The World Pork Expo begins this week in Des Moines and the Farm Bureau Foundation’s sponsoring a fun windup to the event. The foundation’s director Deb Yount-Woods says she dreamed it up four years ago, and the first couple years the “hog jog” event included runners, walkers and bikers heading to the center of the state for the expo’s opening. The event has evolved into a motorcycle ride this year, called “Cruisin’ With The Hogs.” They start Saturday June 12 at an auto auction company in Grimes, ride 60 miles north to Saylorville Lake, come eastward through Ankeny, Altoona and Pleasant Hill before entering the fairgrounds and riding down the grand concourse where all the barbecue contests are going on. You don’t even have to ride a Harley to join these hogs, she says, and at least one of the goals of the event is to have fun and “eat a lot of barbecue.”The main purpose, of course, is to raise money for the Foundation, which dates to 1991 and is dedicated to helping with rural Iowa farm income, health, and education. Yount-Wood says it wasn’t hard at all to recruit bikers for the “Cruisin'” event. She says the riders are great “givers” who want to do something for the community as much as they love to ride — and she hopes they get the excellent weather that’s blessed the event the last couple years. Motorcycle riders can sign up the morning of the ride, and for their 25-dollar entry fee they’ll get admission to the World Pork Expo, a free skullcap, and free barbecue.
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