A Case for Staying Home This Fall
Every autumn, a good portion of Huntingdon Valley gets in the car and drives forty-five minutes to a farm in Bucks County to stand in line, pay $19 to look at a pumpkin, and come home with a cider donut and mild resentment. I have been that person. I’ve done the hayride.
But we have a Gothic cathedral, a castle, a 900-acre nature preserve, and a beer garden, all within about ten minutes of one another, in our own zip code. Here’s the argument for staying put.
Glencairn Museum has an unusually strong season
If you’ve lived here any length of time, you’ve driven past Glencairn, the castle-looking one, because it is in fact a castle, and thought you should visit sometime. This fall is a good sometime.
Third Thursdays: September 17 and October 15, 4–7pm. After-hours access to the galleries with staff on hand, plus the Tower, which is the real draw this time of year: autumn views over the valley from a castle tower. $15 adults, $12 seniors and students, free for members and children 4 and under.
From Tower to Garden: Glencairn’s Symbolism Inside and Out: Saturdays and Sundays, September 19 through November 8, 3:15pm, roughly 75 minutes. A guided look at the symbolism throughout the estate and gardens. $15 adults, $12 seniors and students. The late start puts you outside in the best light, which someone clearly thought about.
Elizabeth Pitcairn and Friends: Sunday, October 18, 3pm. Pitcairn performs on the Red Mendelssohn Stradivarius, the violin that inspired The Red Violin, in the Great Hall, with pianist Derek Wieland and cellist Kenneth Kuo. $40 general admission, $20 Basic members. Expected to sell out; buy in advance.
Myth & Magic at the Museum: Saturday, October 31, 2:30–5pm. Free, family-friendly, Harry Potter–inspired, with a scavenger hunt and prizes. Costumes welcome, no registration. A free Halloween party in an actual castle is difficult to improve on.
Introduction to Stained-Glass Painting: Saturdays, October 3, 10, 17 and 24, 1–4pm at Bryn Athyn College’s Doering Center. Four sessions in traditional technique, and you leave with your own painted panel. $325 including materials.
Pennypack Preserve, which we all underuse
Pennypack Ecological Restoration Trust, 2955 Edge Hill Road. Miles of trails through restored meadow and woodland, and genuine fall color with no highway involved.
Guided programs run all season, walks, natural history talks, the fall native plant sale, at about $5 for members and $10 for nonmembers, advance registration required. They’ve moved to a new registration system, so an old bookmark may not work. Call 215-657-0830 for current visitor hours.
The Bryn Athyn Historic District
We are remarkably casual about the fact that there is a hand-built Gothic cathedral here. Bryn Athyn Cathedral was constructed using medieval methods, craftsmen and workshops on site, the design evolving as it was built rather than following finished blueprints. That is not how buildings get made anymore. The grounds are lovely in fall and free to walk.
And the beer garden
Iron Hill’s beer garden at 785 Huntingdon Pike is open again, and beer gardens are at their best in October. Hoppy Hour runs weekdays 4–6pm and weekends 2–4pm. A 3pm concert at Glencairn, 5pm at the beer garden, home by seven, that’s a complete fall Sunday with no highway in it.
What this has to do with houses
Buyers ask me about schools, taxes and commute times, and those have real answers. But the question underneath is what it’s actually like to live here, and no spreadsheet answers that.
This is the answer. In October you can walk 900 acres of preserve, take your kids to a free Halloween party in a castle, hear a Stradivarius on a Sunday afternoon, and finish in a beer garden, inside a five-mile radius, none of it requiring three weeks’ notice. That isn’t a marketing line; it’s just the fall calendar. Most towns don’t have this, and I think we’ve stopped noticing.
If you’re weighing a move, into the neighborhood, out of it, or up the street into something with a better yard, I’m glad to talk it through with no pressure attached.
Jennifer Agadzhanov PHL Property Collective · Fusion PHL Realty Licensed REALTOR® · Commonwealth of Pennsylvania
