The first thing you, dear reader, should understand is the historic location where this faire has…read morebeen held for the past several years. It is Fort Mifflin, originally constructed in 1771 in a place they then called "MUD ISLAND". Yes, that's right. Mud. Fort Mifflin is still an active base for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and is currently the oldest active U.S. military base and the only base in use that predates the Declaration of Independence.
So, back to the location: MUD. As in very wet ground. This fort sits on part of the remaining wetlands situated along the Delaware river where the Schuykill River empties. It's essentially built on a giant natural sponge. What does that mean? It means wear waterproof shoes whenever you visit this place, Faire or not. It does not matter if it hasn't rained in weeks: You are likely to still have mud.
Today, Fort Mifflin sits very directly next to the Philadelphia International Airport, right along an active runway. What does that mean? Dragons, cleverly disguised as aircraft coming in for landing. Stripey Dragons (American Air), Triangle Dragons (Delta), Brown and Gold Dragons (UPS), even Dragons hailing from Southwest. We saw lots of dragons. :)
It's a place that was built before cars, and so in between the faire vendors and performers who are there all the time, the parking lot is super full. You CAN take a chance and park your car along the side of Hog Island Road, however please understand you are right at a major airport, and you are also close to the airport's fuel storage tanks, so there's a better-than-average chance that your car will be towed while you're frolicking.
The faire organizers rented the closest available lot, which, because of that big airport runway, is about a mile drive away. If you could walk in a direct line between the two, it's like 1/4 of a mile. Great, except it's an ACTIVE RUNWAY and they don't take kindly to pedestrians.
Anyhow, we DID read the instructions for parking before we arrived, paid our $5, and hopped a shuttle. They had 4 large 12-15 passenger vans running constantly and I think the longest we waited in the 3 days we were there was maybe 20 minutes, during which they had a folk singer with his guitar and kazoo.
The faire itself is probably more what you'd call a 'pop up' faire, compared with some very large fairs like Pennsylvania that is 'purpose built' with permanent village structures, this is much more pop up tents and temporary stages. I like both kinds of fairs, however I don't compare them. That would be like comparing the St. Denis Fun Fair with Great Adventure, right?
The shuttle drove us right to the gate, and we had zero problems checking in using our $40 season passes. The first section when we entered had a stage, food trucks and a couple vendors. There were covered and open sky tables for people to sit at while they ate.
The next two spaces were shows and vendors. I visited the hair braiding booth first where the lovely person braided my hair right up and put pretty decorations in too. YAY. Then we saw the falcon show - the falcons were not flying free because of the very close by airport. Airport + bird = bad. The falconer was great, she told us all about the birds, how to become a falconer, etc.
There were like 5 total stages and we saw some great acts, a storyteller, harpist, daredevil fire and magic act, and a singing group were all on hand.
They had taken care to rope up the wettest mushiest areas, and they had laid flat plywood all along the walkways, which definitely helped. The vendors were all very nice, no temu re-sell crap, and they had two different 'find it' games for families to play while they were there. Find the Cheese was really funny too.
I really enjoyed my time at this faire and would go again next year. I will bring a hat and sunscreen next time, I always forget these. If you're looking for big showy stages that look like the globe theater and a village, this isn't your faire. However if you're looking for genuine artisan crafts, great shows and a lovely sense of ...community, then this is your place. By day 3 I was greeted like an old friend, which was super cool.
