Mexico's 'Day of The Dead,' Asia's Moon Festivals, And Bewitching Fall Activities

A celebration of fall around the world! Lea remembers ceremonies she attended in Asia and Mexico, as well as offering the best places to view autumn leaves, suggestions for Halloween and Thanksgiving, wine and beer celebrations, and some of the most unusual fall festivals, including a laughing-in-unison celebration in Japan.
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Podcast host Lea Lane blogs at forbes.com, has traveled to over 100 countries, written nine books, including Places I Remember, and contributed to guidebooks. She's @lealane on Twitter; Travelea on Insta; on  Facebook, it's Places I Remember by Lea Lane. Website: placesirememberlealane.com.  Please follow, rate and review this weekly travel podcast!

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* Transcript edited for clarity.

Lea Lane  00:04

Hi, I'm Lea Lane, an award-winning travel writer and author of Places I Remember: Tales, Truths, Delights from 100 Countries. On this podcast we share conversations with travelers about fascinating destinations and memorable experiences around the world. In episode eight, I spoke about spring festivals around the world and in episode 19, summer festivals. On this episode we're talking about some of the special pleasures of fall, my favorite time of year. Bittersweet, fruitful, thankful. Around much of the world there are warm days, crisp nights and the colors and smells of autumn. Let's first talk about the changing color of leaves, and not just in the northeastern United States. From September through November, you can follow the leaves. I'd love to take a leaf peeping trip for three months, keeping the beauty going, following the changing leaves from north to south and from higher to lower elevations. And here are a few lesser-known destinations I might choose. Ozark National Forest and Arkansas has more than 1.2 million acres. During October fall foliage is at its peak and there are plenty of mountain springs, rivers and breathtaking parks to photograph the Catskill Mountains a couple hours north of New York City or a less crowded alternative to New England hike or take a scenic drive before checking out local cideries and breweries. Columbia River Gorge between Washington and Oregon has over 50 waterfalls during October and November. Mount Hood is awash in fall colors. The Pocono Mountains in Pennsylvania are backdrops to gently winding roads, perfect for fall foliage gazing, especially route 507. leaves begin to turn in mid-September and peak in October. The southwestern landscape is spectacular and fall along the enchanted circle in New Mexico. This 83 mile drive connects the towns of Taos Eagle's Nest Red River and Questa, and McCullough Falls State Park is home to Georgia's tallest waterfall at 729 feet. You can view it for many trails along the park. And at the bottom of falls. You have a great view of maples and oak trees surrounding Chesapeake Bay in the Delmarva Peninsula, Maryland's eastern shore. Be sure to walk around Elk Neck State Park to see the gorgeous colors and chowing down on some Maryland Blue Crabs while you're at it, you just take a mallet and bag away. In early November fall colors come to Tennessee, drive down the Natchez Trace Parkway to see poplars, maples, oaks and hickory trees. Cape May New Jersey a vintage seaside resort town turns into an autumn Haven mid-October through November. The historic lighthouses give overviews of the changing fall colors as well as the Atlantic Ocean, Delaware Bay and Cape May Point State Park. Aspen Colorado is named for his gorgeous aspen trees that turned yellow gold in the fall. Stop at Maroon Bells to take in the scenery. Along the Wisconsin River is a glacier form gorge known as the Wisconsin Dells. During the fall the Dells are particularly peaceful boat tours, river walks and sightseeing in Devil's Lake State Park are delightful ways to enjoy the colors. Outside the United States Korea, Taiwan, China and Japan are all known for beautiful color especially in the highlands. and in Europe. charming villages in historic cities such as Paris and Prague are gorgeous in the autumn season. You can drive around on your own to view leaves, but always check to be sure that fall festivals will be on. Around the globe, winemakers and wine experts celebrate new vintages and older favorites with festivals tastings, vintage specific food pairings, and educational wine theme seminars. The Lone Star state is known for barbecue, but fine why? Well, Texas is America's fifth largest wine producing state. It even hosts grape fest the Southwest's largest Wine Festival, held annually in September, some 250,000 people sample Texas vintages and the festival includes a grape stomping contest. If beer is your drink of choice, and even if it isn't Oktoberfest in Munich, Germany is the world's largest celebration of beer and fun. The Folk Festival is held annually in Bavaria for 16 to 18 days from mid or late September to the first Sunday in October, and more than 6 million people from around the world attend. The festival originated on October 12, 1810. Celebrating the marriage of the Crown Prince of Bavaria, who later became King Louis the first to Princess to race up on Saxon Hill brewhouse.

Lea Lane  04:44

Let's turn to Halloween. It's not just trick or treating anymore. Salem, Massachusetts the witch city is known for the tragic events that unfolded during the Salem witch trials, when 19 innocent victims lost their lives in 1692. The women were not witches and were accused to pure Original beliefs of the time visit in October if you want a glimpse of the city's darker past, along with present day be witching fun. The month long spree includes seances, ghouls ghost stories, pirates, vampires and the McCobb. And of course witches. I was there one Halloween and witches in black, many with pointed hats kept walking around shopping and looking as casual as soccer moms the Grand Parade in Salem kicks off the festival each year, and many families bring their kids for Halloween night. But Halloween parades around the world now seem to be more for adults than kids. The one in New York's Greenwich Village in Manhattan is the greatest Halloween show in the world with over 50,000 participants every year. Small towns have Halloween fun too. You can get spooked in Bowling Green, Kentucky, the hometown of John Carpenter, the mind behind the cult classic horror film Halloween. The town celebrates the master of horror through an entertaining driving tour of 17 locations, places where carpenter filmed it's a boo bash. Since 1920, the Anoka Minnesota Halloween festival was created to bring local communities together for more treats than tricks. The first celebration included a costume parade and sweets for the local children. years later, in 1937. Over 20,000 people attended the festival, and Anelka became recognized as the Halloween capital of the world. Today, the festival remains a grand small town tradition. Many fall festivals around the world are focused on harvest time. Mascara, translated as many faces is similar to Brazil's Rio Carnival, and is celebrated every October in bulk a lot in the Philippines. The festival started in the 1980s when the provinces main livelihood sugar was priced at an all time low. The Smiley masks were a declaration of the people of buccal odd city that they will survive challenges. And buck a lot is now nicknamed the city of smiles to coat. The Feast of Booths follows shortly after the High Holy Days of the Jewish New Year celebration, and the eight day festival gives thanks to God for the harvest. Special booths are constructed to recall the period of the Exodus recounted in the Hebrew Scriptures when the Israelites lived in huts in the desert. Before entering the promised land. Israel is filled with Sukkot celebrations, and you can find them in Jewish temples around the world. One of the most important traditional mid autumn festivals in Asia, including China, Taiwan and Vietnam, is the celebration of the harvest also known as the moon festival because it coincides with the full moon on the 15th day of the eighth lunar month. It's a time of family gatherings, matchmaking and public celebrations, special pastries called mooncakes are prepared ceremonies give thanks for the harvest and to encourage the harvest giving light to return again in the coming year. Lanterns and lights of all sizes and shapes are carried and displayed. Symbolic beacons that light people's path to prosperity and good fortune, and celebrants pray for babies espouse beauty, longevity or for good future in general. I attended a shimmering light filled ceremony called Loida Thrawn in Thailand, on a November evening when the moon was full, floating banana leaves placed with candles and messages attached make their way down the waterways of the country celebrating a new beginning of sorts after the rainy season. This was probably the most visually beautiful festival I have ever seen. The most famous autumn festival is no doubt Thanksgiving, observed in Canada on the second Monday in October, and in the United States on the fourth Thursday of November. This is a national day of rest and big family meals. Plymouth Plantation is a living history museum in Plymouth, Massachusetts. Founded in 1947, it attempts to replicate the original settlement of the Plymouth Colony established in the 17th century by the English colonists who became known as the pilgrims. Thanksgiving there is where the first feasts with settlers and native peoples took place. It would be meaningful to celebrate there at least once and then there are full celebrations that have nothing to do with the harvest at the autumn Dance Festival at the jambay Lacan temple in the Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan, drums pound dancers swirl in one of the most spectacular of the many monastery and temple festivals held throughout Bhutan. Performers enact everything from body folktales to allegories of Buddhist doctrine. For example, women dressed as princesses cavort with buffoons until their royal fiance's returned from a journey. And what are the princesses noses cut off, then they are forgiven and their noses magically restored, and a huge wooden stick representing male genitalia

Lea Lane  09:40

is shaking over women's heads, boosting female fertility, a different kind of harvest celebration, I guess. Japan has some of the most eccentric fall festivals of all the locals in Hidaka Gowa have held an annual laughing festival in October for 200 years to cheer up a sad deity and to bring them good luck According to a legend, a goddess was laughed at by other gods because she overslept and was late for a meeting. She was so sad that she locked herself in a shrine. The people in the village gathered around the shrine and their laughter turned her grief into joy and she finally agreed to go out. A parade led by a bell juggler marks the beginning of the day long celebration, wearing a clown like costume holding a bell in his right hand and a treasure box in the left, he leads participants to the shrine, all of whom are shouting Waray Waray Laugh, laugh, and when they arrive at the shrine, they all laugh in unison. Japan is an ancient society and they have a fall festival called Shu katsu, meaning preparing for one's death. I call it try before you die. During the Tokyo festival, participants can sample their own funeral and prepare to say their last goodbyes. They can put on funeral garments lay down in the coffin, learn what to do with their belongings and learn how to write goodbye notes and obituaries. This one may be practical, but I think I'd rather go to the laughing festival. The monkey buffet festival honors the longtail than the cat population. lapboard Thailand celebrated the last Sunday of November 1000s of macaques gathered at Temple to feast on tons of fruits, vegetables, desserts and beverages prepared by the locals. This event was described as one of the strangest festivals in the world by London's Guardian newspaper, along with Spain's baby jumping Festival, which we talked about in episode 19. The name of the podcast is places I remember and there's one full festival that is unforgettable to me. In fact, I wrote about it on my forbes.com blog. And like the festival I just mentioned in Japan it involves death, but it also celebrates life and remembrance Dia de los Muertos. The Day of the Dead is a haunting tradition held throughout much of Central and South America. I remember my trip a few years ago to Riviera Maya in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo, in the Yucatan peninsula of Mexico. Those three days and nights from October 31 through November 2 were unforgettable. The Day of the Dead celebration begins with food, including regional cuisines such as tamales and Malay sauce, pumpkin and fruit sweets and the famed pantum were to read of the dead mexican market sell toys and candy transformed into definitely symbols such as skeletons, coffins, and La muerta death herself. And then there's the fun shopkeepers and families paint their faces for several days posing and preening Calaveras cheeky poems criticizing politicians or chiding friends and family are written as if the person had already passed a clever mockery of death reminding us of our own mortality. On October 31, All Hallows Eve children create all just to entice the angel Ito's the spirits of dead children to return and go door to door asking for sugar skulls. It's like Halloween, but with an emphasis on family and departed loved ones rather than costumes. November 1. All Saints Day poignantly focuses on deceased children who are believed on this day to return to life. Graves are cleaned and decorated with candles paper streamers and seasonal flowers such as miracles. And on November 2, All Souls Day the true Day of the Dead families and loved ones gather at cemeteries to be there when adults spirits return celebrations include music, food and prayers. Home altars are adorned with lighted incense candles, flowers, and candy skulls inscribed with the names of the deceased altars typically include Mexican folk art of colorful cut paper, and personal objects and favorite foods of the departed lighted candles illuminate the way for the dead souls. And then there are the haunting legends. At nightfall, my face painted in stark black and white. I joined a few others in a small boat, we floated on a snowy day, a cave with a symbol of death prowled around in another boat candles lighting the water with the heat of faith and life far more evocative and beautiful than any Halloween haunted house. Katrina is Mexico's favorite most adapted representation of death, the star of many Day of the Dead celebrations. The sound of lapping water in the darkness was truly eerie. As the Katrina in our book told her mournful tale of her lost children. ancient stories are part of the day of the deaths power and our Katrina told us about beautiful ex Dube who frightens men with her revenge and Lola Rona who in grief and anger drowned her son's in a river and has wandered forever to find their bodies. The celebrations ending varies depending on the region and our Mayan ritual of darkness and fire. The shaman surrounded by flames gave thanks for the sacred elements of water, sun, wind, earthen life,

Lea Lane  14:32

villages dance to drum beats, and the community prayed for harmony, promising to continue feeding the fire of life. Despite the looming specter of death, at least once in your life, try to share this experience to bond and have fun and to remember those who have come before I can't think of a more ideal intergenerational trip. I hope that you enjoyed the selection of fall festivals and pleasures and thanksgiving. I'm thankful for you for becoming an ever growing up audience in the six months I've been doing this podcast, tell your friends about us write a review, contact me at the links on my show notes with suggestions or comments. And at my website placesirememberlealane.com. I'll write you back. I'm here for you every week, covering the world with super guests sharing travel information and travel memories. I know that you're out there in over 80 countries as they talk to you today, listening in and I hope being inspired to make travel memories of your own. Enjoy full travel and all travel.

Lea Lane  15:36

Thanks for sharing travel memories with us. My book, Places I Remember, is available on Amazon and at bookstores, in print and Kindle, and I read the audio version. Please subscribe to this podcast and consider giving us a review. Until next time, join us wherever in the world we're going.