By SHERRI SMITH BROWN

You’ll find pumpkins of all sizes at pumpkin patches and corn mazes during the fall months. Most are operated by local farm families, who want to share the farm experience as well as a little farm fun with others.

When the leaves take on autumn hues, the air is a little crisper and pumpkins litter farm fields like orange confetti, it’s definitely time for a trip to a pumpkin patch. Pumpkin patches have seriously come into their own since my older children were young. In fact, I’m not sure where you went to visit one back then, but there sure weren’t any advertised in my vicinity. Not so now. Pumpkin patches and corn mazes are all the rage in the fall.

To run a farm these days, it takes a lot of hard work (sweat), patience, love and faith in the weather. You’ll find that a number of farm families want to share their farm experiences and their knowledge about animals and plants and let visitors, especially youngsters, have a good time doing it. Each September and October when the pumpkins are ripe on the vines, many farms open their gates, so to speak, to schoolchildren during the week and the public on the weekends. I’ve taken Brianna to Uncle Bob’s Pumpkin Patch in Coweta County a couple of times and to Ison’s Farm in Fayette County with a preschool group, but there are numerous ones around the state. (more…)

By SHERRI SMITH BROWN

Georgia > Southwest Georgia > Lowndes County > Valdosta

Wild Adventures Water and Theme Park mixes animals, amusement rides and water park rides like the Wahee Cyclone, a four-person tube ride that swirls down a dark, 45-foot funnel.

Thrill rides, water rides — and animals!

A combination amusement park and water park sounds like a lot of fun, but Wild Adventures Water and Theme Park in Valdosta captures both of those and throws in an extra – wild animals – to give you a three-way adventure that is hard to beat.

Wild Adventures is divided into seven sections, each with its own collection of rides and animals.

When it comes to amusement park rides, Wild Adventures offers plenty of family rides – everything from the Century Wheel ferris wheel to the Dizzy Dragons. There are numerous Thrill Rides, including the 50-mph vertical loops of the Boomerang with its six inversions and two hills; The Bug Out – a wild mouse ride with single cars, hair-pin turns, and sudden drops; and the Cheetah, a 90-foot tall, 3,000-foot long wooden roller coaster. And, of course, the gentler Kids Rides, such the Rio Grande Train and Saddle Up Pony Rides, are also plentiful. (more…)