Thanksgiving is just a couple of weeks away. Visions of football from the La-Z-Boy and bountiful home-cooked meals may be dancing in your head. But there are plenty of nontraditional ways to celebrate around this quintessentially American holiday if you’re willing to hop in the car and bypass conformity. Here are a few:
Be nice to a turkey
Millions of Americans will have an encounter with a turkey this month, but most will not end well for the turkey. Indraloka Animal Sanctuary flips the script.
“You will be a healthier person if you are a friend with a turkey than if you eat a turkey,” said Indra Lahiri, founder of the sanctuary in Falls Twp., near Dalton. “I strongly suggest that people get the chance to know them.”
Mongo, Lyndon, Scoddy, Mojo and Patricia are the five turkeys in residence at Indraloka. None of them will end up on a dinner plate, although they may have eaten from a dinner plate at Indraloka’s annual ThanksLiving celebration. That event was held Saturday, but the turkeys always enjoy a visit.
Indraloka welcomes visitors by appointment, plus “there are events constantly,” Lahiri said — including cider tours Nov. 14, 22 and 29. Events require registration, and all programs include interaction with the animals.
“Turkeys are such wonderful, intelligent animals,” Lahiri said, noting that Mongo and company are “like dogs and cats. They know their names. They love to sit in your lap.”
Information: indraloka.org; 570-763-2908.
The chip gobblers
By Nov. 29, two days after Thanksgiving, you’ll probably be ready to eat and drink again. You can do that — and watch other people eat, very quickly — at Sabatini’s Bottleshop and Bar, 1925 Wyoming Ave. in Exeter.
Sabatini’s will host Northeast Snacks’ 10th annual Middleswarth Potato Chip Eating Contest. You’re about a month too late to enter the contest — entries fill up quickly — but there’s no fee to be a spectator.
“If somebody wants to come in and watch, it’s pretty fun to watch,” said Lindo Sabatini, who owns the shop with his wife, Maria. Doors open at 10 a.m. and the contest starts at 11.
Contestants will have five minutes to eat as many chips as possible. Bags of Middleswarth chips — a Pennsylvania staple, made in Snyder County — are weighed before and after the participants dig in. Contestants may choose plain or barbecue chips, and water is allowed.
Sabatini said the chips are good, but he doesn’t consider entering the contest.
“Normally the winner will eat about two bags,” he said, referring to Middleswarth’s familiar Weekender bags, at 9 ounces each. “I don’t know how they do it.”
Information: sabatinis.com; 570-693-2270. Also: northeastsnacks.com.
Forget the sauce, go right for the cranberries
You won’t find any cans of cranberry sauce at the Tannersville Cranberry Bog Preserve, but you will find something more precious: the southernmost low-elevation boreal bog along the eastern seaboard. What was once an ice-age lake is now occupied by a thick soup of peat moss, filled with vegetation not normally found in most parts of Pennsylvania.
The 1,000-plus-acre Nature Conservancy preserve includes the fragile bog itself, which is accessible via a floating boardwalk system and is open to the public only by appointment or during regularly scheduled walks conducted by the Monroe County Conservation District’s Kettle Creek Environmental Education Center — the last of which for the season is Wednesday at 1 p.m. But visitors are always welcome on two trails — the North Wood and Fern Ridge trails — that skirt the cranberry bog.
Diana Flint, administrative specialist for the education center, said cranberries typically populate the bog from about mid-August through September. She’s familiar with Ocean Spray TV commercials featuring a cranberry-carpeted landscape, but visitors to the Tannersville bog shouldn’t expect that, no matter what time of year it is.
“There are cranberries,” Flint said, “but it’s not loaded with them.”
Information: nature.org, mcconservation.org; 570-629-3061.
As American as apple pie
A lot of places are closed Thanksgiving Day, but Ritter’s Cider Mill in Jefferson Twp. isn’t one of them.
The attraction at 117 Wimmers Road will be open Nov. 27 from 9 a.m. to noon, enough time to fulfill your desire for apples, cider, apple cider doughnuts, a kids’ hay barn, even an apple slingshot. (Sorry, you can only shoot at targets, not at your family.)
Ritter’s is a tradition among many local families, but visits from farther away pick up in the fall. “We get a lot of out-of-towners especially in September and October,” said Sally Brinkman, who owns the farm with her husband, Earl.
Brinkman took over the operation this year from her parents, Gary and Debra Ritter — a change of hands that she notes “wasn’t a real big transition,” having lived and worked on the farm for 47 years.
Ritter’s sells 18 to 20 apple varieties in peak season, with honeycrisp the most popular, Brinkman said. At this time of year, though, apples and cider take a back seat to a baked specialty.
“Pies are big on Thanksgiving,” Brinkman said.
Ritter’s offers fruit pies made from scratch, including apple, pumpkin, blueberry, cherry, peach, strawberry rhubarb and “probably the most popular,” apple crumb, Brinkman said.
It’s no small task. “We’ll sell about 1,000 pies” for Thanksgiving, she said. They’ll start baking around 2 a.m. the day before the holiday and not finish until 3 or 4 that afternoon.
Pies for Thanksgiving or Christmas should be ordered in advance. Ritter’s is open from the first Saturday after Labor Day through Thanksgiving Eve from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., and Black Friday through Dec. 23 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Information: ritterscidermill.com; 570-689-9790.
Support NEPA’s natural inhabitants
Thanksgiving is about our relationship with nature, and this is a good time of year to support Pennsylvania’s native fauna.
Supporting wild animals is a 365-day-a-year effort at the Red Creek Wildlife Center in Schuylkill Haven. Founder Peggy Sue Hentz said her facility takes in and, if possible, rehabilitates “all species of Pennsylvania wildlife except for bears and venomous snakes” — a total of more than 4,000 animals a year.
The most common patients at Red Creek are cottontail rabbits, followed by squirrels and opossums. But hawks, foxes, owls, vultures and waterfowl are not uncommon. Some of the animals are not releasable after treatment and become permanent residents.
Red Creek’s training/nature center, featuring educational displays and a short walking trail around a pond with a few nonreleasable animals, normally is open every Saturday and Sunday from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., but visitors should call ahead to check.
“We offer a wide variety of school programs, and for clubs and just about anybody,” Hentz said. Red Creek is staffed by seven employees, about 20 volunteers and about 20 interns “during baby season” — March through October. The education center produces and sells some of its own books, including titles for children.
Information: redcreekwildlifecenter.com; 570-739-4393.
Don’t cook but have dinner anyway
If you like the idea of a traditional holiday meal but don’t want to be bothered making it, the Farm-To-Table Thanksgiving Dinner To Go at the Settlers Inn in Hawley may be right up your alley.
“We do a sit-down as well as our to-go service for Thanksgiving Day,” said Kevin Rogali, front desk supervisor. “It dates back to our previous owners, who are retired” — Grant and Jeanne Genzlinger. “They’ve been doing this for a very long time. It’s a tradition.”
The takeout dinners, at $40, are chef-prepared and ready to heat, with a menu that includes Forks Farm roasted turkey breast, turkey roulade, mashed potatoes, sage stuffing, house-made cranberry sauce and corn pudding, with plenty of available add-ons. Patrons must order by Nov. 20 and pick up their meals Thanksgiving Day between 9 a.m. and 1 p.m. Customers pay when they pick up.
“We usually sell out every year, probably a total of 80 to 100,” Rogali said — including “guests who can’t get in for the traditional sit-down dinner. … It’s great for anyone. The feedback has always been very good for the dinners.”
Information: thesettlersinn.com; 570-226-2993.
Honor the earliest American cultures
Another attraction that’s open on Thanksgiving — and almost every other day — is the Pocono Indian Museum in Monroe County.
Owner Mal Law, 80, said the museum at 5425 Milford Road in East Stroudsburg is closed only on Christmas and Easter, and he should know: He and his wife, Margaret, 79, who both grew up in Kingston, launched the museum in 1974. It’s open every day from 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.
Law said the museum was born of his “love of studying Native American people, and being able to show people misconceptions about them.”
Focusing on the indigenous Lenape inhabitants of this part of Pennsylvania, the museum provides a self-guided audio tour. “We have a series of six rooms,” Law said. “Each room takes the story a little further.” The half-hour visit “starts with prehistoric times, and then we move on to lodging, food and pottery making, weapons and tools. … It tells the story of them right up until they come into contact with the first Europeans.”
This isn’t the Pocono Indian Museum’s busy season; that comes during heavier tourism months, when a lot of visitors stop by on their way to nearby Bushkill Falls. But the museum also welcomes school groups, which Law traditionally does not charge for. And every student leaves with an arrowhead artifact.
Information: poconoindianmuseum.com; 570-588-9338.
Get your football fix the traditional way
For people of a certain age, the holiday conjures up cherished memories of Thanksgiving morning football games between heated high school rivals. There are few still around, having been pushed aside by prioritization of playoffs, scheduling conflicts and other factors. One that has survived is Northampton vs. Catasauqua, two Northampton County schools separated by about a mile and a half.
That the game is still being played — every year since 1925, except for pandemic-disrupted 2020 — is no small accomplishment, given that Northampton Area High School enrolls about five times as many students as Catasauqua Area High School. But there’s more to it than football.
“We’re trying to keep the concept of having a get-together with the two communities,” said Thomas Moll, Catasauqua’s athletic director. “You try to get excitement in the community.” That includes pregame meals, pep rallies, bonfires and tailgating.
Moll said attendance at the games Catasauqua has hosted, like this year’s, has typically been around 3,000. “The games aren’t as well attended as they used to be,” he acknowledged. “The key is the weather.”
This year’s Thanksgiving Day game will be played at Alumni Field at Catasauqua Middle School, 850 Pine St., Catasauqua, at 10 a.m. Advance tickets are on sale at the high school athletic office at $6 for adults and $3 for senior citizens and non-CASD students. Tickets sold at the game will be $7.
The Tannersville Cranberry Bog in Monroe County. (COURTESY OF THE NATURE CONSERVANCY)
The Tannersville Cranberry Bog in Monroe County. (COURTESY OF THE NATURE CONSERVANCY)