The San Diego County Fair Day 1

The San Diego County Fair, or how we like to still call it "The Del Mar Fair", is a sight to see if you come to San Diego in the summer time. I always recommend it to anyone who is from out of town. The rides, the food, the games, and the night time lights. Even though it is kind of the same every year, Darlyn and I make sure we still find time to go, to refresh our memories and to create more.

We initially wanted to go to the fair the weekend that it opened because when we did that last year, there was no traffic and the crowds were minimal. We didn't have to snake through the mob of people and the oil was fresh for the deep fried foods. However, this year, there were many family events going on every Saturday so we weren't able to go early, but we still went and that is all that mattered.

After we both took care of some things we had planned, we headed to the fair around 4pm. We really wanted to go from opening to closing, but we already knew that even the fair wasn't that big for a whole day of festivities. Plus, it was much cooler in the day during the time that we went.

We planned out our day during the weeks prior to going and we knew we wanted to get as much food in as we could so we decided to get Australian Potatoes once we got into the fairgrounds and that is what we did.

For those who are unfamiliar, Australian Potatoes are just horizontally sliced potatoes that has been battered and deep fried. You can choose to top it off with nacho cheese, bacon bits, sour cream , and/or ranch. We chose nacho cheese and sour cream! It was a lot to eat for just two people, and unfortunately the taste of the batter and oil gets bland and not so appetizing by the end.

Afterwards, we went to walked it off and browsed the Fun Zone where they held the games and rides. Mostly, there were the same games and same rides. Shoot out the star game, football game, basketball, water gun, etc, etc. Most of the rides were just meant to spin in circles until you got sick. Our plans didn't involve riding any rides or playing any games. We didn't want to ride any rides because we didn't want to puke up any food and we didn't want to play any games because most of them were rigged. We just wanted to watch people get sick on rides and watch people win and lose at games. We enjoy people watching haha. However, there is one game I play every year and my winning percentage was pretty good until today. I didn't get to take a picture of the game because I forgot to but it consists of 15 or so playing slots. The objective of the game was to roll a small ball into holes that say, slow, fast, or faster. The more the ball rolls into the faster the more your horse advances to the finish line. First to the finish line wins. I ALWAYS win when the game is around. I do not win everytime, but I win at least once. But this day was different. $3 per play and I played 4 times total that day. I SWEAR that game was rigged too. I clearly saw my horse was in the finish line before everyone else and I still lost...

After the disappointment, Darlyn and I went to go check out the booths that sold gadgets and gizmos. Everything was the same as years before. Shower heads, power washers, blenders, food chopping devices. The only new thing that we noticed were fidget spinners that were like $30, and 10 foot USB charges. The lady said that if we bought two for $20, we could get one free. We said we would think about it.

Afterwards we decided to get a chocolate and peanut dipped cheesecake! As we ate it, I kept thinking it was going to be like ice cream but it wasn't. But don't get me wrong, it was pretty good. The cheesecake had a little lemon zest flavor to it.

We decided to finish the cheesecake before we went to more exhibits because the peanuts kept falling off and making a mess. We first checked out the "Wild West" exhibit because that was the theme of the fair. It was ehh, nothing too impressive and it was too dark in there for picture. Come to think of it, I wonder why it is so dark all the time in there every year.

Afterwards, we headed to see the animals! The San Diego County fair has a small petting zoo and host a lot of animals. They had sheep, goats, chickens, ducks, cows, and pigs. There were probably many more than I could remember. We also were able to get a glimpse of "The Giant Horse". They charge a couple bucks just to see the horse, but it was so huge, we were able to see it over its fence, and it was HUGE! Poor horse though, it has barely any room to move in the place it was being displayed. What we found most entertaining were the small goats eating hay and straw through the gate. There was one pile of hay that seemed to get all the goats' attention because others from surrounding gates wanted some. We also saw a odd cow that just kept licking the air.

After saying bye to the animals, we headed to the kid's zone because it was close by. Usually, we had to walk a long way around to get to the kid's zone but we took the short cut that was always there but we never took. We just looked around but our main goal was to take the sky ride back to the main part of the fair. When we were buying tickets to get admission to the ride, we noticed that the lady selling the tickets was wearing fair pins from previous year. If I only knew they sold pins I would have totally started buying a collection many years ago. But I had to start this year. Better late than never.

As we were on our ride over to the main part of the fair some kids dropped a water bottle and it slammed onto the floor beneath. Luckily, no one got hit. The people who were next to where it fell never even realized that it was dropped from above, they thought someone just threw it. Darlyn was a bit scared of the height, I was a bit too but ehh. We tried to take many pictures from up above because it showed the entire fair and beyond. Also, it was golden hour, so the lighting was perfect!

When we landed, we weren't yet hungry so we decided to check out the Fun Zone once again because there were areas that we didn't explore. AND I went to go play the same game again to see if I could win. The 3rd and 4th time playing that day. Yet, no luck for me. So we decided to find some more food, more of a dinner for us. We had our mind set on what we wanted to eat from planning it days/weeks prior but we wanted to see our other options. We checked out the funnel cakes and the jalapeño popper bacon grilled cheese but eventually we ended up with our foot long hot dog with veggies and nacho cheese!

I had this last year and was able to finish it alone, but this year Darlyn and I were splitting it so it was a 6 inch for the two of us. It was pretty good and it filled us up well!

After finishing eating, we went to check out the last two exhibit halls that we have yet to see. One of these was more of a home and garden exhibit so it didn't really intrigue us. When we got out the sun was setting and the nighttime lights were out. The fair was shining!

Night time at the fair is very beautiful. It's just a reminder of how lucky we are to be in a city like San Diego, where we can be outside at night where it is not too cold and not too hot. As we headed to the Farris Wheel we decided to take our annual photo booth shots. There is always the same worker every years manning the photo booths, it is so funny. Before we inserted to coin into the photo booth we planned out our poses because the booth takes a pic every 5 seconds. We had a regular smiling one, a kissing one, and two silly ones. As always my big ass head was taking up all the space... sorry babe. But the photos turned out great! We have a huge collection of all our photo booth pictures dating back to our first date together almost 9 years ago.

The Farris Wheel is always a must for us at the fair, especially at night because we can see all the lights of the fair. But, apparently it is also a must for dozens of other people. The line to the front of the ride was super long. But it seemed to go by fast because it gave us a chance to take some pictures together at night. There was a new edition to the Farris Wheel as well. Each gondola had lights on their ceilings to illuminate the capsule, making it easier to take pictures at night! We were fortunate to have our gondola to be stopped at the very top of the wheel. We took pictures half the time and enjoyed the ride the other half. It went by too fast like always.

Afterwards, we did one last walk around the Fun Zone to take pictures of the night lights. But we started to head towards the exit when I started to get a migraine. But we figured it was okay, because we would be returning one more time this year...