FBC Fall Fair 2009

Falls Brook Centre held its fall fair the first weekend after the long weekend in September, and just like in years past, the fair was enjoyed by all who came, whether it was the food, the music or the games.

As in 2008, this fair was complimented by a forest festival that began at the Bristol Farmers Market, an exhibition of Some Trees, Francis Wishart’s forest inspired paintings, and a book display at the Florenceville-Bristol Library.  Vendors from the forest festival came to the fair to display and sell hand crafted wood carvings, brown-ash baskets, sumac lemonade, and to chat about wilderness survival skills.  Two portable sawmills gave spectators a sense of how trees become the boards in their homes.  And a woods-person competition gave people a run for their money getting water to boil with a hatchet, a couple pieces of wood and a couple matches.

Ron Smith who spoke about wood lot management for Non-timbre Forest Products guided a walking tour through the trails on Skedaddle Ridge to show exactly what he was talking about.

  
The fair didn’t stop there!  Sunrise Alpaca had Alpaca wool and products on hand, and Hope Seeds sold a wide selection of seeds and some organic produce as well as Fall Brook Woodworking’s amazing red pine apple boxes. 

Throughout the days music was played at the barn with some salsa, and meringue lessons, gymnastic routines, and a long-standing fair hit, Pearly’s magical act. In the Evenings the sounds of Gordon Gets Lots got the fair started, John and Donna played for the barn dance, The Beechwood Beaters took us back to good old rock and roll, and Mike Trask with Alex Madsen played some good ol’ folk and country songs.

The Big Blue Bus was on display for all to learn about Climate Change and how to reduce our energy consumption and help the earth.   Aswell, Dr. Richard Komp gave two short workshops that continued on some of the PV solar module work he had left over from his previous workshop.

With all the excitement attendees needed a lot of food to keep fueled.  The old cauldron was pulled out and set up to boil dozens of corn on the cobs, and pounds of sausages were barbequed.  There was Indian food which had a line up going all the way down the driveway, delicious empanadas and other Colombian food.  And if that was not enough cinnamon twists were fired in the adobe oven, and home-made pies were available for those who could still eat desert.

The Falls Brook Centre staff would like to thank everyone who came out to make the Fall Fair such a fun success!