Wayne County Life

Great Lakes Seaway Trail Autumn Travel Trip Tips:

Autumn traveling along the Great Lakes Seaway Trail National Scenic Byway offers agricultural bounty, spectacular seasonal colors, sparkling sunsets, and lots of fun places and events. Here is a list of 10 exciting travel themes for fall 2011.

First-Ever Great Lakes Seaway Trail VolksWalk

Get up, get out, and talk the first-ever Great Lakes Seaway Trail VolksWalk Saturday, September 24, 2011 at the Seaway Trail Discovery Center in Sackets Harbor, NY. This inaugural American Volkssport Association-sanctioned event has a War of 1812 theme in keeping with New York State’s annual September 24^th recognition of the historic conflict:

Great Lakes Seaway Trail GeoTrail

Geocaching is a hot new healthy outdoor adventure on the Great Lakes Seaway Trail. Grab your GPS and search for the 75 hidden caches amidst our scenic, natural and cultural landscape. Have fun and earn collectible geocoins; learn how at www.seawaytrail.com/geotrail.

Patch together your crazy quilt friends for a Great Lakes Seaway Trail quilting tour – see free itinerary at www.seawaytrail.com/roadtrips - with a dozen shops to visit and the September 23-29, 2011 Quilting Around Chautauqua Show at the elegant Victorian-era Chautauqua Institution. Shop for fabrics to make your War of 1812-style quilt for our March 17-18, 2012 show – www.seawaytrail.com/quilting.

Bring binoculars on the free byway birding itinerary – www.seawaytrail.com/roadtrips - that reaches from the Pennsylvania Borderlands and Presque Isle to New York’s Braddock Bay and Derby Hill Bird Observatories, the Indian River Lakes and Lake St. Lawrence. The fall migration is a busy time on this important flyway.

The autumn fishing is fabulous in the waters along the Great Lakes Seaway Trail. Anglers from around the world will fish a 35-mile stretch of St. Lawrence River from Ogdensburg to Massena, NY for the September 23-30, 2011 Carp Angling World Championship with nearly $150,000 in cash and prizes: www.carptournamentseries.com.

Leave the kids at home September 23^rd and dress up in creative costumes for the posh Play Ball at The Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, NY. The menu has all your childhood favorite foods with a gourmet twist. Get your tickets ahead: www.museumofplay.org.

Learn flytying and casting and pet the fish at the September 24^th Salmon River Hatchery’s National Hunting & Fishing Day Open House in Altmar, NY: 315-298-7605. New York and Canadian environmental educators and wildlife rehabilitators answer your questions at the New York Power Authority Power Project’s September 24-25 Wildlife Festival in Lewiston: www.nypa.gov. Feel the soft fur of an alpaca at Sandy Creek Alpacas Farm’s September 25^th open house event in Kendall, NY: www.sandycreekalpacas.com.

Friday-Saturday nights-only nerve-shattering mix of live actors, animation, evil characters, dazzling special effects occurs all month at Screamers’ Hollow in Sterling, NY: www.screamershollow.com. Sundays September 18-October 30 take a trolley or walking tour of Buffalo’s historic Forest Lawn Cemetery - www.forest-lawn.com. See how history, art, architecture and nature blend into a unique resting place for many famous people – you may even meet some!

As autumn wanes, wind your way along the Great Lakes Seaway Trail to wine festivals: September 17 at Boldt Castle on Heart Islands in the 1000 Islands at Alexandria Bay: www.boldtcastle.com; September 23-25 at North East, Pennsylvania’s Wine Country Harvest Festival: www.nechamber.org; and to wineries along Lake Erie from Forestville, NY to North East, PA for November 4-6 and 11-13 harvest season weekends: www.lakeeriewinecountry.org.