August 20--Sibley Lake CG, MN to Albert Lea, MN

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Saturday, August 20th, 2011 Sibley Lake State Park, MN. Sunny at 9:30 this morning at 64 degrees but lots of clouds hanging out. Mileage is 16,185 to start the day.

Drove Rosie II to the lakeside campground to dump our holding tanks and take in fresh water. This is a nice camping set up, especially if you have a boat or horses. They have a special horse campground for people who wish to camp and ride their horses on the trails in the park.

Heading toward highway 15 through many little towns now. Seeing lots more turkey farms, some pig farms, and ethanol plants. Stopped in the town of Litchfield and bought cheese for gifts at their cheese outlet store that was in a true farmer's store. Wandered around a bit and looked at different items used for raising dairy cows or other animals---like bright neon colored 2 inch Velcro straps used to "mark" an animal by placing the strap around a foot. The mark could be for anything like "needs to be vaccinated", or "has been vaccinated"---you get the point. What interesting bits of knowledge you can pick-up/learn by wandering in stores in other parts of this country and in other countries as well.

We were somewhat disappointed in the small town of New Ulm, mostly due to our own expectations. Yes, many German-Bohemian immigrants settled this area in about 1854-1856 and built some very attractive brick buildings and still carry on many old traditions. However, the downtown is now a blend of that old and new architectural styles and misses the mark somewhat of being a completely "European German" town. It is still an attractive town and plays up its German heritage for the tourists. The heritage museum is housed in the attractive old post office built in 1910, a very nice statue honoring the pioneers was erected in 1991, a glockenspiel was built in 1980, the heritage tree marking the town's 150's anniversary was dedicated in 2006.

The original immigrants were looking to found a utopian German community in the American wilderness, but had not reckoned with the Dakota Sioux. The early townspeople were front and center of the US-Dakota War of 1862 with the reservation being only 10 miles upriver from New Ulm. The exact death toll from this war will never be known, but it is estimated that 800 whites and 400 Indians died making it the largest series of Indian and white battles in American History. The result of this war was the Dakota Sioux losing all their lands in Minnesota and being then relocated to poor land in South Dakota.

After walking around downtown for a couple blocks and then driving around town, we got gas and continued on out of town on route 15. Gas was $3.649 a gal and we took 20.554 galleons for a total cost of $75.00. Mileage is 16,300.

Had lunch in Rosie II on the grounds of the Madelia High School under a shade tree.

At Fairmont we attended the Morgan County Fair. We knew this was not going to be as big as the Santa Clara County Fair in California that we grew up attending, but we didn't expect it to be only 4 H participants. People we asked said that all the county fairs in Minnesota were for 4H kids only. Watched for about an hour while young people brought in their breeding heifers, then market heifers, then top wining heifers in all categories into an arena to be judged. We learned quite a bit as we asked questions of the people around us who were obviously related to the young people showing their animals.

Walked through and looked at rabbits , chickens, sheep, and the pig barn. Also looked at the usual handicrafts, produce, canning, and baked goods. Walked over and sat in the bleachers and watched a group of riders work their horses through poles set up in a line down the middle of the arena. Some did very well in time and some did very poorly, but all tried to do their best. We all smiled at a 4-5 year old girl and then a 5-6 year old boy decked all out in western wear as they rode their ponies through the poles---what made it fun was that their father, we think, walked in front of the ponies and the ponies just followed along weaving through the poles. We do not think the children guided the ponies at all, but it was cute. Watched until our bottoms went to sleep and then walked through the food area.

Several local church and civic organizations were set up in large buildings selling dinners and other food items. We bought 4 pieces of pie, rhubarb , one pineapple, and one peach, plus a turkey sandwich for Valerie and a "commercial" turkey dinner for me. We saw the term "commercial" listed in other places on other meat dinners also. The turkey one I bought was a slice of white bread, real turkey pulled like pork on top, then another slice of white bread, then a scoop of mashed potatoes and then gravy poured over all of it. It really wasn't too bad except the white bread was really soggy/gummy on the bottom and I prefer very grainy wheat bread.

Before we left, we walked over to where the John Deere exhibit was and I asked the man coming down off a humongous machine if he, "were a John Deere man?" I meant a salesman and he took my question to mean if he had one, and I think he responded like "are you a Ford or Chevy person?". We had seen so many of the big suckers in the fields we wanted to know how they operated. He patiently showed us how the machine worked and answered our really basic questions. He then told us that the machine we were looking at was so sophisticated that when it harvested it mapped out the farmer's acreage and told him the yield per acre so that he could add more fertilizer to a particular spot in the future if that was what was needed. It printed out overlays for him to study. The thing cost over $300,000 without all the needed attachments.

We took a quick walk through the vender tent to see what they were selling before we exited our first fair in years and years. Sometime, when we didn't notice, it sprinkled and then the dust from the parking lot settled on the raindrops so we now have a "spotted" Rosie---an appaloosa you think??

Fairmont is located down from highway 15 a few miles west on Interstate 90 so we hopped on 90 and drove east to the town of Albert Lea. Easily found the Wal-mart right off Interstate 35 that crosses there. Ate our turkey dinners and some of the delicious pie and settled in for the night.

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