Dan-san 80 Year Old B-Day Outing from Lisa

Lisa prepared Arlington Horse Race outing for Dan-san, her father.  It was a very nice day for the outing at the Arlington Horse Race Track.  This outing fee and betting money are Lisa’s B-Day present to Dan-san.  Thanks to Lisa for arranging this outing.

This is Arlington Horse Race Track entrance.  There are not too many flowers around the entrance as used to be. 

Dan-san and his friend are standing in front of the entrance

Horse stables for pacing

Horses that would run in the first race were pacing around.

No. 5 and 6 horses were very good looking horses. 

No. 3 horse Hiroko picked was at there, too.  Which is the best horse to win, No. 3, No. 5 or No. 6?

Ticket counter

Here is the track – This is different than Japanese track.  On the American track horses run counter clock wise.

From the finish line looking up to see the seats in the Grandstand.

Dan-san, Dan-san’s friend Charles, Lisa, Elsa, Elsa’s boy-friend Richard

Lisa’s Dave, Dave’s brother Chris’s family, and Dave’s parents were also there.  Hiroko thought it surely took their photos but they are not in her camera.  Chris’ daughter asked Hiroko to take the photo, so Hiroko might be confused, so Hiroko borrowed their photo from Christmas party photo.

This is the booth Lisa rented.  There is a tv screen to see the race in each booth.  The waitress constantly came to take our order for foods and drinks, and brought it to us.

The first race would be starting. All the horses were coming out to the track and warming up.

Starting point was across the field, so it was hard to see them, so it is nice to have the tv screen on the table.

Here is finish line.  Here comes the first horse.  It was #5.  Dan-san won this race.

Happy Birthday!  Congratulation!

The next race was Turf Race, which means the horse runs on the grass.  3 Turf races out of a total of 9 races were held on that day.

Starting gate was brought to the grass area.

Horses came out and lined up in the gate.

Workers were trying to put horses in the starting gate.

Race was started.  Horses were starting to run.

Now the gate was taken out and the finish line was prepared.

Battery in Hiroko’s camera was worn out.

Everybody stayed until the last race, 9 races.  The first race was started at 3 PM, so the last race was finished at 7:30 PM.

Thanks to Lisa and Elsa, Joyce and Holly for their generous presents for Dan-san to have such wonderful outing.