Bull balls ...

My kinda day ... woke up to that mid western sun and bright blue skies overlooking the cactus and green meadows with the quarter horses grazing in them. Ate breakfast with a preacher and his nurse partner who had just rolled in for the night but
had never left their room! Sweet fresh fruit and eggs to die for.
So the plan was to bike it to the Stock Yards, the biggest cattle auction market in the world then go over and visit the Horse Reining Championships
which were in town for the week at the State Fair Park. But it was mighty hot and so finally
drove over with Cindy the residential artist as we both wanted to photograph the spectacles and wow were we in for a show!
The Stockyards date back over a 100 years and the auction house is original. We walked over the walkway which looks over the cattle waiting to be auctioned off and into the auction room. Fascinating about 60 guys who were seriously bidding without even raising an eyebrow and spending hundreds of thousands brokering deals for their clients. Spoke to one who explained how it worked. He'd said prices were currently good having just bidded and purchased one lot of 50 cattle for 49000 dollars or about 1k a piece.
Fascinating and another world.
Drive over to the reining championships - first day of a weeks tournament with the worlds best / exquisite horsemanship and beautiful horses able to turn on a penny.
Hot was not the word today - scorching / drove and visited Stockyards City, tried some hats and boots on was introduced to some cowboys favorite accessory. Couldnt believe it but hanging up in the shop were all sizes of natural and coloured bulls balls which explained are used by some cowboys to attach to the back of their trucks and hang on the tow bar - macho or what! And guess what I was given a pair by the shop owner - ah that's a kind momento!
We couldn't resist going to eat at the famous stockyard cafe which opens first thing in the morning for the cattlemen serving everything from lamb and beef offal to lemon meringue pies! Quite a people watching place!
Quite an eye opening day and wonderful to return back to the farm and kick my boots off, chat about everything and nothing and share a good dinner with new friends.