Maple Sugar Festival and tours begin March 3 at the Hudson Highlands Nature Museum
CORNWALL The Hudson Highlands Nature Museum will host a festival to celebrate the opening day of maple sugaring season on Saturday, March 3, from 10:30 a.m. to 3 p.m.
The festival and maple sugar tours take place at the Outdoor Discovery Center, on Muser Drive, across from 174 Angola Road, Cornwall. At the festival, visitors will join museum educators for crafts, games, tree tapping contests and Native American story telling at the outdoor camp fire. They can sample Journey Cakes and Jack Wax as well.
Maple sugar tours through the sugar bush run every half-hour beginning at 10:30 a.m. Tour size is limited so visitors are urged to sign up for their walking tours as soon as they arrive. Food and maple products will be available for purchase. On the tours, visitors will learn that what began as an exchange of ideas and practices between early explorers and Native Americans has become one of New Yorkers best loved treats and an important industry in the state.
Visitors will learn the history, how to tap a maple tree, how to collect the sap, and how the sap boils down in an evaporator to become maple syrup. The walking tour experience lasts approximately 60 minutes and ends at the Museums farmhouse where maple syrup and gifts can be purchased. Visitors are asked to be sure to dress warmly and wear boots for snow and mud. This is a wonderful family outdoor activity. Trails can not be navigated with strollers.
The festival on March 3 takes place at the same time as the tours are running with no additional charge.
Admission for tour is: $12/Adults, $6/Children ages 3-11. Members: $8/Adults, $4/Children ages 3-11.
For more information, call 845-534-5506, ext. 204 or visit www.hhnaturemuseum.org
The award-winning maple sugar tours will run every Saturday and Sunday from March 3 to March 25 Dates are: March 3, 4, 11, 12, 18, 19, 25, 26. Tours start every half-hour and run from 10:30 a.m. until 3 p.m.