2026 Iowa State Fair
(8/14/2026 - 8/17/2026)
2026 Iowa State Fair(8/14/2026 - 8/17/2026)
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“It’s a holy place.
That’s the American Way – they need to give people an excuse to come and
worship. … Roadside attractions: people feel themselves pulled to places where,
in other parts of the world, they would recognize that part of themselves that
is truly transcendent, and buy a hot dog, and walk around, feeling satisfied on
a level they cannot truly describe, and profoundly dissatisfied on a level
beneath that."
- Neil Gaiman, "American Gods"
“Over a million people
visit the Iowa State Fair each year to stare at a full size cow made out of
butter."
- BrianW (me)
On 8/14/2026 Brian and Katherine flew from Austin to Des Moines,
Iowa to attend the Iowa State Fair. Also to visit Yev Pusin and Annalisa
Penhollow. Click on any picture
for the very highest quality original.
We changed airplanes in the Denver Airport. Below is an outdoor sitting area in an airport, which is unusual.
Below is a picture as we land at Des Moines Airport (DSM) on our United flight.
Welcome to Iowa!
Katherine and I stayed at the
"Surety Hotel" in Des Moines.
Our hotel room.
In the Surety Hotel, they have a selection of different drugs in the minibar. There is caffeine, taurine, alcohol, and THC. This is the first time I've seen marijuana in a hotel mini bar. The drink is called "Climbing Kites" and remember that marijuana is highly illegal in Iowa. I kind of hope in the future that hotel minibars offer more drugs like cocaine and LSD.
The first night Katherine and I met up with Yev and Annalisa at "Proudfoot and Bird" for dinner. The 3 panel wide door behind us in this picture is the entrance to a Speak Easy called "The Confidence" inside the bar area of Proudfoot and Bird.
The next day I took an Uber to the Iowa State Fair. The picture below shows the entrepreneurial neighborhood a block away from the fairgrounds. The private home owners here sell $6 - $10 parking in their front yards during the fair.
I respect the hustle. The locals are providing a valuable service
(parking) and have colored batons and professional looking signs.
One final picture of the residential parking with cars parked in front yards.
Here I am in line to enter the Iowa State Fair.
A sign declaring what this is, inside the event.
I carried a GPS tracker that produced the blue lines below. I entered the
fair at the red marked "A".
At the end of the day I left from "G"
(Annalisa gave me a ride back to the hotel).
Right inside the entrance near "A" was a human slingshot. There are two people in that little wheel between the two poles.
I guess I'd call this "Main Street", the widest boulevard through the fair.
Just a picture to give the "vibe" of the fair. A lot of food choices.
I ran into Yev and his cousin almost immediately.
Here is some pole meat for sale.
Yev's cousin recommended the "Dill Pickle Deep Fried Cheese Curds". I had
not had breakfast yet and they were really good!
Here is my breakfast of champions: Coke and deep fried cheese curds!
Annalisa had texted and said she was near a "Giant Slide" so I made my way there.
A panorama of the scene near the bottom of the giant slide.
A picture of people sliding down the giant slide.
I didn't go into the "Snakes Alive" display below because they charged an extra admission fee and it wasn't worth it to me.
I wanted to ride the chairlift so here I am just starting out.
Below is kind of boring movie as I ride the chairlift at the 2026 Iowa State Fair taking a video. Click here for the highest quality original.
A picture looking down from the chairlift at the Iowa State Fair.
Looking backwards towards the giant slide.
They had a Ferris Wheel at the Iowa State Fair.
Picture below by Yev. It is Yev, Brian, and Annalisa at the 2026 Iowa
State Fair.
I noticed this mural of a bunch of Iowa farm animals enjoying themselves. I can't tell if this picture is wholesome or deeply disturbing. I think the pigs are drunk and planning on selling the old horse on the left to the glue factory to buy more whiskey. Because some animals are more equal than others.
There were some small companies promoting their products at the fair. Katherine had mentioned getting an arcade game recently and this caught my eye.
Yev (blue hat far lower left) called my attention to the "Political
Soapbox" at the fair. A candidate for governor (Rob
Sand) got up and spoke to the crowd while we watched.
The picture below is Liz Pusin (Yev's sister) but it she turned away to watch one of her kids while I was snapping the photo, LOL. I worked with Liz in 2014 (12 years ago) at Backblaze.
The "Butter Cow" is a cow sculpted out of butter. It seems to be a recurring thing at the Iowa State Fair for the last 60 years.
Here is the Iowa State Fair "Butter
Cow". It is a life size cow made of butter. Notice the timeline
at the bottom of the photo. It is deeply, deeply disturbing that the local
Iowa residents think it is "normal" and "healthy" to make a cow out of butter
then stare at it. In the timeline you can see they like recreating
important historical events like "The Last Supper" out of butter.
The life size figures below are made out of butter. And everybody walking around acts like this makes sense.
Small dwarves wearing strange hats and a dog. Made entirely out of butter.
The timeline is a work of subtle art.
We wanted to go see a really large bull (male cow), so we made our way to the "Super Bull".
The bull in the picture below is named "Big E", and he's 3,026 pounds of pure muscle and pent up rage. We kept poking him through the red bars trying to get him to do something. We were clearly safe because the bars were unbreakable and held together by one strand of wire (seen on the left).
The kids wanted to play on the "train" (seen below).
The Oscar Mayer wiener mobile.
That's it for the fair! The picture below was on our flight home in a layover in Denver Airport. Denver Airport is famous for the alien tunnels under the airport hiding a secret alien base.
There are a few things wrong with this picture of a bathroom in the Denver Airport. The soap dispenser is not centered properly, and not positioned correctly so the soap falls down on the counter instead of into the hole. The paper towels are in that little cubby so when you reach for a paper towel the motion detector soap dispenser dumps soap on your arm. Also, everybody in the airplanes and the ground crews can watch you use the bathroom. But I've never heard anyone claim that people who design airports are smart or thoughtful.
There was a mysterious small sign of rising smoke in the Denver Airport which I think says it is Okay to smoke a pipe if you stand under the sign.
And finally, here we are landing in Austin. You can see the Austin city skyscrapers in the sunset.
That's it!