They say the way to a man’s heart is through this stomach, but Kings Landing managed that long ago. While New Brunswick’s historic village may be attracting visitors with their Harvest Dinners, for our friends and family it is already a well-established tradition to spend our Thanksgivings at Kings Landing.
Disclaimer: We did our research here. Decades of it. Kings Landing practically raised me. I don’t know how many hours I spent in their blacksmith shop as a kid. It seemed like we were there most days every summer. My mother probably saw it as cheap daycare. She’d drop me off, sometimes with my sister, and I would stare into that flame as long as it was going. I was completely enthralled with the whole process—the heating of the steel to the right shade of orange, the beating it took to force it into the shape of nails and hooks and brackets and games they sold at the gift shop. It just about pushed me down a completely different career path I was so in love with it.
For those who haven’t experienced it, Kings Landing Historical Settlement is a living history museum in the form of a village. Also, it was never technically a settlement, but let’s not get hung up on details. Created in the 1960s when the Saint John River was flooded for the construction of the Mactaquac Dam, buildings and homes from around the flooded region were carefully relocated onto Kings Landing’s 300-acre site. Everything was recreated just as it was between the 1880s and 1920s, including the blacksmith shop, the sawmill, and the gristmill.
It’s nice to imagine a place nearly frozen in time at its pinnacle of quaintness and happy to carry on with a little bit of Victorian lifestyle maintenance. There’s a wonderful sense that you can set out to accomplish anything with your own two hands…. eventually. The village is an absolute dream for people with a DIY work ethic.
Going back each year is not only like stepping back in time, but also a lot like visiting your grandparents for the holidays: nobody is moving very fast, the food is good, and not a whole lot has changed. While it’s great to take in the history of the place, the advantage of a season-long pass is just to go and relax (or really immerse yourself in the lifestyle and pick up some blacksmithing skills).
Kings Landing is always at its best when its engaging its visitors, and the Harvest Dinners have been a great opportunity for them to pull out all the stops. The village is bustling with people and activities. The fields may have been harvested, but there’s plenty of baking and music and play. While it might be a bit silly to trade in your iPhone for a regular apple, you’d be surprised at how many laughs you can have chasing a bit of fruit around a field.
The meals themselves are fantastic. In an era where it seems impossible to get everyone to sit down to the dinner table at the same time, it’s quite an experience these days to share a meal with friends and family, and a couple hundred people you’re about to make friends with.
Served at the King’s Head Inn on long communal tables, the seasonal meals are taken in family-style. With pheasant and turkey and venison and prime rib, along with potatoes and squash and turnip all being passed around—not to mention Kings Landing’s famous homemade brown bread and pies (served with both dinner and dessert)—nobody was left hungry. Not to start any fights, but I’d be willing to bet that their pumpkin pie is better than your grandmother’s.
The feasts really do showcase what Kings Landing best at: giving you an immersive experience and a little timeout from modern society. It makes you want to engage with a community that makes getting dirt under your fingernails feel natural, and it reminds us of how their way of doing things is both practical and important. The fact that the food is delicious and plentiful is just… gravy.
While Kings Landing has already had their two big Autumn feast days (both the distinctive Harvest Home and Thanksgiving), the village is currently booking for Christmas dinners at the King’s Head, when the inn will be all decked out for the holidays. You can do that by clicking here.
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