Travels of the Agnew Family for 2008.01.01 to 2010.01.31

The IPM (International Plowing Match) is a big thing in Ontario farm country. Each year a farm or farms is transformed into a large RV park, parking lots and tent city. Tent city is home to food concessions, exhibits (quilts, local tourism, livestock, dairy products, meat products, etc), vendors (heating systems, tractors, construction materials, basically anything that might interest someone living in farm country) and entertainment. As the IPM was held in Teaswater, about 10 minutes from Walkerton we went with our friends Anne and Victor. The four of us were amazed at the sea of cars that were already parked when we arrived before 10 am. After the car was parked we wandered to the "main" road and caught the transport to the entrance gate --- a hay wagon (other parking lots actually had wagons that had seats in them). As I looked around tent city I was amazed at the info structure that had appearred in the matter of a couple of months in a farmers field --- roads (a little squishy as the tail end of Ike had passed through the area on the weekend dropping a fair bit of rain), tents of all sizes and electrical poles - yes with electricity. The day passed quickly as we wandered around the site looking at the different exhibits. The highlights for me were the "square dancing tractors", the corral (horses, etc.) and the quilt display. The square dancing tractors were amazing ---- eight tractors (4 couples) followed the instructions of the caller. The crowd was told that the old Farmall tractors could turn on a dime, after watching the show I believe them. I think this show was the surprise hit of the IPM.



The transport from "parking lot E" to the main gate were hay wagons




The square dancing tractors




The Bruce County Cattleman's Association advertising campaign


This was an amazing team of horses and wagon.


Happiness is ....................

Ed would love to have another Kubota tractor



Walking down one of the aisles