Schmeeckle Reserve Hosts Fall Candlelight Hike Festival

Schmeeckle Reserve hosted their annual Fall Candlelight Hike Festival on October 27 for the Stevens Point community. 

Around 4,000 people attended last year’s Fall Candlelight Hike, organized and funded by Friends of Schmeeckle, a non-profit organization that helps support the Schmeeckle Reserve.

The hike featured several loops of trails, lit up with hundreds of torches and jack-o’-lanterns. The festival involved several educational activity stations inspired by this year’s theme: “Totally Terrific Turtles!” Turtle origami, educational turtle-themed stations, and live turtles and raptors were present at the event. The turtles were provided by UWSP’s Herpetology club.

There were two performances presented by the environmental education and interpretation student majors at UWSP. The students wrote their own skits and performed them as well, dressed as characters to teach the community more about turtles.

“One of the things that makes this hike a little bit different than other candlelight hikes is because we have this education component. This is the capstone for those students…it makes it special,” said Melissa Ruether, outreach coordinator for the Schmeeckle Reserve.

The Schmeeckle Candlelight Hike was started in the early 2000s by former director Ron Zimmerman and current director Jim Buchholz as a way to raise awareness about the reserve and provide a fun and educational event for the community.

The first hike started with only 200 in attendance, but it has grown significantly over the years. In 2019, shortly before the COVID-19 pandemic, over 6,000 people attended.

There are many volunteer opportunities available each year for students and community members.

Ruether said, “We have volunteers for pumpkin carving in the fall, of course. A lot of them are student groups… But it’s not only students, we’ve had two community groups reach out as well.”

Pumpkins for the event are donated by Cee-Dee Acres Farm.

Volunteers are needed each year to fill and set up torches, greet attendees, decorate, run activity stations, and help with the cleanup afterwards. This year, volunteers additionally covered sections of trail with temporary boardwalks, as they were flooded from recent rainfall.

“There are people willing to volunteer their time. It’s not always pretty tasks, but I sometimes get people from past years emailing me months in advance asking to help out. It’s a really wonderful time,” said Ruether.

The festival provides an opportunity to hike with friends and family, and creates a space to educate the community with Wisconsin and nature-based themes chosen each year.

Ruether said, “It’s kind of magical to see so many people in our community who want to enjoy being outside, usually on chilly dates, just going for a hike, or participating and watching a skit. That, to me, is just amazing. It’s amazing how big this has gotten.”

The Schmeeckle Reserve also hosts an annual Candlelight Hike in the spring. The 2024 spring hike will take place May 3, with many more activities and volunteer opportunities available.

Abigail Cherek

News Reporter

[email protected]