Collegiate Times

This weekend, the Radford Highlanders Festival will bring a little bit of Scotland to the New River Valley.

The Highlanders Festival, now in it's 14th year, is a joint venture between Radford University and the City of Radford. The event is a celebration of the area's roots.

"Some of the first Scots-Irish immigrants settled here in Radford," said Bonnie Roberts Erickson, a key organizer of the event and a member of the Office of University Relations at Radford. "We have a really strong heritage here. The first president of the university was of Scots-Irish decent."

The Highlanders Festival will feature Scots-Irish traditions, such as heavyweight athletic games, bagpipe music and sheepherding competitions.

The original organizers decided that Radford was a perfect fit to host a festival.

"We developed the idea that this would be a great thing to promote," Erickson said. "It would bring people to campus and be both fun and educational."

The first Highlanders Festival hosted about 10 vendors. This year more than 70 will be attendance, Erickson said.

The Celtic Store, a Texas-based purveyor of Celtic goods, traveled the farthest to take part in the festival.

Vendors may keep visitors busy, but the centerpiece of any Highland festival is the athletic games.

The Raisback Memorial Games will feature 18 athletes competing in traditional games of strength and precision. The kilt-wearing competitors will compete on Saturday in events like the hammer throw and the caber toss.

Caber tossing involves tossing a telephone pole-sized log end over end. A perfectly tossed caber lands with the thrown end facing away from the athlete.

If tossing giant logs is not up a visitor's alley, the festival also features falconry demonstrations and plenty of musical acts.

Headlining the festival is the Celtic band Teribus. The group, which plays traditional bagpipe and drum tunes, is a festival favorite according to Becky Haupt, the director of Main Street Radford, which is an organization that promotes business and events in downtown Radford.

The City of Radford enthusiastically partners with the university to sponsor the festival, Haupt said.

"The city has tried to expand the whole event into a weekend-long event," Haupt said. "It is so interwoven with the university and the city and all these events."

Alongside the Highlanders Festival is the Appalachian Folk Arts Festival. The festival celebrates the evolution of local art and culture from early settlers in the Appalachian region.

The Highlanders Festival is an immensely popular event in the New River Valley. Around 10,000 cars were estimated to have traveled to last year's gathering.

"You can imagine what an influx that is to our city," Haupt said. "It is something that is just continuously building, and it is just such a good time."