If you like animals, music, gardening, competitions, martial arts, colonial history, or any and all things blueberry, you’d be bound to love Historic Bethlehem’s 31st annual Blueberry Festival at Burnside Plantation recently.

The jammed parking lot attested to the fact that the festival has many, many fans of all ages. For the young, pony rides were available and in a barn kids could read to therapy dogs.

Anyone interested in local colonial American history would have learned a great deal from Ted Moyer, a guide for Historic Bethlehem sites. Among other things he explained the high horse power wheel on display in a barn that was used by farmers before electricity became available.

Attendees could also watch young people demonstrating the karate and kung fu moves they had learned at the Lehigh Valley Martial Arts tent.

Another very popular attraction was the performance by El Sistema Lehigh Valley Orchestra. The young musicians in the orchestra get both music lessons and instruments free of charge through the collaboration of the Allentown Symphony Association with the Allentown School District. The players, who range in age from grade two through high school, were divided into two groups, with the younger members performing first.

Finally, of course, the Blueberry Festival would not have been complete without a blueberry pie-eating contest. The competition drew school-age and adult contestants and a crowd of observers.