What constitutes a Giant Pumpkin?!

Apparently, one that weighs 1,431.5 pounds.

After wanting to go for a few years, I finally made it to the West Coast Giant Pumpkin Regatta. It was a blast and I will go again.

I didn't know what to expect at all, and when I arrived there were all these huge pumpkins on display. They were amazing!

In order to move the pumpkins they needed to rig them up with this rope system and use a forklift to manuver them.
After seeing a few of them being weighed I got to see the biggest being weighed that was there that day. It weighed in at 1431.5 pounds...that. is. One. BIG. pumpkin. Wow. The guy standing with it is the grower. His name is Steve. He was pretty proud.

This pumpkin was also grown by Steve and had been at a competition in Half Moon Bay, CA. It had bottomed out, cracked and the "pumpkin juice" running down the sidewalk was sort of interesting.

After the weighing of the pumpkins they put them in this pond, at the Tualatin Commons, and prepared them for the regatta.

This is the moving of the biggest pumpkin to the pond.

Lowering the pumpkin...

Even in water, it must be difficult to push a pumpkin that heavy...

Look at all those pumpkins!

In black and white...

Smile!

I loved the suit that the guy in yellow wore...it said "Seed Extractor" on the back. Sweet!

By the way....I heard some people talked about buying those seeds...I thought to myself, "gee, I wonder how much a seed from a giant pumpkin would cost?" That was then answered by someone behind me, who must have read my mind. A mere $100. Yes you saw that right - 100 big ones for a seed, a pumpkin seed.

Trying to flip the pumpkin so that the flat part would be on top for carving an opening purposes. It took a bit of heaving and hoeing to get it.

Got it! Every once in a while there would be a stray pumpkin and there were these weird this remote controlled boats that would push them back into place.

Making the first cut.

Check out the inch depth of the hunk of pumpkin that is being held. That one piece alone would probably make a whole pumpkin pie.

Digging deep to get all the guts.

Taking away a precious bag of spendy pumpkin seeds.

Don't fall in!

A cute dog in one of the canoes in the pond.

Testing out the pumpkins. Making any last minute modifications.

After having added some fun last minute details.

Getting ready to head towards the start line.

At the start line.

go, Go, GO!

After paddeling down around the pond they were on the homestretch!

One of the pumpkins was a dud and the guy fell out....he swam, while pushing his pumpkin at least half of the race back to the start/finish line.

There were four different heats of races. The next was a relay. It as a competition between the Tualatin Valley Fire and Rescue Department and the Portland Office of the Army Corp of Engineers.

The third heat had to do with people fetching balls that were tossed into the pond by the audience. Racers had to fetch as many as they could and the balls had different point values based on color. The picture below is of the Mayor of Tualatin competing. There was another heat, which I decided not to stay for, but the event overall was a lot of fun. I have been to many fall festivals and events and this was probably one of my favorites. And, like I said, I will go back again another year!