved that at the Pocono fairs growing up. Sad to say, but the fried twinkees looked good too.

written by jrad's mom on September 2, 2008

The demolition derby was at 7pm and they were done hours before that. It's really exhausting all that fried food. I would have stayed as well, but you know... Winnemucca.

written by

JRadhirsch on September 2, 2008

Teats...teats...all I see are TEATS!!!!

written by the Zote on September 3, 2008

Yay! I know I'm a little bit behind, but I LOVE state fairs. And county fairs. And the 4H projects. And the funnel cake. And the part where the pigs race for an oreo. Few people understand the enthusiam.

written by alena Kitson on September 20, 2008

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