by Marilyn De Angelis Pennell

Created on: July 13, 2008   Last Updated: July 18, 2008

American Staycations: Wild and Wacky Festival in Your Own Hometown

High Gasoline Prices Ruining Your Travel Plans? Try a Wild and Wacky Festival Staycation

How would you like to go to a blindfold rowboat race or a local version of the World Pillow Fighting Championship? Maybe a Rattlesnake
Contest, a Rotten Sneaker Competition or a Lobster Festival are up your alley? Perhaps you'd like to attend a Blobfest to celebrate the making of the 1927 B movie "The Blob" or a Wooly Worm Festival where you can race your own caterpillars.

These and hundreds of other wild and wacky small town events are entertaining Americans from Maine to California. No more traveling to far flung destinations to get a taste of the odd, quirky and exciting. No more high priced gasoline for long distance car trips or expensive airline tickets. In fact, most of these exotic adventures won't cost you a dime.

And, the best part is that you can create your own local extravaganzas just by using your imagination. Here are some real events taking place across America that will inspire you to get in touch with your own inner impresario.

*Let's start in Rockland, Maine, a small seafaring town on the rocky coast. Each July thousands of people crowd into the harborfront for the annual Lobster Festival. A gala parade with floats and marching bands winds its way down Maine Street to kick off the festivities. A Grand Marshal crowns the festival Sea Goddess and Princesses while King Neptune and his court preside. There's also plenty of lobster to eat. But if you don't like to crack these crustaceans, you can still enter the Lobster Crate Contest. All that's required is the ability to skip across ten to fifteen lobster crates strung together in the harbor-without falling in. Losers are treated to a dip in the icy ocean.

*Tastebuds not tantalized? Then tune in to your sense of smell. Did you know that your feet each have more than 200,00 sweat glands? These tiny glands can churn out a pint of sweat every day. This obscure fact led to the start of the annual International Rotten Sneaker Contest in 1988. Each March regional winners gather in Montpelier, Vermont for the big enchilada- a shot at a $500.00 savings bond and the honor of having their stinky sneakers enshrined in the "Hall of Fumes." How would you lke to be a judge of this contest?

*Across the country in Fullerton, California, townspeople bring their pillows out to play in the annual World Pillow Fighting Contest. But this contest, now in its 36th year,

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