When Is The First Day Of Fall 2018? Can’t-Miss Events In Georgia

GEORGIA — With its crisp air, stunning leaf shows at home or nearby and sunny afternoons that fill football stadiums across the country, autumn officially arrives Saturday In Georgia.

The Atlanta BeltLine Lantern Parade is the perfect example of the unique fall fun we have in Georgia. Debuting on the Atlanta art scene in 2010, the event has been growing ever since. It has grown from 1,200 participants and tailgaters along the parade route in 2012 to more than 70,000 people in 2017 for an awe-inspiring spectacle of lights and sounds.

The 2018 Lantern Parade is Saturday, Sept. 22, 7 p.m. line-up, 8 p.m. parade steps off.

It’s free and open to all to participate and walk in the parade – no registration necessary! But you can tell your friends about the Lantern Parade on facebook. They just ask that you bring a lantern or glowing object to carry . It’s all about you and your creativity!

48th Annual Oktoberfest in Helen

The 48th Annual Oktoberfest in Helen includes German music, dancing, food & drinks! Enjoy Waltzes, Polkas and the Chicken Dance! Oktoberfest will run from September 20-23, then reopen again on September 27 and continue daily through October 28, 2018.

The Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau recommends these unique Georgia events:

Little 5 Points Halloween Parade

The Little 5 Points Halloween Festival & Parade is one of the biggest Halloween events in the entire country. More than 35,000 people pack the city’s music, entertainment and art district for a parade as eclectic, captivating and chilling as any you’ll ever see.

Netherworld

Netherworld combines over-the-top special effects, intense makeup, unique monsters and incredible stunt actors for one of the most immersive haunted house experiences anywhere in the country. The innovative experience continues to grow and evolve on yearly basis.

Oakland Cemetery

The gates stay open after dark around Halloween at Oakland Cemetery. Hear from one of the legendary graveyard’s eternal residents as you gaze upon gorgeous candlelit mausoleums during the hour-long tour of Atlanta’s most illustrious final resting place.

Stone Mountain Park’s annual Pumpkin Festival

Take in all of the splendor that autumn provides while you enjoy park attractions, fun-filled games, live shows, and more! New for 2018, a family-friendly nighttime fall event with thousands of carved jack-o-lanterns lighting up each night! During the daytime check out the Carnival in expo with prizes to delight your little ones. Let the autumn breeze blow across you as you listen to classic and contemporary tales from the one and only Mother Goose. Join Spookley the Square Pumpkin and lift his friends into the air for a Dance-A-Long Party Parade that dances through Crossroads, and then meet him at Spookley’s Pumpkin Patch Meet & Greet. Beat the clock with a tasty treat at the Pie Eating Contest and much more! Then stick around for the new family-friendly nighttime fall event. The not-so-spooky festivities include thousands of carved jack-o-lanterns, massive pumpkin displays, costumed characters, glow-in-the-dark mini golf, flashlight tours of Dinosaur Explore and a dance party!

We’re also coming up on the end of Daylight Saving Time, which officially ends on Sunday, Nov. 4, but that’s a while off.

The autumnal equinox officially occurs in the Northern Hemisphere at 9:54 p.m. EDT on Saturday, Sept. 22. This year’s Harvest Moon — the first full moon after autumn begins — rises on Monday.

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The fall equinox occurs when the sun crosses the celestial equator. The word equinox comes from the Latin words “aequus,” which means “equal,” and “nox,” which means night. That’s led to the perception that everyone worldwide sees the same amount of daylight and nighttime, but it’s not the absolute truth. To be precise, daylight lasts about 8 minutes longer than nighttime on the day of the equinox.

But all that aside, here’s what the equinox means in practical terms for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere: It marks the beginning of fall, with daylight hours continuing to shorten until the winter solstice in December.

(For more news like this, find your local Patch here. If you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app; download the free Patch Android app here.)

Here are five more things to know about the equinox:

1. The chance of seeing stunning aurora borealis displays increase after the fall equinox. Both the spring and fall equinoxes are good aurora seasons, NASA says, but autumn produces a surplus of geomagnetic storms — almost twice the annual average.

2. No matter where you are in the world, the sun will rise due east and set due west during the fall equinox (the same thing happens during the spring equinox). For the directionally challenged, it’s a good time for a reset. Go outside around sunset or sunrise, find a landmark and mark the sun’s location in relation to it.

3. You can stand an egg on one end during the fall equinox — and any other time during the year. “The Bad Astronomer” Phil Plait compares the egg-standing myth to “an extremely contagious virus.” Plait, an American astronomer, skeptic, writer and popular science blogger, says the reason eggs can be balanced on one end most likely has to do with tiny bumps on the end of the shell that “act like little legs holding the egg up.”

4. When days become shorter, animals in high latitudes experience biological changes. One of the weirdest examples is found in the male Siberian hamster, whose testicles swell almost 17 times their normal size, according to Mother Nature Network.

5. You may be indulging yourself with everything pumpkin spice, but you can blame any resulting weight gain on the changing of the seasons. When the days shorten and cool, were not outside as much in the sunshine — the primary source of Vitamin D for most people — and that reduces fat breakdown and triggers fat storage. So go ahead and get extra whipped cream on that pumpkin spice latte and see if this will fly: The universe made me do it.

Photo and video courtesy YouTube