Mothman Festival- Point Pleasant, West Virginia

West Virginia is a state that is constantly growing on me.  I find myself looking for excuses to get there!

I found a great excuse this past weekend when we made a day trip to the Mothman Festival in Point Pleasant, West Virginia.

You know I love finding a reason for a road trip, and if that road trip involves a strange legend or some bit of folk lore then I am absolutely in!

If you are not familiar with the Mothman, look him up!  The Mothman is one of my favorite legends, and he is forever linked to the town of Point Pleasant.

I won't speculate on what the Mothman may or may not have been.  You can do that on your own, or you can look up any number of other sites with any number of theories.

Let me suggest that at some point in your life, you do read the book, "The Mothman Prophecies".  John Keel's book that really started awareness of the Mothman is just an interesting and creepy book.  Even if you are a total skeptic, this is a fun book to read for it's creep factor.  Then, after you read the book, visit Point Pleasant!

Back to the actual Mothman Festival.  We drove up early Saturday morning, and got to town right around 10.  It was rainy.  REALLY rainy, which, made for a rough drive from Kentucky, but I felt it sort of enhanced the vibe for a festival of a mysterious creature.

I do think the rain kept attendance down for some time, and I think a few vendors may have no-showed because of the weather.  Still, there were plenty of people around, and there were many things to do!

We visited the Mothman Museum!  The museum has many props from the 2002 movie based on Keel's book, and they also have other props from TV shows about the critter.  Oh, and there are plenty of items relating to the original sightings, and to the collapse of the Silver Bridge.

This year we were able to take one of the bus tours offered by the Mothman Museum.  The ride is around an hour and 15 minutes.  We were driven by the road where the first sighting occurred, the office where one of the first witnesses worked, and we also went inside of an igloo in the famous TNT area.

The "Men in Black" did hassle us before we went on our trip, questioning us about where we were going.  They advised us not to go to the TNT area as, "scary things are out there, like bunny rabbits with pink makeup."  It was very entertaining.

Our tour guide on the bus knew all about the Mothman, and she had theories of her own- some that were a bit dark! 

Back at the festival we were able to chat with some really interesting people!  Jeff Wamsley runs the festival and the museum, and this has become a real labor of love for him.  He has a personal connection to the legend and the area (he remembers the day the bridge collapsed).  Plus, with admission to the festival being free, and the museum charging an embarrassingly reasonable $3, Jeff isn't doing this to get rich.

We were also able to talk to the very cool Lyle Blackburn who has written a book on the "Beast of Boggy Creek".  More on him later.  We recently passed by Boggy Creek as we drove through Arkansas and I am sure I will have a post or two up about that soon.  It was a lot of fun talking with him about Boggy Creek.

I was super excited about meeting Rosemary Ellen Guiley, who has written about 50 (FIFTY!) books an all sorts of unusual things.  I just read a book of hers on West Virginia, and one on Salem Massachusetts.  We talked about Salem some.  More on her and her books too, I promise to get reviews up before Halloween!

Anyway, I really love all of the interesting guests at this event too!

We did want to get back home before dark, so we had to leave the Festival earlier than I wanted.  This is a festival that justifies hanging around for both days!

http://mothmanfestival.com/