Deming Loggerrodeo

You know you're in the Pacific Northwest when you see a line-up like this.

Mid-June Kerry, Wyatt, Tate, and a neighbor boy went to the Deming Loggerrodeo, your one-stop shopping for sawing contests, log-rolling, speed-climbing, trailer-backing, cable-splicing, ma-and-pa-bucking, and obstacle-choker-setting, among other things.

I'm not sure what the significance is of this display, but it's certainly an encyclopedia of chain saws.

The boys could only go for part of a day, because they were committed to help some friends with haying that evening, but they got an education while they were there!  If you look closely at the upright "tree", you'll notice the two men are using an old-style two-man crosscut saw AND they're standing on spring-boards.  Old-time loggers would use spring boards to get them up above the bottom of the trunk where it flares out (and would take a lot longer to cut).

These guys are giving a (modern) demonstration of how to load a log truck.

And here they are, showing off their wonderful loads of logs.

These two are running some sort of obstacle course (and about to get wet!)

And these guys are chopping down their "trees" by hand.  But they're not just chopping for speed...

... a good logger can fall a tree right where he wants it.  See the watermelons on the ground?  That's what they're aiming for!

I don't know how many hit the mark, but this one sure was close!

It's all interesting, and fun to watch.  But the big attraction is the speed climbing.   And they start young!  (This photo from Deming Log Show website.)

Sometimes they're racing against another climber...

... and sometimes they're racing the clock.  They also race to different heights, like the green mark on that "tree".

And sometimes they race up AND down... a 90' spar.

In real-time, it looks like this:

Crazy!

I had an idea when the boys were little to plan a road-trip around unique events like this, but I never did it.  The Loggerrodeo may be exaggerated, but it's based on real skills used in an industry important to our local economy.  Some of the other events that inspired me... not quite so practical.  I have cousins in Council, Idaho who invited us, but somehow we never made it to the annual Fourth of July World Championship Porcupine Races.

What do they do where you live?