Summer is the perfect time to be out and about with your family, having new experiences and making memories. One of my family’s favorite summer adventures is the New York State Fair, because it has so much to offer for all ages. It is the perfect place to make summer memories that will last forever. In fact a day at the New York State Fair was the first date for my husband and I, 20 some years ago.
So I headed out on a warm summer day to explore the fair with my oldest daughter, and we brought along my new Samsung Galaxy Prime GoPhone. There is so much to see and do at the Fair, and I used the phone to take lots and lots of pictures.
One of my favorite things at the fair is all the animals – especially the babies. The Dairy Cow Birthing Center is one of the best places to see young ones, since it welcomes new calves into the world every day, and you can even watch the calves being born. We didn’t get there quite in time to see a calf being born, but we did see this baby, just 30 minutes old, as his mother encouraged him to take his first wobbly steps. They even have a text message alerts available to let you know when a mom is in labor, so next time I will sign up for that and get there a little sooner!
There are plenty of other animals too. I like to visit the goats and llamas, and my daughter insisted on going to see the chickens, geese and rabbits. Plus there are animals you won’t find on local farms at other booths. We watched both a Bird of Prey and a Wild Cats show during our visit. My daughter is a biologist and animal enthusiast, so I think we saw almost every animal at the Fair!
I like to go to the free shows at the Fair, so in addition to the animal shows we also watched a blacksmith demonstration and cooking show. My daughter was just sitting through these since I went to all the animal shows she wanted to see, and wouldn’t you know she won a door prize at the cooking show! I used the NY State Fair schedule on my Galaxy Prime to make sure we knew when the shows we wanted to see were scheduled and got there in time to get seats.
Of course food is a huge part of any state fair! There is a quite a range from healthy food like roasted corn to decadent treats such as deep fried oreos. I especially enjoyed the Apple Fritter a la mode, a deep fried apple fritter topped with vanilla ice cream and cinnamon sauce – yum!
I used the handy Fair Food Finder app that I downloaded to the phone to find the restaurants to eat at, and ate one of my favorites – a pulled pork sandwich. My daughter is vegetarian, so the app was especially useful for finding vegetarian delicacies, like the vegan chicken wings she had for dinner.
After dinner we went to visit some of the many booths to see demonstrations and learn about new things. Naturally we stopped by the AT&T GoPhone booth, which was demonstrating virtual reality glasses.
We tried them on and played a neat virtual reality game. I was not very good at it at first, and of course my daughter caught on much more quickly. But I finally got the hang of it, and it was fun to try the 3-D game. Then the helpful folks manning the AT&T booth made free t-shirts for my daughter and I, letting us choose our own designs. I picked corn dogs and my daughter chose a Ferris wheel. Making the t-shirts was fun, and a free t-shirt is a pretty nice fair souvenir!
And what was just across from the booth – more animals! There was a tank with sting rays that you could touch, so of course we had to stand in line for that.
By then it was getting late, so we headed out to walk down the midway and enjoy the sights. We didn’t ride any rides this year, but we enjoyed walking along the midway and checking out all the carnival games and rides. One of the great things about the New York State Fair is that it is so large there is something for everyone, whether your goal is to ride all the rides, sample all the food, or pet all the animals.
