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Get Sticky & Sweet at the Maple Sugar Festival at Fort Hunter 3/1/26

Enjoy a FREE, fun-filled day of maple syrup tastings, tree tapping, crafts, & family fun on March 1!

By Rachael Benion - Publisher, Macaroni KID Harrisburg • Carlisle • Hershey February 5, 2026

FORT HUNTER MANSION AND PARK

Why the Maple Sugar Festival is the Sweetest Event of the Year

Let’s be honest. Kids love anything sticky. Syrup, glue, mystery substances on your couch. But what if, for once, the stickiness came with fresh air, family fun, and a built-in science lesson? That’s the Maple Sugar Festival. It is one of those rare “everyone wins” outings where kids learn something accidentally and parents don’t have to plan an entire production to make it happen.

Free admission
Hands-on learning
Taste tests
Crafts

What’s in Store for Your Little Syrup Enthusiasts?

Tree Tapping 101

Practice tapping trees and learn how sap becomes syrup. Your kid will have a genuine “wait, syrup comes from trees?” moment, and you’ll quietly enjoy watching their brain reboot.

Maple Candy Tasting

Learn how maple syrup turns into candy and taste the final product. Science is better when it tastes like dessert.

Taste Test Maple Syrups

Sample different varieties and discover that you, too, can become a syrup connoisseur with strong feelings.

Sweet-Themed Crafts & Activities

Crafts, activities, and hands busy in the best possible way. Also known as “parents quietly exhale.”

Stock Up on Pennsylvania Maple Products

Delicious PA maple products will be available for sale, so you can take the sweetness home and pretend you tapped the trees yourself.

A child practices tapping a maple tree during a hands-on maple sugaring activity.

Hands-on maple tapping. The kind of learning that sticks, sometimes literally.

Pennsylvania maple products displayed for sale, including bottles of maple syrup and maple treats.

TAKE SOME HOME

Maple products you will “just browse” and absolutely buy

Local maple goodies make great gifts, great treats, and great “we did something wholesome this weekend” evidence.

Why parents love it: It’s educational, outdoors, and delightfully low-effort. Kids run off energy. Parents get fresh air. Everyone leaves slightly happier and faintly sticky.

Event Details at a Glance

Date
Sunday, March 1, 2026
Time
12:00 PM to 4:00 PM
Location
Fort Hunter Mansion and Park, Harrisburg, PA
Admission
Free
More info
Contact Katie Sciamanna at ksciamanna@dauphincounty.gov or call 717-599-5751.

Final Thoughts

If you have ever watched a kid pour syrup like they are practicing for a future career in extreme sports, this event is for you. Come for the tasting. Stay for the hands-on fun. Leave with a family memory that smells faintly like pancakes.

Are you a “light drizzle” household, or more of a “syrup floodplain?”