The Wild Turkey Festival offers nightly entertainment, carnival rides and games, vendors and various food booths.
2023 Date: May 4-7, 2023
Location: Downtown McArthur
Website: https://www.facebook.com/wildturkeyfestival/
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This post documents my experience on May 7, 2011.
Only a few days before going to the Vinton County Wild Turkey Festival, I was blessed with a wonderful vision…
…of three wild turkeys on the side of the road (there’s only one in the pic)!
I originally interpreted this vision to mean that my festival expectations would be fulfilled three times over with an experience of smoked turkey legs, awesome turkey hats for the kids, turkey call contests and maybe even some turkey wildlife presentations.
Instead, the Wild Turkey Festival was your basic small-town festival…
…with rides…
…a dunk tank…
…and an entertainment stage for some cool karaoke.
There were some turkey things…
…found in food truck decor…
…a few vendor products…
…and the one steak vendor that happened to sell turkey legs…
…but it seemed to get mixed with non-related things, like henna and Mexican wrestling masks.
Interestingly enough, I think I grasped a better sense of the festival…
…through the presence of hunters and gun raffles.
I say this because these two things communicated that the festival acted more as a starting point.
You weren’t here to enjoy the rewards of the wild turkey (ie wild turkey grub) after the hunt.
No, you were here to work yourself up and prepare (ie gun raffles) before venturing off on that great wild turkey hunt in the wilderness.
And once I came to this realization, I felt an inner peace fill me…just as the hunger inside me started growling.
Being that most of the food here was fairly festival-standard (with only turkey legs at the steak booth)…
…I couldn’t help but stop at this food booth after reading the menu.
It was here that my long travels were rewarded…
…through the introduction of cornbread salad, consisting of a corn bread base topped with cheese, chives, tomatoes, corn, bacon bits and a sour creamish dressing.
Perhaps this was the vision all along.