What sounds better than a wagon ride through beautiful fall foliage, hiking through a heritage apple orchard, sipping hot soup, and learning through gardening workshops on a fall Saturday afternoon in beautiful Northeast Iowa? If this sounds like the ideal day for you and your friends and family, join us on Saturday, October 15th for an afternoon of FREE activities for gardeners, seed savers, and foodies of every age and stage.

The event features a Soup Cook-Off, which will include Decorah area chefs from Rubaiyat Restaurant, Magpie Coffeehouse and Bakery, Norse Culinary Team at Luther College, and defending champion Restauration - Hotel Winneshiek. This year, squash takes center stage and all participants must use the Banquet squash in their creation. The squash variety will make it debut in the 2017 Seed Savers Exchange seed catalog. (The event is free, but the soup tasting is a suggested $5 donation.)

Workshops are schedule at set times throughout the afternoon:

12:00 pm Orchard Hike & Talk

12:00 pm Squash Display & Presentation

12:45 pm Food Preservation Techniques

1:30 pm Garlic Workshop

2:15 pm Seed Saving Workshop

3:00 pm Making Hard Cider

Other activities going on throughout the afternoon include hayrides, cider pressing, a natural dye demonstration, film screenings (part of the Up Up! Film Festival) and kid-friendly activities like face painting and pumpkin carving.