International Plowing Match

The International Plowing Match and Rural Expo was in Chute-a-Blondeau this year, just a short stop down the road so Natalie and I decided to head over. They expect 100,000 people to visit over five days. A huge tent city has been set up in a farmer's field with electricity and roads brought in for just these days. We parked the car and they took us in hay wagons to the actual site!


Isn't this burlap cow kinda cute?


More burlap farm animals. I thought they were pretty creative.


We went inside the farm animal tent. Here's cool Canadian Chantecler chicken, a handsome bird.


Loved this sweet-faced alpaca.


Sheepies are the cutest!


Some lovely cows drew a bit of attention.


There was a giant mama piggy with tons of babies, but I liked this one best...the one who wasn't feeding but snuggled by mom's head. Looked like Babe!


Maybe there's a future for me in pigs? Who knew?


Out back of the Eco tent was a raptor demo. Except they weren't letting the bird free because there were small dog demonstrations next door.


Good idea!


Here's one of the larger dogs going through the paces.


Pretty impressive.


There were several displays and tents full of antiques, mostly farm equipent.


Brightly painted tractor seats.


Old, worn machines.


Many machines ran by steam power and had a special section of their own.


There was even a display of antique chainsaws!


There were plenty of displays of new, shiny equipment too.


Here's Natalie sidling up to a machine that takes logs in one end and shoots out cord wood from the other. (Richard will want this one!)


There were cool seed to feed displays (note water bottle on the side...perhaps to feed the seeds?)


The Quilt of Belonging is an impressive site, in a tent all its own.


After all that walking and looking, we had to try a poutine...


...and afterwards headed to the dairy tent for a taste of Canadian ice cream.
It was a gorgeous, warm and sunny fall day. We had fun but never managed to see any actual plowing!! Maybe another time...

To read the review of the poutine, click here to go to poutine chronicles blog.

To see Natalie's account of our visit click here to get to her blog.