The last Saturday of January 2021 came and went without fireworks or other hoopla in Buckeye Lake, Ohio. That’s normally the day of the Buckeye Lake Winterfest but the event, like so many others, fell victim to COVID-19. Interestingly, the previous year’s Winterfest was one of the last pre-pandemic events I attended. The blog entry is here. A December 2020 newspaper article announcing the postponement said organizers were hoping to hold the event in the spring but that seems not to have happened. What attracted me to the event in the first place was its use of Benny the Bass in a Puxsuntawny Phil style role in predicting the timing of warmer weather. Last year, people were not nearly as interested in when winter would end as when the pandemic would. That may actually be true this year as well, but Benny was back on the job in any case.

I was on my way north long before dawn was even thinking about cracking. In 2020, I parked near the brewery and walked to and from the park where Benny makes his prediction. This year, with snow on the ground and near-zero temperatures, I had no desire to do much walking and drove directly to the park. There were a few cars present when I arrived but not many. Before getting out of my car, I decided to drive to the other side of town for coffee.

By the time I returned, Benny and quite a few fans had arrived. I managed to get the closeup of the real Benny at the top of this post before it got too crowded, and I got a shot of the mascot Benny — but not a very good one — a bit later. Removing a glove to take pictures was something I kept to a minimum and taking pictures with both gloves on was something that kept picture quality to a minimum.

In the predawn darkness, the shadow-based method of predicting that groundhogs employ is useless. Instead, a bunch of minnows is dumped into Benny’s tank and a one-minute countdown begins. If the time expires without Benny downing a minnow, six more weeks of winter is to be expected. If a minnow is gone before the time is, we’ll have an early spring. Either way, we get fireworks.

In 2020, the crowd chanted “Eat it, Benny”. This year they seemed too cold to chant much of anything despite the MC leading the more official “Take the Bait. Spring can’t wait.” cheer. That, plus repeated playings of the new Winterfest song, may have done the trick. All the minnows survived until the thirty-second warning and several seconds longer but then…

I took the picture of Benny’s tank and prediction once the area was sufficiently clear of bodies to get a clear view. Once the park was sufficiently clear of cars that I could get out of my parking space, I drove directly to Our Lakeside Diner for the traditional (It is now!) perch and eggs breakfast. Incidentally, this place definitely knows how to serve coffee.

Then it was down the street to the Buckeye Lake Brewery for another tradition. When I was here in 2020, I delayed having a beer until I had walked around the town quite a bit. This year, despite a fourfold increase in temperature since I’d arrived, I had no desire for a stroll of any length. So the perch was quickly followed by a Winterfest Ale and that was quickly followed by my departure for home.

About a month ago, a visit to Jack Pine’s Glass Pumpkin Festival yielded a blog post in which I lamented losing an SD card containing “phenomenal photos”. That card has reappeared and, even though my claims of phenomenality will suffer for it, I’m super happy to share some of its contents. For those who missed it or want to refresh their memories, the original post is here.

In my lament, I mentioned ice cream and music, and here is proof of both. The ice cream was quite good. Perhaps because it wasn’t overly pumpkiny. So was the music, but, sadly, I don’t know the name of the fellow entertaining us. If I heard it at the festival, I’ve forgotten, and, while the online schedule is still accessible, it shows a gap between 2:00 and 4:30. The picture was taken about 3:25.

Numerous artists were offering items for sale at the festival and not everything was made of glass and resembled a pumpkin. There were also some vendors selling food at the festival but none that made me want to take a picture.

But, yeah, glass items dominate the festival. It is, after all, hosted by a glass studio. At first glance, things that resemble pumpkins might also seem to dominate the festival, but I’m not so sure. Outside of the Jack Pine Pumpkin Patch, there sure are lots of non-pumpkin pieces.

Several artists were at work inside the studio making glass pumpkins. They would frequently hold out their work as it progressed and explain what they were doing. These non-stop demonstrations alone were easily worth the drive and the price of admission, and the items produced really are phenomenal even if these pictures aren’t.