One More Reason You Want To Live in Annapolis: The Maryland Maritime Heritage Festival is Here This Weekend

May 2nd, 2008 Categories: Fun Fridays

Searching For a Home in Annapolis This Weekend? Take Time Out To Attend This Festive Celebration of Maryland’s Maritime History

Back in the days before Starbucks and souvenir shops dotted the streets of our fair city, Annapolis harbor was a hub of maritime enterprise. English settlers arrived by boat in 1649, noticed that locals were thriving on crab cakes, oysters and the like and decided – not unlike many of our clients – that this would be a very good place indeed to stay for a spell.

When they weren’t fishing, the settlers grew crops, including tobacco, which they shipped off to England. The vessels returned with an enormous selection of goods for sale, including slaves – one of whom, Kunta Kinte, is immortalized by author Alex Haley in his book Roots.

If this sort of thing fascinates you – or you’re just looking for a good excuse to get out this weekend – by all means come to Annapolis for this celebration of Maryland maritime history. Kudos to Annapolis Mayor Ellen Moyer for creating this event back in 2001.

The festival runs Friday, Saturday and Sunday. You can check out the events schedule at the festival’s official website, but highlights include Watermark Cruises’ Pet Parade, the Phillips Crab Cake Eating Contest, the blessing of the fleet and lots of music, fun and frivolity.

One event we definitely won’t miss is the North American Town Crier Competition, to be held at 1:00PM on Sunday. Apparently, the best of the best town criers from across North America will be competing, in full period dress. We had a sneak preview this morning at a Chamber of Commerce meeting and it was rousing, to say the least. These guys can really belt.

This being Fun Friday on our blog, I couldn’t help digging around to see what I could find in the town crier section of YouTube. Here’s a really stupid one that I loved.

This entry was posted on Friday, May 2nd, 2008 at 3:21 pm and is filed under Fun Fridays. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Jeremiah said at May 3rd, 2008 at 9:23 am
Another fun thing if you’re over 12 and want to pass on the moon bounce is the South River Colony golf course challenge. Just chip the ball 25 yards into the hole for a year free membership, 10 feet or closer nets you a $25 greens card.