The 31st annual Celtic Classic Highland Games and Festival was held in Bethlehem Sept. 28-30. The festival is the largest free Celtic festival in North America, and year’s event benefited from sunny weather with temperatures in the low 70s on both Saturday and Sunday.

With the nice weather came large crowds that most likely allowed the event to reach its historical average of over 280,000 people during the three days.

New for this year was the women’s highland games demonstration. Three of the top women contenders in the country participated in a demonstration that featured the same type of highland games the men traditionally take part in. Event organizers are hopeful that the women’s portion garners enough interest to host a full fledge women’s competition in the coming years.

Other popular traditions included an assortment of food, music, merchandise, pipe bands, highland games, dance, blacksmiths, poetry, oral history, baking contests, fiddle demonstrations and many other activities.