One thing you should add to your bucket list is visiting Punxsutawney to see the groundhog ceremony once. It is an experience. I visited in 2015 when it was 54 degrees so that was great. I visited Staten Island Chuck the last two years at the Staten Island Zoo.
I returned to Punxsutawney, PA in the Winter of 2024 and it was a much bigger festival than before, More places for breakfast, more places open and much more events over the weekend. I think the town learned a few things over the last eight years.
Downtown Punxsutawney, PA on Groundhog’s Day morning
Downtown Punxsutawney, PA on Groundhog’s Day
Phil statues are all over the downtown
The Governor of Pennsylvania introducing Phil at Groundhog’s Day 2024
I was working on a new project for the Lodi Memorial Library to have a Groundhog’s Day celebration but try to find a groundhog in New Jersey. No zoo or natural group had one so we revamped the event for the first day of Spring and will have a rabbit (See Lodi Larry comes to the Library Day: Day Forty MywalkinManhattan). When the event fell through and all this talk of Groundhog’s Day I decided to go to the source and off I went to celebrate Groundhog’s Day in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania.
Punxsutawney is about five hours from my house so it was not the quickest trip but it is all straight highway down Route 80 until you get to Route 219 and then a turn off onto Route 119 South where you twist and turn until you get to Punxsutawney, a sleepy little former coal mining and coke town.
Visiting a Museum: The Unique, Unusual, Obscure and Historical 