 The lights are about to go dark on another great Minnesota get-together. Our Josh Peterson shares with us what made this year's Minnesota State Fair another success. For the past 12 days, nearly 2 million people went through the gates and checked out everything the Minnesota State Fair has to offer, whether it was the many animals, the larger than life rides, or the variety of entertainment. Many blocked to the fair for multiple days of fun, breaking previous records. We did have two record attendance days and those were Monday and Friday, but all other days were also really great attendance days. We're actually up today about 30,000, so through yesterday we're up about 30,000 people coming to the fair. Despite cooler conditions and a couple of rainy days, the weather didn't have much impact on the fair's attendance. The weather always plays a factor, but we hope that people come to the fair, you know, because we have some really excellent program, we have great entertainment lineup, you know, we have some great deals on food, we have some great deals just kind of throughout the fair grounds. Even with an estimated 1.9 million visitors who attend the Minnesota State Fair, the fair still manages to attract many first-time visitors. Kind of wild, I knew how many people were going to be here, so it's not that overwhelming and stuff, but I saw a lot of the different foods, it was really interesting. It was a alligator for the first time, it was really good, that's pretty much all I wanted to do, but I'm going to check out some of the other foods. With new additions like the great big wheel and old-time favorites, the Minnesota State Fair is a tradition for many Minnesotans. Even though the 2017 Minnesota State Fair is coming to a close, preparations for next year's fair are about to begin. Planning starts for next year's fair the day after the fair ends. So, you know, we do about a month of recaps and then we jump back in and start planning for 2018. It takes a village to welcome 2 million people to our fair grounds every year. In Belkin Heights at the Minnesota State Fair, I'm Josh Peterson, Lakeland News. The 2018 Minnesota State Fair will run August 23rd through September 3rd. If you've enjoyed this segment of Lakeland News, please consider making a tax-deductible contribution to Lakeland Public Television.