Travel Notes
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Are you proud of your vacation photos, nature pictures or other images from your travels?
Think about entering the 2009 National Geographic International Photography Contest. There are three categories -- people, places and nature -- and you can enter a total of six photographs. Images can be black and white or color, digital or shot with conventional film, but they must be submitted digitally to www.ngphotocontest.com.
The contest ends Oct. 31. The entry fee is $12 per photo for entries received on or before Oct. 15, and $22 per photo for entries received between Oct. 16 and 31. First-place category winners will win a digital camera kit and the photos will be published in the magazine.
The contest is being held internationally for readers of editions of the magazine outside the U.S., and three international grand prize winners will also be chosen.
Twelve events from ethnic festivals to craft fairs will take place in the Valley Forge area and Montgomery County this fall.
Green Lane Park will host the 10th Annual Scottish-Irish Festival, Sept. 11-13, with singers, dancers, bagpipers, food, crafts, games and more.
German heritage is celebrated in Norristown, Sept. 19, at Elmwood Park Zoo's Oktoberfest, featuring seasonal craft brews and live music.
Colonial music, storytelling, crafts, games and even a dog show are on the schedule for the Sept. 26 Founder's Day Fall Festival at Washington Memorial Chapel in Valley Forge National Historical Park. Asher's Chocolates Retail Store, in Souderton, will hold its free Fall Festival the same day.
Another Oktoberfest is planned for Oct. 3 on Butler Avenue, in Ambler, with music, artists, crafts, sidewalk sales, hay rides and beer. Also on Oct. 3, the Apple Butter Frolic takes place at Mennonite Heritage Center in Harleysville, with demonstrations of antique farm equipment and folk crafts. That night, Pennypacker Mills, in Schwenksville, hosts an event called "Haunted Stories by the Bonfire." Pennypacker also hosts an All Hallow's Eve Fall Festival Oct. 17.
The Laerenswaert Colonial Craft Fair will take place Oct. 10 in Worcester at the Peter Wentz Farmstead. Guests can shuck corn or crush apples with a cider press.
The Pennsylvania Guild Fine Craft Fair, Oct. 17 and 18 at Montgomery County Community College, in Blue Bell, features music, food and children's activities.
Also in the area, Willow Creek Orchards in Collegeville has pick-your-own veggies and pumpkins, while Freddy Hill Farms in Lansdale hosts activities every weekend in October including pig races, pony rides, a farm zoo, funnel cake and more.
Details at www.valleyforge.org.
Some 130,000 volunteers are expected to spend Sept. 26 working in parks, beaches and wildlife reserves to build trails, remove garbage and pull up invasive plants.
Many locations are also offering crafts, kid's activities, barbecues and campouts.
The event is a program of the National Environmental Education Foundation.
More information at www.publiclandsday.org.
If you're looking for the place where buffalo wings started, you'll naturally want to head to Buffalo, N.Y.
And if you want to join thousands of other wing fans in celebration of the deep-fried saucy favorite, plan your trip for Labor Day weekend, when the city hosts this year's National Buffalo Wing Festival, Saturday thrugh next Sunday.
Last year's wing fest drew more than 78,000 people for events that include professional eating contests and sauce competitions. Wings are offered in an endless variety of flavors with sauces ranging from mild to suicidal, and there's even an event in which contestants bob for wings in a pool of blue cheese.
Bottles of Frank's RedHot, billed as the "Official Wing Sauce of the National Buffalo Wing Festival," will be given away from a booth at the festival. The company's celebrity chef and spokesman, Kevin Roberts, will be appearing in a celebrity chef challenge with the festival founder, Drew Cerza. Mr. Roberts will also take part in cooking demonstrations featuring RedHot recipes.
Buffalo's Anchor Bar and its founders, Frank and Teressa Bellissimo, created Buffalo wings in 1964. Since then, wings have gone from a tavern snack to a mainstream restaurant menu item, with entire food chains built around their sale.
One of the 10 largest fairs in North America, The Big E, takes place Sept. 18-Oct. 4, in West Springfield, Mass.
More than a million people attended the fair last year.
Animals featured at the fair range from Clydesdale horses to sea lions to sheep dogs, plus, of course, plenty of livestock.
Free concerts kick off Sept. 18 with Charice, followed by Foghat, Sept. 19; An Evening With Boyz II Men, Sept. 20; Lane Turner, presented by GAC, Sept. 25; Little Big Town, Sept. 26; Jamey Johnson, Sept. 27; Bret Michaels Rock of Love Tour, Oct. 3; and Seether, Oct. 4.
Advance tickets purchased online now through Sept. 16 are $10 adult, $8 for children ages 6-12 (plus $1 per ticket service fee). Children 5 and under are free. Details at www.TheBigE.com. Most buildings and exhibits are open 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.
First Published August 30, 2009 12:00 am
