Mini-Roadtrip Heritage Farmstead - Plano, Texas

We were 1 for 2 on weekend outings this Saturday. The weather has finally broken from the usual August Blast Furnace, and we dashed out Saturday morning to enjoy the change.

Expedition 1 - Win:

We didn't go far, but still had an enjoyable morning walkthough at a local Historical Farm. Its a really small little plot of land in the middle of one of the largests suburbs of Dallas. The cooler weather made it nice to walk around and snap some pictures.

There are old farm buildings, and restored school house, and lots of farm implements ranging from restored tractors to old worn out horse drawn beauties.

They also had a Cane Sorgham Mill, or Press. This was a common tool found throughout the South. A Mule or Horse was hitched to the end of the boom pole. As it walked in a circle around the Mill, gears and rollers turned inside. Cane sorgham, or sugar cane, was fed into the device to be crushed. The juice would flow out and was boiled down into Sorgham Syrup... Yum!

My Grandparents actually ran one of these back in Lousiana when my Father was a boy. Sadly, they had gotten rid of the old Sorgham Mill before I was born. I'd sure like to have it back now, for sentimental reasons. You can still see old Mills like this in action throughout the south, especially during the fall.

Expedition 2 - Kinda Fail...

Our main destination for Saturday was the North Texas State Fair and Rodeo, in Denton, Texas. They have a Rodeo every night for over a week - and Saturday night was scheduled to be a "Bull Blowout" - which consists of a couple of hours of solid Bull Riding. No roping, no barrel racing, no bucking horses - just wild and rough Bull Riding - my favorite, just inches above the Saddle Bronc event.

The problem with that evening's entertainment was that the weather was GORGEOUS, and the event was virtually FREE. You pay to get into the North Texas State Fair and you can just walk into the rodeo for nuthin'.... sound good to you?

It also sounded good to thousands and thousands of other people. We got there 45 minutes before the bull riding was supposed to start and there were almost no seats left. Just the seats right down at the bottom of the stands where people walk by. And walk by they did.... all evening. We were eight bulls into the bull riding and we hadn't actually seen any of the action due to the mass of people aimlessly wandering around in front of us looking for non-existant seats.

Seriously.... A little forethought on crowd management might have been in order, ya know?

Anyway, it was disappointing - especially considering the last all-bull event we tried to attend was a wash out too, due to violent thunderstorms. However, we did manage to kill some time walking around looking at exhibits and vendor booths at the other areas of the Fair. We particularly liked the photography exhibit. It was cool looking at all the ribbon winner's entries.

It was dark as we left. Walking toward the exit gates, we passed by a climbing wall that they had set up. Atop the wall were some flags and two large inflatable Cowboys Football characters. I glanced at it at first and didn't notice anything... then a little voice in my head said, "What the...?"

I pointed it out to my Mrs. and she started laughing immediately. Picture is grainy and odd looking, cuz I had to lighten it up in Photoshop due to the darkness and distance to subject:

The guy in front doesn't look like he's enjoying it as much as the guy in the driver's seat is :)