Scarecrows

The scarecrows are back for their second annual display at the nearby town. I took a few photos of my favorites around town.

The beauty salon

 

Subway restaurant

The antique shop

The pawn shop

The lumber yard

  

The food pantry

The bank

The mechanic shop

Cotton Harvest Festival

Cotton Fest has come and gone. Or I should say, "Cotton Harvest Festival" since I was corrected a few times recently. It had many of the same elements as last year's festival with a few new attractions. There was a Tractor Pull this year which I found interesting. It wasn't as I had thought, tractors playing tug of war, but instead more of a tractor dragging a huge piece of equipment across the field sort of event. The little I did watch seemed like it wasn't so much about horsepower but more about skill in using it. If I hadn't wanted to see the rest of the festival I would have sat and just watched this. Maybe I will next year.

The carnival arrived a few day early to set up. This was a strawberry ride.

This was a caterpillar ride.

Amazingly, this was the Ferris wheel.

The Antique Tractor Show was set up around the ball field where the tractor pull was going on.

There were lots of old John Deere tractors on display.

I usually think of tractors by color instead of brand. So this is a RED one.

This old grey Ford tractor was a nice relief in John Deere territory. It was my favorite.

There was also an antique car show.

This was my favorite: a 1940 Plymouth pickup.

The Tractor Pull was held on the old ball field behind the fencing. The outfield was used for the competition.

Various sized tractors were timed as they pulled the same huge piece of equipment across the prepared track.

There were new tractors on display as well. This is the biggest tractor I've ever seen: 9630 John Deere.

I had to take this for scale. The tires were taller than Daughter.

The festival was mostly held on Main Street.

A little train gave rides to the children.

New this year was a mechanical bull ride. This is on my bucket list.

Photos of Longhorns seemed to be popular this year in the Photo Contest.

This antique chuck wagon was one of my favorite things.

A local farmer donated a trailer of cotton for the children to play in.

The "glamping" ladies - Sisters on the Fly -  were giving tours of their vintage trailers.

Something else new this year was a Scarecrow Decorating Competition.

There was live music and dancing in the street.

Lots of cowboy hats were for sale.

This was an felted llama wool Texas flag.

Texas flags were everywhere.

Daughter waited in line for 30 minutes to buy a deep fried Snickers chocolate bar.

She said it was worth the wait even though it was very sweet.

Before we left, we had to ride the Ferris wheel - little in comparison to the Texas Star.

The Ferris wheel cost $4 for a ride that took us around 30 times. Pretty good value.

Our view from the top of the Ferris wheel.

Texas Star

We rode the Texas Star when we went to the State Fair. It is the largest Ferris wheel in the northern hemisphere. That's quite a claim. The wait time was about 20 minutes and it cost $7 each. And for that price we got to go around two times. The seats or "gondolas" are safely protected with bars. We shared our gondola with a couple other people. We had a great view of downtown Dallas from the top.

Here are the facts on the Texas Star.

I was relieved to see: DO NOT ROCK CAR.

The Ferris wheel was moving in a clockwise rotation.

It didn't appear that all the gondolas were being filled.

Most gondolas had 4-6 people inside.

It felt a bit like being inside a cage.

We'll ride the Skyway ride another time.

The midway was very busy this Friday evening.

The midway is right below the Texas Star.

This is a good view of the Cotton Bowl stadium.

The downtown Dallas skyline

Each gondola had a Texas flag on top.

Downtown skyline from a different angle

View from the bottom

Another view from the bottom

The Texas Star is so big it's hard to get it all in one shot.

This view is from the other side of the midway.